Baby (diaper) Shower for Gavin

This Saturday we had a wonderful diaper shower for Baby Gavin, thrown by my mother-in-law. We got lots of diapers, particularly size 1 (I am pretty sure I literally will not need to buy ANY size 1's!), and we literally will not have to buy wipes ever again until our NEXT child. Seriously. I can honestly and confidently say that! Even with my almost two year old, Mason, still being in diapers, we will have enough wipes to last until he is potty trained AND to last until Gavin is potty trained. It was such a good feeling having a hard time finding a place to put it all when we got home!

I ended up organizing the diapers fairly well, but had to put two huge boxes of wipe refills in the attic to use whenever the time comes. (Yes, we still had more boxes of wipes that I did find a place for in their room/closet!) I finally feel like everything is ready for Gavin and not much else needs to be done!

I am 33 weeks and 1 day and at my doctor appointment last Thursday (32 weeks and 4 days), I was still dilated to a 2, but was now 70% effaced (the last appointment I was 50% effaced). I am so thankful that they decided to give me the steroid shots at 30 1/2 weeks. Now at least I can rest easily knowing that if he comes a little bit earlier than Mason did (Mason came at 36 weeks 5 days), that it all should be okay and he should not need to go to the NICU. That is such a relieving feeling!

I go again to the doctor on Friday, December 20th, and I will then be 34 weeks and 5 days. I have a feeling that will be my last doctor appointment or second to last one before delivering. (My next appointment would be the next week, as I would be moving to weekly appointments, and it would be the day or two days after Christmas!)

I am excited for Gavin to be here, but do want him to stay in until at least 35 weeks! We will see what he decides to do though :)

Here are some pictures from our shower!

Cupcakes from a wonderful little bakery... Maxie B's!

My sweet little Mason playing with the stick horse that was one of the decorations :)

My sweet husband and I

Diaper cake! (The shower was cowboy themed)

My sweet girl Savannah was running around downstairs playing with a friend of her's that was there throughout most of the shower, and I just realized there were no pictures of her!! :(

Here is a picture my husband captured two days before the shower of me with both of my sweet babies...

Savannah, Mommy, and Mason!

We all can't wait for Gavin to join the mix and the fun :)

Morning Scripture Reading

Happy is the man that feareth alway: but he that hardeneth his heart shall fall into mischief. (Proverbs 28:14 KJV)

While reading my Bible this morning (I am currently finishing up the book of Proverbs), I came across this verse. It spoke volumes to me. You may read it and think, "oh I don't have a hard heart", thinking it's meaning having a hardened heart towards God. However, in context, it is actually referring to hardening your heart against people or even certain people.

It spoke to me, because I have a tendency to get so annoyed with a particular person or a couple of people over time that I begin to just think badly of everything they do or say. I know this is not right and is letting the devil get in my thoughts and lead me down that negative path. I never would have considered myself as having my heart hardened toward them necessarily though; that is, until I came across this piece of Scripture.

I know that for these select people in my life, I am going to have to daily fight this battle and make a conscious effort to not let my mind think negatively towards them. I need to distance myself from them the majority of the time and when our paths do inevitably meet for select circumstances, I need to be as cordial and loving as ever. Matthew also has a specific piece of Scripture pertaining to this that my Mam-ma used to remind me of.

But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? (Matthew 5:44-46 KJV)

She used to refer to it as, "loving the lovely" and "loving the unlovely". Anyone can love the lovely; that is easy. This doesn't just mean literally, the lovely. It means anyone who is like you or favorable to you or lovely to you. However, it is not so easy to love the unlovely or those who are unlovely to you. I have always struggled with this. 

While I can easily love the outcast at church or in school, back when I was in school, and I can easily befriend the person that seemingly has little to no friends, I have a hard time showing Christ's love to someone who I'm around a lot, just simply because of these traits about them that overwhelm me or annoy me. 

As I mentioned yesterday, I began my drive home with my family yesterday with a mindset to be different and to be like my Mam-ma was and would have wanted me to be, to be like Jesus. I know I am imperfect and flawed, but I also know that with His love and guidance, it is possible. So here we are on December 2nd, 2013, and I am making a commitment to love the unlovely people in my life, no matter how difficult it may be at times.

