Community

Yesterday, I had my eGroup with other moms who have special needs children. We have moms representing autism, brain injuries, cystic fibrosis, cerebral palsy, paralysis, rare neurological genetic conditions. So as you can tell we have a lot to talk about. But we didn't have this group until a few months ago and I can't imagine a month where I wouldn't meet with the ladies now. It is such a fun group and we encourage each other. When I thought about what we deal with in my family, I knew that we should have an eGroup with other moms like deal with these issues too. It helped that one of the ladies in our group basically told me I had to start it :)

Our first book was Desperate: Hope for the Mom who Needs to Breathe. It is such a great book and talks about the need for our generation of women to have community. Way back in the day, people didn't really leave their hometown. So you lived where your mom, grandma, sisters, cousins all lived. You had instant community. But what do you do now when you live 5 hours away from them all? You have to make a new community.

I am now listening to a sermon series from Craig Groeschel called Friending. He says that we should have around 5 friends that would pick up your phone call at 2am and help you no matter what, but most Americans only have 2. How many do you have? What do you need to do to open yourself up to friendship? It takes work to keep your friendship up but it is so worth it to have people you can do life with. More importantly the way you invest in your friends is the type of friend you will get back. If you need a friend who says they will pray with you then you need to be a friend that prays for them.

The one word I keep getting when I think about making my community is "intentional." What are you doing right now that is developing your friendship with someone? What are some steps that you can take that may be out of your comfort zone that will have a lasting impact on you and your family? I want my children to grow up and remember our home as open, inviting, lively. But that takes work...seriously you have to clean and cook and not burn your food. Are you up to the challenge? It is worth it!

Christmas Photo Shoot

This is the last set of pictures that I have been meaning to post. But hopefully I can keep thinking of some stuff to post after this so that I don't have a blog drought for 3 months :)

Pastor Steven Furtick gave our family the gift of a photo shoot for Christmas with the amazing Sean Lyon. We got all decked out in our Christmas clothes and we loved the pictures! The girls look so beautiful in their red dresses. Thank you so much Pastor for the amazing gift! I love the picture of Adleigh pulling off her shoe...definitely a great picture of her crazy personality! And you will see in a lot of these Liana is clapping, that is because the best way to get their attention and to make them smile was to sing "If your happy and you know it, clap your hands." She would always participate!

Liana Walks!!!

Liana has been taking a few steps for about a month now, but Thursday during her physical therapy she decided to really go for it. She walked back and forth across the room almost the entire therapy time. Her highest number of consecutive steps (with no help) was 18! Obviously I ended up getting the camera after she was getting tired so her best ones were at the beginning of therapy, but this video will show you just how amazing she is!

God has been so good to us and He has used our girls countless times to show us how mighty He is and that He answers our prayers, even the audacious ones! Liana has come a long way from the preemie they wanted to take off life support and it is all because of our might God! Enjoy the video.

Family Pictures with The Schultz's

I am back for day 2. What up?!??!

I have two sessions of really amazing pictures that our friends did for us and I knew that some people would really want to see. Today I am going to post some pictures done by Cheyenne Shultz. Here is her website. She and her husband Geoff are absolutely amazing and we loved taking our pictures with her. You should definitely check out her site if you are getting married because you would have the most amazing pictures!

Anyway...here are some of the awesome family pics.

BABY DEDICATION (babies in our case)

I know that Adleigh and Liana are gifts from God to us, but dedicating them last Saturday showed family, friends, and fellow parents that we want to honor God with how we raise our girls. I don't think I realize sometimes how serious our jobs are as parents. We need to be daily teach our children about their Savior. More than anyone on the planet our children will look to us for answers and maybe more importantly will always observe how we practice our faith.

Our Lord is to be lifted high and His glory to be told to all. Our children need to know of how marvelous our creator is and how he loves them in a personal way. Thank you to everyone who has prayed for our girls and can now see them so healthy and perfect. God has done so many miracles in their life!

Here are some pictures of that special day.

The 1 year Birthday!

