Highlights

Bronwyn's first adult tooth showed up

behind a bottom baby tooth this week.

She's been wiggling it from sun up to sun down

and is SO IMPATIENT to lose that darn tooth!

Lochlan blew kisses for the first time ever.

3 times.

TO MY MOM!

I'm insulted. LOL

Of course, my pride felt a little better

when he planted a real kiss on my cheek earlier today.

And then did it once more just for fun.

Puckered up lips and everything.

That boy just knows how to win the girls over.

Also, today was Lochlan's first day in nursery.

He didn't cry when I left him.

He just seemed so surprised to find a room

full of toys at church that he'd

never known about before. Ha ha ha!!!

When I went to go and check on him after an hour,

he was laying face down on the carpet,

with his knees tucked under him,

just sucking on his binky and observing everyone around him.

I couldn't help but laugh! One of the nursery workers came out

and asked me if it was his nap time.

I laughed and said I guess so.

When I picked him up, he was happily playing

with a walking ball popper toy

that he let me put away when I told him it was time to "go go go!".

Poor Aftyn has the flu.

She came home after school on Friday and had a fever.

And she's been having a horrid time of it since.

No school tomorrow for her!

I subbed as the primary chorister today.

I spent at least 5 minutes giggling

at Mirren who kept raising her hand and saying

"Me!" whenever she felt

there might be an opportunity for her

to get to do something important.

She said her very own prayer tonight over her food.

Even though the prayer had already been said.

She wanted to say her own, without help.

 Except I got to prompt her how to end.

It was very sweet.

She is so earnest and sincere and independent.

 I love that little girl.

I love my kids.

They equally drive me crazy.

Buoyed Up

I think I need to put some words to paper, or whatever, and get this said.

The past 3.5 weeks have been sad, confusing, 

happy, comforting and lots of other things.

I've learned things, eternal things, that I know 

I was meant to learn through this experience.

I know there are many more for me to learn.

But I need to express my gratitude for the love and support I have received.

I look back on the past weeks and in reflection see more love than sadness,

 more comforting words and support than despair.  

My heart is beginning to rebuild itself and 

feels almost ready to go out and face the world again after my quiet retreat. 

Another thing I need to share is that 

my blanket that I worked so hard over has turned out

to be such a blessing.

 I tried to take a picture. I tried!

 My favorite part is the heart square in the lower right hand.

It says "In Loving Memory" and we'll fill it in eventually.

 It is the memory, the GOOD memory, that I wanted it to be.

I am grateful and blessed.

I am learning to be happy about this moment in our life, 

and I'm sure I will keep learning

as I continue to find both the good and the bad of our miscarriage.

Reed Has Some Competition

Aftyn wrote me the sweetest Valentines Day message today.

Here's what it says:

                        "You are as sweet as Roses,
                          you can danse like the wind,
                         and I'll love you forever."
                              
                                          (Written, punctuated and spelled how she did it)

Pictures Lately

       Fruit bouquet 

 didn't last long and YUM!

                          Picture I took of my calendar. 

Baby #5 would have fit perfectly in the middle.

                                                          Bronwyn wanted a picture

             Mirren got the cutest smile on her face standing here all posed, 

and then I noticed, she had on her Sunday shoes 

aka her dancing shoes for this moment in time. :) 

 Dancing

 More dancing

 Most dancing

 Time to stop and smell the roses

 Judge me if you will, but when you stumble upon this cute bow that you made 

and Lochlan and his beautiful head of hair is right there, 

tempting you to see just how beautiful it would look on him if he was a girl, 

wouldn't YOU put it on him too? 

And look, it WOULD look so dang cute. 

But he's a boy. 

So I took it off. 

Ha ha.

 The many

 varied

 funny faces

of Lochlan

Mirren Funnies

"I have a tummy ache Mommy."

"You do?  Where?"

"In my mouth" 

as she opens wide and puts her hand in 

to point to where her molars are.

Searching

(Here is your warning: I may be writing about loss, sadness, grief, for a little while.
I'll consider it normal for me.  Please feel free to skip it
and maybe come back in a few weeks when I can start to step away from it.)

It has been an interesting week.

I've been gathering my littles close to me, 

wanting to create a nest of comfort and love and family togetherness 

as we've all dealt with the loss of our baby in varying degrees.

Each day has felt like a Monday. 

The day after I had my miscarriage ironically. 

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday felt like they never existed 

because my world couldn't move forward 

from the day after it felt like it crashed down.

I feel like I've been searching this week.

Searching for an answer, 

searching for my baby, 

searching for the solution 

that pieces me back together and helps me to feel whole again.

I clung to and worked myself sore and tired this week. 

Over a quilt that while in the woes of morning sickness 

and the lack of energy that accompanies it, 

I lamented that I had wanted to finish in time for Christmas. 

With a sure feeling in my heart that finishing this quilt 

would bring me closeness to my pregnancy and the baby I had carried, 

I finished it finally after hours and hours and hours of work.

 And do you know what I felt?!?  

Elation, happiness, wholeness?  

No. 

Emptiness.  

And I remembered, from my long ago days 

of newly grieving for my son who I placed for adoption, 

that nothing fills the hole that the unrequited love of a child leaves in your heart. 

It is only as you piece together your  life again, 

day by day, choice by choice, moment by moment, 

greeting every day with faith in your heart and courage in your step, 

to face each day with that familiar ache in your heart,

that life begins to move forward again. 

What I wouldn't pay for someone to go through that process for me

but I know that it is only through the hard moments 

in my future and in my present 

that Heavenly Father is refining me. 

That through this pain as I reach to Him in faith

that I will survive, recognizing that there is purpose to it. 

That when I look back many years from now

I will see the blessings waiting behind this trial 

and I will see the growth in myself 

as I've come through it.

And someday when I reunite with my baby,

 my aching arms will know that it was worth it.

Gone

Good news! My shingles are almost gone!

Bad news!  The reason I was getting so sick, probably, is also gone.

This past weekend, I miscarried my itty bitty baby. 

I was 13 weeks 5 days pregnant.

My water broke on Friday night. 

I rushed to the E.R.

No heartbeat. 

My heart stopped beating.

My head stopped working.

My body stopped feeling. 

My world is upside down.

Today my body started feeling again.

I started feeling that the whole thing just wasn't fair.

Other pregnant people only a few weeks ahead of me are finding out their baby's genders.

And I'm trying to make sense of such a big hurt in my life.

 I hate grieving.  I hate grief.

It takes patience. 

I will get through this. 

Just give me time.