Heading back to resume "normal" life/December: the start of something new

We left my Papa's house this morning about 3 am to head back to North Carolina. It was very bittersweet for so many reasons... Although it is always nice to get back home and sleep in your own bed along with getting back to your normal routine, Texas is my home and that is where all my family is. I love being anywhere in Texas, but I especially love being there at my Mam-ma and Papa's house. No place feels more like home. Now with Mam-ma being gone also, I really am glad I can be there for Papa and help fill some of the loneliness that he is obviously feeling. Although he is doing very well all things considered, I still (understandably) watched him get pretty emotional several times throughout the week, particularly the last couple days before we left. I just hated leaving him and so wish I did not have to.

Here is a picture of Papa spoon feeding Mason (my sweet almost 2 year old (he'll be 2 in just 13 days)) some coffee... It was just so sweet.

When we left, he asked me when we would be back. I told him sometime after Baby Gavin was born (I'm 32 weeks today), we would be back for everyone to meet him. He said, "well you let me know as soon as you know when y'all are coming and I will have everything ready for y'all!" It just made me so sad and homesick for my home there already, and I hadn't even gotten in the car yet. I just love my Papa.

This trip was very weird without Mam-ma there, but I know she was in Heaven smiling down on us all. Zach and I were talking about just last night while lying in bed about how it's so different with her as opposed to anyone else in either one of our lives who has passed away before, because there really is no doubt in anyone's minds where she is. Every single one of us knows she's in Heaven and therefore it almost feels like she's not even gone, because we know we'll get to see her again. It doesn't make missing her any less prominent though. I miss her everyday.

Savannah (my sweet 4 1/2 year old) got to go to her cousin Ryleigh's birthday party yesterday. I am so glad they planned the party for while we were still in town! It was at Sweet & Sassy and all of the girls truly had a blast! Savannah just was on cloud 9 the entire time! It was so fun to watch her get pampered and dress up like a princess!

Here are some pictures from the party...

I just love my little girl! She is so much fun and is a huge blessing!

I know when we get back home, we will settle back into our routine just fine... My daughter will resume preschool tomorrow morning and my son will resume Mother's Day Out. I will resume housework and my husband will resume work. I have a doctor's appointment on Thursday that I am looking forward to as I am already currently dilated to a 2 and over 50% effaced with my baby being completely dropped. I am so very thankful for the time we had together away from the normal chaos of life though. I will miss the uninterrupted time we all had together while seemingly being in another world for the week.

Here is one last picture of my husband and daughter while we were out to breakfast with my Papa yesterday....

As Christians, we should be thankful every day, not just Thanksgiving or the month of November. That is something Brother Jim loudly pointed out at church Wednesday night. I for one and am going to make a conscious effort to be thankful for all of these blessings in my life and for The Lord who blessed me with them, most importantly. This is the kind of life my Mam-ma led and it's the kind of life we all should be striving to lead as well.

May December mark a new beginning for us all... A time to be renewed and find a newfound purpose!

A typical day/cleaning and laundry schedule

Here is what my typical day looks like and what works very well for me:

My kids sleep in until anywhere from 8:30 am- 9:30 am (occasionally 10 or 10:30 am if they were up later the night before than usual) on any given morning that they do not have preschool. The mornings they have preschool, my husband drops them off at 8:15 am on the way to work and so he gets them up about 7:45 am and gets them ready quickly and feeds them breakfast and out the door they go (their preschool is literally less than five minutes from our house). So for the mornings they are home with me, they wake up between 8:30 am- 9:30 am and I feed them breakfast while I make my bagel and coffee. They do not eat a ton right away in the morning, so usually by the time by bagel and coffee is ready, they are already done. I then send them to their playroom for their morning alone playtime. I have done this with my 4 1/2 year old daughter since she was 18 months and with my 2 year old son since he was 15 months or so. It really is so valuable!

I cannot stress enough to moms who do not currently do this with their children to start doing it! Start out at 15/20 minutes that they HAVE to stay in their playroom or their bedroom and play independently and gradually work your way up to an hour or an hour and a half. If they are not used to it, yes, they will come out! This is normal and to be expected. So long as you stay consistent and keep sending them right back in there (if they continue to come out, then treat it as direct disobedience and punish as you would for any other form of direct disobedience), they will eventually get the point that they have to stay in there and play and they will do so.

So back to our morning routine…

I send them in their playroom to play (they usually play in there for an hour and a half or two hours), and I go sit down in the living room and drink my coffee and eat my bagel. This is my quiet time to do whatever. I often utilize this time to read my Bible or if there is an episode of something that I missed from the night before, I may watch it for free on abc.com, etc. Afterwards (kids are still playing in their playroom), I put my dishes in the dishwasher, make sure my kitchen is clean (clean countertops, sweep/mop floor), and then do any laundry that I need to do. If I am going to wash anyone's sheets that day, I go ahead and put those in, so they will be done in a timely manner (particularly by nap time if they are the kids'). If I have any clothes in the dryer from any laundry I did last night, I put those away at this time. I then go jump in the shower and get ready.