Well today is actually my birthday so I guess it is fitting that I post the girls' bday pictures today :)

We had a blast. There were so many people celebrating what God had done and is doing in their lives. I must say how amazing it felt to see the girls gobbling up their 1 year birthday cake and to know what all it took to get to this point. We did have an incident where Adleigh's birthday cake got pushed into the floor and yes I picked it up and gave it back to her. Only one side was damaged! So here are the little ladies in all their glory! I have posted just a few and you can check out more on my Flickr page.

Also, a few weeks ago our church showed a video of the story of our girls. It shows how God answered our prayers. You can see it at Pastor Steven Furtick's blog.

Liana is loving some cake.

Adleigh isn't quite sure if she should dig in or not.

Oh the joy of a baby's first taste of something sweet.

My sister with her daughter Pressley!

Liana with the Hubatka girls.

Not for Granted

Our friends Aimee and Adam had to say goodbye for now to precious Kayleigh. Kayleigh has been such an inspiration to so many people. Her life has taught us how to fight through our circumstances and how to embrace every second we have. She is truly a miracle baby. Some of my sweetest NICU memories are of us and the Freemans in our little area holding Liana and Kayleigh. Thank you Adam and Aimee for letting us get to know Kayleigh and for allowing her to have such a tremendous impact on our lives.

I had a few moments last night to look through some blogs of other NICU parents. Some were just starting their fight while others just took their preemie out to the "outside world" after months of staying in protecting their child. Wade and I talked about how around this time last year was when our world started to turn upside down. Pretty much every walk we take on as a family, we end up talking about how we felt during certain moments in the NICU and then we are able to look at our girls smiling or babbling at us.

I never want to take for granted that:

I can hold my daughters without anything being attached to them.

I am able to tuck my daughters in at night and then be the first one they see in the morning.

Liana is surpassing any of the doctors expectations.

Adleigh overcame the worst intestinal issue a preemie can have.

My girls love their feet to be touched. (preemies can have feet issues because of how often they got stuck for blood)

That we are able to ride in the car without the heart monitors.

They love food and don't have any oral aversions.

We have a church that supported us and prayed for us.

My God picked me up and carried me through the most difficult season I have faced.

What do you never want to take for granted?

The girls keep trucking on

The girls are getting closer and closer to progressive care. It is awesome to hear the nurses say, "I will be back on Monday with her...that is if she is even here." How far we have come!

Liana has a cranial ultrasound on Monday. She has these every two weeks to keep check on any swelling in the ventricles and to watch how the bleed is resolving. All the doctors and nurses seem kind of amazed that she hasn't had any swelling in the ventricles. Wait until they see a completely normal brain on one of those scans!

Adleigh is still working on being on full feeds (the max amount of food for her weight). They added fortifier to the breast milk to give her more calories and when they did that she started having more aspirate (stuff left in her stomach). So, now they are going to hold her at a smaller amount and then see if she does better. They think she just needs time for her digestive system to learn how to digest this new part of food. So we probably have a day or two before she is off her IV fluids and on full feeds.

Both girls are supposed to have their second eye exam today. Please continue to pray that there will be no sign of retinopathy of prematurity.

I also had a shower yesterday and it was amazing. I felt so loved and the girls got lots of great things. We got a lot of our big items we needed and tons of cute clothes! Thanks so much everyone who came and for all the wonderful gifts. You all are so generous!


Here is a little family pic with Adleigh!

Have you missed me?

Yes it has been almost 2 weeks since I have posted last. A lot has been going on and I have just been a crazy person. We now know the girls are identical. That means that even though my grandmother is a twin and twins run in our family it has nothing to do with that! Identical twins are just random and there is no medical reason.

I have already been thinking how I will keep them different in my head those first few days. Painting the thumbnails? Writing on them with a sharpie? Any other suggestions?

We finally registered for baby stuff last Friday. I can't believe how much a baby needs (well I don't know if they NEED all that stuff or not, but it makes life easier!). And then to have to put 2 of some items ended up making our registry look massive. Babies R Us does need a better selection of double strollers. We ended up with this sterling (icy) blue color which I really love, but doesn't exactly scream two little girls. We took our friends Larry and Kelly to help us decide what was worth registering for and what ends up being only used once. They were a huge help and we would have been totally lost if they didn't come. Even Riley and Audrey were picking up stuff and helping us out!

Here is one of our ultrasound pics of the girls with their faces beside one another. Isn't the little hand of baby a so delicate and cute.

