Pray for Stellan

There is a blog by a stay at home mom that has, in essence, become famous. This lady had just a regular old blog like mine not to long ago, but it became hugely popular, in part because of some very trying circumstances in her life. She and her husband have been married 5 years, they have 4 children, 4 and under:) This summer, as she was just past halfway in her fourth pregnancy, she received devastating news...her unborn son had a serious and fatal heart condition. She was told he would die before he was ever born. Miraculously, her baby...Stellan, survived pregnancy and his birth, and all signs of his heart condition were pretty much gone. God had worked a miracle in this little life, and the life of his mother, father and brothers and sister. Recently, however, Stellan (now 5 or 6 months old) began having heart issues again. Without going into medical terminology that I don't understand, I will simply say that he has been in the hospital for about 4 weeks. He and his mother just flew to Boston a few days ago and tomorrow morning a very dangerous surgery (for a child his age) will take place on his heart. Thousands of people, all over the world, are following this story and I ask you to pray along with those people for the surgery of this sweet little baby boy. It sounds like it will take place at 8:30am EST and last about 3 hours.

Here are a few links...
This is the link is the background of Stellan's story
This is the link to her actual blog, updated often
This is the link to a news piece done on them last week in her home town of Minneapolis, MN

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OK, I just got done typing all of that, and went to her site to link and found out that little Stellan has not been doing well. He may or may not have the surgery in the morning. Either way, if you have a few minutes to look through her blog, it's rather interesting. She is pretty real and easily shares her struggles, failures and successes. It's refreshing. So...please pray for her, her family, and little Stellan.

Pregnancy and Gardens

I had my first midwife appointment on Wednesday. I have nothing exciting to share. You can not pick up the baby's heart beat quite yet on the doppler, so I didn't even get to hear that. My official due date is November 16 (that's my brother-in-law's birthday). I have a feeling it will closer to a Thanksgiving baby though, because I'm always over due. I have felt pretty well this pregnancy. I've had a few yucky feeling days, but I have not been throwing up, so I'm happy. I'm a bit tired and run down, but that is pretty normal. It's actually better if I don't give in and get to lazy. The lazier I get, the worse I feel it seems, so I'm trying to stay really busy. This morning I did not feel well at all. I had a small probably when I was pregnant with Hannah passing out. I passed out a couple of times (once I ripped the towel rail complete off the wall and even took out some drywall...no good. Today I felt pretty weak and dizzy for a few hours. So, I reluctantly made an egg and cheese bagel and drank a Gatorade, and I feel a lot better. I even got a good lunch, grilled chicken, broccoli and un-fries. So, I feel better...I'm hoping it stays this way.

Garden update....I think our garden looks great! We've had a few problems and a few successes so far. Let me share.

Problems...
*We've tried planting corn, I believe 4 times now. Every time within about 5 days, the birds pick the corn seeds. They don't even have time to sprout. I think this is something I need to plant and grow in small containers, maybe indoors until they are established then try to transplant. I'm pretty sure it's to late in the season to do that now though.

*Most of our salad greens are not doing well. Spinach and iceberg lettuce have not grown at all. I think these are fall/winter plants down here.

*I'm pretty sure I shared my pathetic radishes with you all. So, no need to re-visit that.

Successes (so far)
*Several of our veggies have flowered this week this seems to be a good sign to me.

*Our beans and peas look great. We need to find a way to give them more room to climb. Our little fence is not doing the job. Maybe this weekend. Our peas flowered this week.

*Two of the salad greens, Indian Mustard (I think that's a salad green?!?!) and Romain lettuce look great, to me anyway.

*The zucchini are huge. I had no idea how these, and cucumbers would grow. I definitely didn't plant them "right". But we'll know better for next year. These plants needs lots and lots of room. We transplanted a few that I don't know yet if they'll survive. Zucchini flowered big yellow flowers this week.

*Cucumbers also look great, and they have flowered too. I think they need more room than we gave them, but again, we know now for next year.

*I think our carrots are looking alright, but that will be hard to judge until it's time to harvest.

*And our onions seem to be doing fine too.


We really wanted to have sweet potato plants, but I couldn't get any sweet potato roots to sprout buds, so we just planted two whole potatoes. Probably NOT the way we were suppose to do it, but I couldn't figure it out. What do you think? Do you think we'll get anything? The two potatoes we planted each had 4 or 5 nice long roots coming off so I guess I just thought maybe they'd grow into plants. I'll have to work on that better for next year I think. We'll see though.


It's been fun to watch these plants grow. I hope we actually get to harvest some. Nicole and Hannah both like to play/work in the garden. Hannah was in there with us the other day. We were pulling weeds, so she started imitating us and grabbed anything green she could find and rip it up. Unfortunately, it was usually a real veggie, not a weed! hehe.

More Easter pics

I got my camera back...yay! So, I have a few more pictures from Easter Sunday to share.

Our very lovely family

Sorry grandmas that the girls weren't coorporating very well. haha.

Granny and the girls

Yes, these are our children, we are not ashamed! hehehe. Nicole has replaced the orange goggles with these new pink ones (thanks grammy!)