Right about now my 2 year old may be coming to check on me and see what I am doing. I redirect him to go play with his sister for a little longer and then I go see what I am going to make them for lunch. After lunch, I let them play together for a little longer or sit with me and read a few books, etc. and then I have them both go make sure the playroom is clean (I am very big on them picking up their own toys and they both have a toy organizer with the cubbies that they put all their toys away in. This ensures that they put things back where they go and do not just throw them all together somewhere with no rhyme or reason.), and then I send my daughter to her bed to lie down for a nap (occasionally I will let her lie on the couch in the playroom and watch a movie for quiet time if she does not appear tired to me) and I take my son to his room and lay him down in his bed (both of my kids sleep in their own queen sized beds in their own rooms and so they can obviously get in and out of bed and come in and out of their room by their own accord). My daughter knows she can come out of her room to go to the bathroom and that's it and my son knows not to come out and if he does, he gets one warning and after that, it is a spanking.

Now that the kids are both in their beds, I finish up anything else I need to do, whether it be switching laundry or running the vacuum in the living room (the living room is our only room in the house with carpet- the rest is all hardwood floors and so it all just gets swept and mopped). I then sit down and eat my own lunch if I did not already eat it with the kids and do anything small like pay bills, file away statements, etc. Now is the time that it is acceptable if I want to lie down for a little bit while the kids are still down. I usually have thought of what I want to do for dinner by now and if it is something that does not require any a head of time prep (spaghetti, cheesy BBQ pasta, alfredo tilapia, etc.), I do not have to worry about dinner until about 4 pm. If it something that does require a little extra prep then I may go ahead and get that out of the way before I lie down (boiling potatoes for mashed potatoes, boiling raw vegetables that I am going to put in a stew or soup of some sort, etc.)

If I am not just exhausted this day (pre pregnancy particularly I never really nap and the second trimester of pregnancy I am usually not too tired either), then I just take this time to go sit down and read my Bible if I have not yet already, watch anything I may have been wanting to watch, call my grandma or my sister, call and see how my husband's day is going, etc. Once again, after my obligations are met, this is some extra me time.

The kids usually wake up anywhere between 4 pm- 5 pm, depending on how tired they were. My husband gets home a little after 5. We try to eat right about the time he gets home or 15/20 minutes after. I begin cooking typically about 4 pm and if my kids wake up while I am right in the middle of a hands on part of my meal, I either give them a light snack (applesauce, yogurt, cheese stick, etc.) or send them with a drink to the playroom to play until Mommy gets done. I then, if I am at a part in the meal where I am not required to be right there in the kitchen, go check on laundry if necessary, and then go hang out with kids until my husband gets home. Once my husband gets home, we eat, and then have our own laid back evening routine as a family.

Some additional tips for cleaning and it not wearing you out:

Laundry: Do laundry every day! A load of darks one day, lights the next, towels the next, darks the next (there are usually way more darks in a week than there are lights!), your bed sheets the next day, etc. (I wash our sheets every week and the kids' sheets every 2 weeks. I also only wash towels once a week because my kids use their two towels all week, we just hang up after use, and my husband and I each have a towel that we use for 4-5 days each before putting in the laundry. If you think about it, you are all clean when you get out of the shower and use your towel, so as long as you hang it up to dry, there is no reason that you cannot use it for multiple days at a time!)
Another laundry tip… take care of your kids' clothes (and your husband's if he spills things on his clothing too LOL). If you notice something has gotten on a piece of clothing that day, when that person takes it off at the end of the day, immediately take it to the laundry room and go ahead and spray it with something. Even if you are not doing laundry that second, just go ahead and spray it and set it on top of the washer, so you will see it and remember to check on it after it has been sitting. Clothes are too expensive to let them get stained because you forgot to pretreat something. Also, never put something in the dryer if the stain did not come all the way out. Lay it on top of the dryer and treat the stain again and throw it in with another load. Once you dry an item that has a stain, it is so much harder to get the stain out.

Cleaning: Sweep/mop kitchen every day. This does not take much time, but really is so necessary with kids. Sweep/mop other floors once a week or twice if needed. Vacuum once a week or twice if needed. Clean kitchen countertops every night after dinner or every morning after breakfast. Vacuum stairs once a week if you have stairs (stairs really do get SO dirty!). Clean all mirrors and storm doors once a week. Dust biweekly. Clean bathrooms once a week.
This really is so doable if you get yourself on some sort of a system (certain days you do certain things).