Our cruise pics

We had an amazing time on our Caribbean cruise. The food was amazing, the places we visited were beautiful and it was so much fun being able to have a week to relax with my sweet husband. We even had our waiters sing Happy Anniversary to us. Here are a few snapshots of our week.

(This was our formal night. You can see the twin bump!)

(Our stop at Grand Cayman. Wade and I didn't mean to match.)

(My friend the crazy bird and my classic picture face.)

(Here is Wade's friend, the donkey who needs protection from the sun.)

(Our table and our waiters. The other couple we ate dinner with peaced out before we were able to get a pic with them.)

Tagged...twice

My friend Rachel Olshine and Kelly Hubatka both tagged me in their blogs. I had been meaning to answer Rachel's (since she was first) but now I can do both of them at once!

Here are the rules for both:

• When tagged place the name of the person that tagged you and URL on your blog.
• Write 7 random facts about yourself.
• Name 7 bloggers that you are tagging.

1. I have a hate/no love relationship with my hair. I feel like I can never do anything with it and it is always so limp. I had one awesome haircut (thanks to Meredith Brock) that helped with this problem but it is back in full force now. But I am going to schedule a haircut soon so I won't complain anymore.

2. I love my house to be uncluttered. I want everything to have its place and if it was up to me we wouldn't have any personal items. But Wade couldn't live like this so I make do. But it is like pulling teeth for me to give my house a deep clean. I really need to vacuum and mop my house right now. You can see Scooter pawprints on the wood floors.

3. I am super awkward when you first meet me. Well you might not think so, but it is true. I have a partial shy side that comes out when I don't know someone, but I still want to make a good impression so I am trying to get out of my shyness but feeling super uncomfortable doing it. However, it usually makes for an interesting night.

4. I am the worst phone caller in the world. My friends from B-town probably feel like I don't care about them, but it is so hard for me to sit down and decide to call someone. I just hate talking on the phone. I try to make an effort but it usually only lasts for a week.

5. I have a slight fear of 18 wheelers. Whenever I am next to them on the road I either speed up to get by them as fast as I can or go really slow to avoid being frightened. I remember writing in 8th grade about our worst fear and instead of being snakes, spiders, or bees mine was 18 wheelers.

6. Some of you may know this, but I get mad at technology a lot. Wade makes fun of me because my profession is based all on technology but I feel like a lot of it has made life so impersonal. But what is stupid is the fact that I pretty much embrace it all. I just think back to simpler times and wonder how things might be different.

7. Last random fact...whenever I brush my teeth I take way longer than any normal person. I feel like I either have to sit down and chill for a few minutes or use the time to do something useful like make the bed, put clothes in the hamper, or clear the counter.

Here are my tagged ones.
Sharlie (my sister)
Meagan
Kelly Mac
Bradelyn
Candice
Felicia
Sarah

...Just testing you

This Wed. I will be 14 weeks pregnant...that's the 2nd trimester people! I went through pretty much the entire first trimester not even feeling nauseous. There was about two days in there that I did in the morning for about 5 minutes, but then was fine for the rest of the day. I haven't had any mood changes except for one random burst of tears when talking to Wade on the phone once, but I think a lot of that was from just missing him for the 3+ weeks he had been gone.

But last week I woke up, ate breakfast, still felt hungry, looked in the pantry, felt weird, ran to the bathroom, then threw up. So weird. One random day out of 13 weeks?!? It wasn't too bad though and so far no repeats so we are good!

I also received my first baby gift (except for two baby books Wade's mom had gotten). Sweet Amy Corbett got me a little onesie that is adorable. It says "Nothing's wrong...just testing you." I got a little emotional over receiving it because it is the first thing I have gotten that I could see our little baby wearing in my head.

Wade's mom and dad came up last week and we stopped into a baby store and Bev went giddy. She decided to get a gender neutral color (yellow) and got a little ensemble for the baby. It is super cute and even has little dogs on it so that Scooter got a little loving too.

And finally Wade, his parents, and I went to a Bobcats game. The Bobcats were victorious against Atlanta. We had a great time and Wade decided he wants to keep up with the Bobcats now. Wade got so excited when he saw Earl Boykins because is 5'5" and plays in the NBA! And he was awesome.