Love my girls

I just want to say that I have the sweetest most wonderful little girls. I adore them. I love when Hannah wants to snuggle in my arms. I love when Nicole says, "Mommy, I want you". I love to watch them learn and grow. I love to hear them sing songs, especially Amazing Grace. I love to see them love on their daddy. They are amazing, and I'm so thankful God allowed me to be their mommy.

Easter Sunday

We had Easter dinner this year at Greg & Valerie's house. My mom and dad came over, along with Justin and Erica, and Erica's parents. Also, Grann (Greg's mom) came down with Aunt Lisa and Uncle Gary. It was a full house indeed. We had a yummy dinner and a nice time. Unfortunately, I don't have the pictures to go with it because my camera is still at their house.

However, I do have pictures my dad sent of Nicole's Easter egg hunt in their yard Sunday night. They must have hidden 50 or 75 eggs. Every time Nicole saw an egg she would say, "*gasp (how do you write a gasp sound?* There's another one!". She had fun and we only ran into ants once. She's got a few bites on her toes and knees. Poor thing. Ah, the joys of living in Florida. I remember one Easter I did an Easter egg hunt at one of the local parks and I found an egg under a bush. I reached down, and my hand was covered in fire ants.

The girls both got beautiful baskets from the grandparents, filled with outfits, bathing suites and even some "bling bling" for Nicole (translate, big fancy play jewelry). Jeremy and I have figured out that we don't have to do things like Easter baskets since we know the grandmas will...is that bad? haha.

Super Family Fun Day

Jeremy had yesterday, Good Friday off. It was greatly needed an appreciated. He has been working very very hard lately, leaving work early before the girls get up and coming home just in time for a late dinner and to put them to bed. It's hardest on Nicole because she really misses him. We had been looking forward all week to Friday. I asked Nicole what she wanted to do when daddy was home from work all day and she said, "Daddy chase me, and tackle me, and chase me more" hahaha. She just wanted to play!!!!

We started the morning by having family circle time and reading about Jesus' betrayal and journey to the cross. We wanted to be sure that we spent time reflecting on the reason we celebrate the day. Then we headed over to Dunkin Donuts for a yummy late morning breakfast of donuts and breakfast sandwhiches. Nicole LOVED eating her chocolate frosted donut with sprinkles and jelly beans. Then, we took Nicole bowling! She has never been bowling before. We invited our good friends Bryan, Brooke, Peyton and Caulder. We had a total blast. We each played two games, which was just enough for the kids. Unfortunately, our camera battery died, so I only have two pictures:-( So bummed.



We went out to eat with our friends, came home and took naps (and played Wii). After nap time, we decided to have an impromptu camp out in our backyard (which we had been promising Nicole for some time). We needed to do this soon because it's getting hot and the bugs will become overwhelming soon. So, last night was the night. Hannah slept in her crib, and the three of us slept in the tent. (For those of you worried about Hannah, our tent was right outside the back door with the monitor turned to full blast. She slept through the night and there were no problems). So, Nicole, Jeremy and I sat by the fire till near 11:00. Then we slept in the tent. I say slept...but I only got a few hours, and I think Jeremy did too. Every little noise woke me up and we are both incredibly sore from sleeping on the ground. I guess we're getting old. But, Nicole LOVED it! And that's what really counts:-)

Even Hannah got in on the action:-)

So, we had a super family fun day. It was great. Relaxing, no major issues to deal with, and fun for everything. We really enjoyed daddy being home.

Amazing Jumping Rope video

I'm going to post an update on our super fun family day yesterday soon. But, until then, click on this video. It is AMAZING!!!! I've never seen anything like this before. This is a huge team of girls jump roping, but I PROMISE it's no ordinary jump roping. The video is a bit long (7 minutes) but you will be so amazed, you'll want to watch it all. Very very cool. I couldn't jump for 7 minutes, let along do all these crazy tricks. It blew me away. Give it a moment of your time to check out. It's very cool.

(Thanks dad for the link)

http://soonereyo.blip.tv/#1826380

Duck Duck Goose.

Last night grammy and gramps came over for the evening. Just before bed time we taught Nicole how to play duck, duck, goose. It was quite entertaining. We finally realized it would be good to have on video. So, we set up the camera and just let it roll. This video is a few minutes long, but it's worth watching (especially if your family). Even Hannah gets in on the action at the very end. Enjoy.

Hannah's baby dedication

Saturday, April 4th, we dedicated Hannah to the Lord, formally, at church. Obviously we had already dedicated Hannah to the Lord, long before she was even born. Here are a few pictures.

April Fool's

Yesterday Jeremy and, well....the other shall remain anonymous (unfortunately it wasn't me, I would have liked to be in on it, but I couldn't), forked his mom and dad's house. What does this mean you ask? 826 plastic forks, knives and spoons stuck up through the grass.

Found out last night that their neighbors were heckling them a bit. Greg paid a couple of neighbor kids to pick up all the plastic wear. Hahaha....

Anyone else do something fun on April Fool's?