Kids: Make children pick up after themselves! This is so important for multiple reasons. For starters, it teaches personal responsibility and also teaches them to be clean and tidy and do their part. Secondly, it takes a load off of you and is one less thing you have to worry about.

Take it from me, you WILL feel better and more relaxed when your house is clean. It takes a load off you as a mother and wife knowing your home is clean and taken care of. Your husband will appreciate coming home to a nice, clean house and I honestly think kids behave better in a clean, organized environment than they tend to do in a messy environment.

It is so easy to get overwhelmed at the thought of all you have to do, but try not to. Keep yourself accountable and tell yourself these things need to get done and they will! You can be a great mom and keep your home clean as well. I hate that our generation has been told otherwise, but trust me, not only can it be done, it is very easy to stick to a routine that allows it to get done. :)

Back to Basics

We are in Texas visiting my family for the Thanksgiving holiday. We are staying with my Papa and I am so happy we are and he does not have to be alone during the holidays, as this is the first holiday he has not had my Mam-ma here with him. It has been a hard holiday for everyone, as she truly was the matriarch of our family, but I know that she would want us to carry on and enjoy our time together with one another and not be sad.

That is exactly what we have all tried to do and Thanksgiving, yesterday, was a success. We had an enormous smorgasbord of food that would have made her so proud. She truly loved the holidays! I made several of her signature dishes, one of which (the most famous and well loved) was her banana pudding! I have made this with her multiple times throughout the years, but this was the first time I was to ever tackle it by myself. While all the other dishes I was making of her's I was not the slightest bit worried about, as I have made them multiple times by myself before for other occasions I have cooked for, I was very nervous about this dish! I was mostly nervous because everyone looks forward to this above everything else every holiday and she has most definitely set the bar very high! My Papa came in and helped me make it, as he is a pro himself since he has helped her make it all these years, and it truly turned out delicious! I was so relieved and glad I could keep it in the family! This recipe was my Mam-ma's mother's recipe, so it has been in our family since the turn of the century.