Sweet Lost

So I hope each and every one of you are gearing up for the Lost premiere. It is one of our only fave shows that is coming on since the writer's strike is still going on. It is like a warm, breezy day after a dark winter. I thought that I was going to have to watch the show alone since some of us girls are for some reason going to eat right during the show, but sweet Beth Brown reminded me that she too is a lover of Lost. Thank goodness for DVR!

My dear friend Meagan

Note to readers: Sorry it has been like a week since I last posted. I have been trying to figure out how to get this video I made onto my blog, but it was giganto so I had to keep compressing it without losing too much quality.

My friend Meagan came to visit me last Sunday and spent the night at our house. We grew up together. We went to the same church and school and formed a bond that would last a lifetime. We had so much fun and I was so glad she was able to visit!

(yes, I know we look like supermodels)

As some of you know, Scooter goes absolutely crazy over people. We have to put him outside so that he won't leap all over our guests. But since Meagan is such a good sport we opened the doors and allowed the craziness of Scooter to be unleashed upon her. I actually think this may be one of his calmer moments, but he is still really funny in it. Check out the rare footage of Scooter in action.

Saved by the Bell

This past Friday night our group of friends got together to celebrate Lori's and Buck's birthdays. But instead of the traditional party we went with a Saved by the Bell theme. It was really fun seeing every person commit to the 80s style and channel their inner Bayside High character. Of course Wade went as Zach Morris and then I attempted to go as Lisa Turtle but I didn't really look like her at all so I was just some random 80s girl. Here are some pictures to show you how awesome it was.

(We're so rad!)

(Kelly as Jesse Spano and Larry as "one of the mathletes")

(Rachel wearing her airbrushed tee and Buck is a Mexican version of Rambo dressed as A.C. Slater)

(The whole clan in 80's goodness)

The beast of change

I just had an amazing time with my friend Alyson today. She has been the friend I have had for the longest and we still are close. We go back to about 3rd grade and went on family vacations together and had tons of fun growing up. We would even sit on the phone and watch a tv show on school nights together just so we could occasionally speak up and say, "I can't believe she said that!" I have so many fond memories with her.
She recently got engaged and she will be the first one of my best friends to get married. As she was sitting at my house and we discussed what people were doing now in Belton she received a phone call from her fiance Brent. I could halfway hear the conversation between the two of them and they sounded so cute together and then I got this realization that will sound like I am an idiot to you, but it seemed so divine at the moment. I realized that the man on the end of her phone was the person she was going to spend the rest of her life with. I know that sounds like I am just stating the obvious, but she is my first friend to get married and for the 15+ years I have been her friend she has been a single woman. I don't know if this seemed so crazy for my head to grasp because I don't know Brent that well or because it will seem so different for Alyson to now be Mrs. Nelson. I can't quite grasp it.

I can't begin to imagine what my friends felt like when I got married. Here I was still in college at the ripe age of 20 and my friends were thinking about what class they could make an easy A in and I was planning a wedding. It didn't seem odd to me at all at the time, but when I am on the other end of it with sweet Alyson getting married a normal way it still seems weird. I must have been like an alien or something to my friends.

Anyway, all that being said it reminds me that change is always going to happen. And usually change is going to feel so weird and sometimes uncomfortable that you might just decide to not even consider the change. We are people that love familiarity and want things to follow the routine that we have neatly packaged, but the best things in life are going to be when we embrace the change. Alyson is going to be the happiest she has ever been when she gets married and I will have my best friend to share stories with and to live life with as a fellow married woman. It will be amazing and it all had to happen with change. Some of the best things in my life have happened because I left everything familiar to me and followed a path that I had no idea of the outcome. It was then that I have grown closest to my Lord and that I have been truly excited to see what God had planned for me-I knew it was going to be good because I wasn't in control of it anymore.

Oh the Joy of Marriage

Wade and I have the awesome privilege of doing marriage counseling for two of our friends. We had dinner with them last night to see what they want to get out of this kind of thing. To tell you the truth it seems like Wade and I are newlyweds still so it was kind of funny to be the wise old married couple at this dinner. But we are so excited to pour into this couple's life and share how things worked for us. I know two and a half years isn't long to be married but I feel like Wade and I have learned a lot from each other and we realized that alone we can't do this, but when we center our marriage and our lives on Christ then it makes us willing and joyful to lay down our selfishness for the sake of our husband/wife.