Some pictures of our spread...

~~~~~

While we have been here, we have had no obligations really. We have not had to worry about work, chores, things to do, or anything really. We have just been enjoying spending time with Papa and my other family and each other. It has been so nice to just enjoy each other in the evening and not have all these things we have to do or things to get ready for, but rather just be able to relax and relish in the moment. We have played with the kids so much, heard their never-ending laughter and actually been able to really enjoy it without thinking about what is next on the agenda. We have been able to shower and get ready without rushing. We have been able to just sit and talk for a seemingly endless amount of time. Even with helping Papa clean his house before Thanksgiving and me cooking multiple dishes, it still felt like an enormous weight had been lifted off of us in terms of our to do list. It really has just been so nice!

It makes me wonder how much we all take for granted on any given day throughout the midst of the daily grind. While there will always be obligations and commitments that we have, it really is so important to stop and make time for the things that really matter.

I think part of slowing down is also getting back to the basics. We as stay at home moms should be caring for our children most importantly and then secondly caring for our home. I cannot help but notice that this generation is sorely misguided on what is expected of stay at home moms. So many young moms think that it is "old fashioned" to cook every night, keep your house clean and tidy, and still be involved with your kids. It really is not… We should not be worried about how we can squeeze naps in every day before we even meet these basic needs that women before us for centuries have been fulfilling just fine.

Hear me out: I am not saying it is wrong to take a nap when your children are napping. I for one, being 32 weeks pregnant, can largely relate to that feeling of just pure exhaustion and wanting to just go lie down. I think if time is managed properly throughout the first part of the day, then you will likely have already performed most or all of your obligations and can guilt-free lie down and take a nap while your children nap. It is when the mornings are not productive and then the afternoons are not either, on a consistent every day basis, that I think a problem develops.

Tune in to my next blog post that will give an overview of what my day looks like (what works for me) and a little schedule/method to stick to for cleaning and laundry that makes it so much more doable and so much less overwhelming. We as moms have a lot to do and a lot of responsibilities that often even our husbands do not realize that we have to do; it shouldn't be harder for us, when there is an easier, less stressful way! :)

Dorcas

I always so greatly enjoy going to my grandparents' church when I am home visiting. They go to Cornerstone Baptist Church in Allen, TX. It is truly a wonderful church. If you are in the DFW area, I highly recommend it. See cbclucas.org for more information.

I literally always feel as though God is speaking directly to me when I am at this church and I leave feeling convicted, renewed, and purposeful. I can honestly say I do not feel this way when I go to other churches and often leave feeling unchanged and untouched (as bad as that may sound). Cornerstone is one of the few churches left that truly preaches the Word, even the parts we do not want to hear, and does not sugar coat anything. Pastor Jim's goal is not that you leave feeling good about yourself and has even said multiple times that you should not leave church feeling good about yourself, but rather you should leave feeling convicted and ready to change something about yourself. As Christians, we should all always be changing. There is always ways we can make ourselves better. Benjamin Franklin said, "when you are finished changing, you are finished." These are such true words!

This past Sunday, Brother Jim spoke about Dorcas. If you are like me, you had never heard of Dorcas before now. Dorcas can be found in Acts 9:36-42. It is crazy to think that such an amazing woman is only talked about one time in the Bible and in just a few verses. Nonetheless, the verses that talk about Dorcas are very powerful and speak volumes as to who she was.

Dorcas was actually from Joppa, which is where Jonah was from. Dorcas is unique in the area of her identity. She had two names given to her: Tabitha and Dorcas. Her name meant gazelle. She was known for one thing primarily and that was a needle. She sewed coats and blankets for the widows and the poor. She was truly a selfless woman, known for her charity.

Pastor Jim said that if he could give Dorcas a life verse, it would be Jude 1:22. "And of some have compassion, making a difference…" Read this a second and even a third time if you need to! I know that I sure did!

Another thing that Pastor Jim said that really stuck out to me and I have been repeating over and over in my head since then is, "Compassion not only has a heart, it also has feet. Talk is cheap." He went on to elaborate that it does not mean anything if all you do is just pray for people or say you are praying for someone, but do not actually ever do anything to help them. If you pray for the poor, but let them starve, you are a hypocrite. Now, this is not to say that we should not pray for people or even that when we are unable to help someone that it is pointless to pray for them. Obviously, we should be praying for people and I for one am a firm believer in the power of prayer. However, too often as Christians we loosely throw out the words, "I'll pray for you" or "I am praying for you", when in reality we could do so much more to help that person. I have tried to make a conscious effort, in fact, of NOT saying I am praying for someone unless I know for one hundred percent that I will go home and be consistently praying for them. This may strike some as odd, but if you think about it, it really is not good to say we are praying for someone if we are not really going to… Even if we have good intentions and think we are going to, if we go home and just get back to our daily grind and forget about them, we should have never said we were going to in the first place. I know for me personally, by making a conscious effort to not say that unless I really mean it, I am finding myself praying more for those few people who I do go ahead and say that to, because I am holding myself accountable to keep my word and follow through and pray fervently for that person.

Back on track to Dorcas…

One of the last things Pastor Jim said was noteworthy of Dorcas in those few verses was her adversity. Verse 37 says that she got sick and died. Why would the story of such an amazing, selfless, Proverbs 31 woman end in sickness and death? Shouldn't she surely have been exempt from sickness in her final days? Was she not worthy of more in the end? The answer is sickness is not a punishment; God does not only allow the evil people in the world to get sick and the good and righteous people get to avoid sickness. In fact, God does not even cause sickness to begin with. It is so easy to get mad at God and blame Him when a loved one gets sick and that sickness takes them from us, but the reality is that God is not to blame. After Adam and Eve sinned and the fall of man occurred, we all lost any immunity we had to sickness.

Verses 37 and 42 explain that Dorcas' sickness was permitted and profitable. I want to share verse 42 specifically with you. "And it was known throughout all Joppa; and many believed in the Lord." Yes, you read that right; many came to believe in the Lord as a result of Dorcas' death. She did not only glorify God in her life, but also in her death as well. Brother Jim brought up my grandmother at this point in the sermon, as she was a lot like Dorcas. She did good all the days of her life and led hundreds of people to the Lord. Even in her final days here on Earth at the hospital, she led a couple of nurses to the Lord. At her funeral, over 15 people were saved. One of the last things she said to Brother Jim at the hospital too was that she wanted her funeral to be centered around leading people to the Lord. She would have been so happy and pleased to know that her death saved at least fifteen souls from an eternity in hell.

Dorcas brought God glory and honor all throughout her life. She did not do things for herself, but rather dedicated her life to serving others. She left this world still honoring God and bringing people to Him. What an amazing woman! What are all of us doing for God on a daily basis? Are we living for ourselves or are we serving others? If we died today, would souls be won for Christ as a result of our death? Would our eulogy be so powerful that lost souls would see the light of Christ when hearing it? These are some of the things that I left church Sunday thinking about.

The truth is, most of us can not say these same things about ourselves, but that's the beauty of God's grace- it is not too late to change that! We can start right here, right now, making these changes. When you are cooking dinner tonight, make a little extra and take a plate or a bowl to an older couple or a widow or widower on your street. It is the simple things like that that make a difference! It is so easy to think that you are not able or you are too busy to really make a difference like Dorcas did, but the truth is, it really isn't! The enemy wants you to think that and wants to keep you from glorifying God in your everyday life, but every single one of us can do small things every day to bring Him Glory! The sooner we make it a habit, the easier it will be to stay consistent.

Philippians 1:12 says, "But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel;".

Intro... New to blogging.

I have always said I would probably never have a blog. To me, there was no benefit of blogging, because I actively utilized Facebook for posts I wanted to share with family and friends about my life. After losing my grandmother this past August 19, 2013 to an awful disease called pulmonary fibrosis, who was so much more than a grandmother to me, but rather more like a mother, I slowly began realizing that it actually would be nice to have a blog... If anything for the writing and the ability to speak freely about things that were weighing on my heart, things that I am passionate about, etc.

In addition to being an outlet for me, I do want to be able to reach out to and encourage other women, mothers, and wives through my writings. My grandmother was an amazing mentor and counselor to hundreds of men and women and she truly showed Christ's love to everyone she came in contact with. It has been my desire to follow in her footsteps. Given the time of my life and the current location I am in, I feel it would be easiest for me to start this lifelong journey through blogging.

Here is a photo of me and my Mam-ma just a couple days before she passed away.

A little bit about me...

I am a wife to a wonderful husband, my college sweetheart. We have been through a lot and had many ups and downs prior to marriage, but we always worked it all out and in the end love prevailed. I could not be happier and although at times, I do wonder why we had to go through so much to get to where we are now, I know it has all been part of God's plan and He has a purpose for everything.

We have a daughter who is 4 1/2, a son who will be 2 in just 2 weeks, and are expecting our third (another boy) in just a little over a month. We do also have one precious baby in Heaven who we never got to meet. Before I was pregnant with our son, we miscarried when I was roughly 5 weeks pregnant.

This was an extremely tough time in my life especially as I had never experienced this kind of loss. What made it more difficult was I had not yet shared the news of being pregnant with anyone and therefore did not even know how to begin sharing the news of this loss with anyone close to me. We ended up not telling anyone and dealing with the loss by ourselves, which in hindsight was not the wisest choice. It was very difficult to sort through the emotions I was feeling and to deal with the grief I was experiencing without anyone to talk to about it. While my husband was wonderful, being a man he could not fully understand the degree of hurt that I was feeling and I think that in and of itself was very hard for him. We have over time, shared our loss with a few close to us who have also experienced this same kind of loss in hopes we can help them with their grief a little better than we were able to help ourselves. I have since come to realize that women should not be ashamed to talk about this loss or even share the news of pregnancy early on for fear of a possible loss. These are our children no matter what stage of pregnancy we are in and in the event this horrible loss does occur, we need people to acknowledge the life that was, the life of our young, the life we carried in our womb and ached for when it was taken from us, to truly allow us to grieve in the way we need to.

For an amazing read that will pull at all your heartstrings on this topic, I am posting a link to a sweet friend of mine's blog post on this topic. It was written several weeks following her miscarriage and she puts everything I have ever felt into words so perfectly.

http://fastforwardgirl.blogspot.com/2013/07/the-disqualified-grief.html

Originally from Dallas, Texas, I went to college in Lynchburg, VA where I received my BS in Psychology. I would love to further my education one day and complete my Master's in Marriage and Family Therapy. I may try to do this when all my children are in school. We now live in a small town in North Carolina where my husband has grown up most of his life.

Although I have grown up in church all my life, something changed drastically in my heart at my grandmother's funeral. I began to have this thirst for The Lord that I had been lacking over the past few years, I began reading my Bible daily and truly seeking His face, and I began trying to be more like Him when before I had been much more on again off again.
It is my desire that my family will serve The Lord all the days of our lives and we will all continuously strive to be more like Him.

Here is a picture of my 2 kids.

I hope you will enjoy reading my blog and will find something in it that speaks to you or encourages you in some way. I look forward to connecting with many other wonderful people as well.