I am guessing that people must see this special glow around Wade that makes them want him to be part of their weddings because this past Saturday two of our other friends got married. And Wade had the honor of being the one that married them. On the day before and the hours leading up to the wedding I don't think I have ever seen Wade that nervous. But you would never have known it once he started. It seemed like he should take a side job of marrying people. I was so proud of him and so happy for our friends to be joining the married crowd!

So if you want a marriage tip of the day from counselors Wade and Ferris then it would be to never joke about divorce. Never use it as a way to scare your spouse. Just don't use it.

The lone married one, until...

I got married two months before I turned 21, to Wade who is 8 years older than me, while I still had one year left of college. Needless to say my friends who I grew up with weren't anywhere close to making that decision and I have been the lone married one out of our high school clan for awhile now. But the other day one of my best friends Alyson called me to let me know she just got engaged! I loved hearing Alyson say that she got engaged and knowing by experience how much she is going to love marriage and that this is going to be such a wonderful time for her. So I had so much excitement inside for Alyson that I had to post a blog about it.


(Watch out Alyson, the roles are about to be reversed! What?!)

Weekend Recap

I have been doing a pretty bad job of blogging regularly. I just always put that as the last thing on my list and then of course I never get to it. So I apologize. I will do better, but I am not making a promise that you can hold me to.

Weekend Recap

1.So my small group girls (and my friend/co-leader Wendy and her daughter Lauren, and our friends Nick and Trevor, but for the sake of simple writing all of these people are included in the term "small group girls") came up and visited Saturday and Sunday. We ate at Firebirds (an awesome steakhouse) and they went to Elevation Sunday morning with me. It was so much fun. I loved being a host to them and loved getting to hear what is going on and just see them. They are all talking about college and what they want to do in their life and it seems so weird to think that when we first started hanging out they were tiny freshman. They want to come up like every month. I would absolutley love it!


(I have some sweet timer skills don't I? Too bad my eyes look like little slivers of black)


(Of course we had to do the traditional funny picture. Scooter looks a little depressed)

2.Elevation took crazy to a whole new level on Sunday when they passed out a total of $40,000 to the people who came. You can visit the Bless Back Project and see what people are doing with the money they received. This is the coolest thing I have ever seen a church do. I mean what church gives away its offering and then doesn't take up another one and asks it people to go crazy and do whatever they can to bless someone other than themselves and family members. I love it! They didn't care if you talked about Elevation or anything they just wanted to send out an attitude of generosity and catch on that we can do the same with our own money.

3.Then finally Wade was supposed to go out of town yesterday and today, but some plans fell through. Since he didn't have to go to Atlanta today I got to go to watch him play for an event last night in Columbia. Wade and the band did an amazing job and I was so happy I got to see it. We also went back to our old house since we know the people we sold it to. It felt so weird being in a house that we spent 2 years at (our first married years) and it is completely different. But even after visiting our old stopping grounds I am incredibly thankful that we live in Charlotte now and I have an awesome home.

3b.Also, Wade's friend Andrew brought him back a sword/big knife from Africa. Watch out if you sneak up on Wade too fast. He may cut you. Jk. Maybe.

What a great Thursday

Today was an awesome day. My fence installers came today and started working even though the delivery truck had a flat tire this morning and were running late. Then at 12 I left my house to go see Meredith Brock, hair stylist extraordinaire, in order to get a new do. I stayed at her house until about 3:45. I must say I am totally digging my hair. It looked so bland and just blah before, but now I feel like some girl punk rocker. It is amazing what a fun haircut can do to a girl. A little color and few strategic snips makes you feel like a new person. Then when I got home the fence posts were up and all that is left is to fill in is the boards. So sometime tomorrow little Scooter will get to play outside and run around off a leash. He is going to love it.

Also, I found out today that some of my small group girls from Columbia are going to be coming up October 13th and they are going to come to church with me that Sunday. I am super pumped. These girls are now seniors and I miss them so much. We were together from their freshman year and I had to leave them right before their last year of school. So that Saturday is going to be wonderful as I get to hang out and hear what is happening in their lives.