Dear Prudence Turns 1

This past Sunday, we celebrated Prudence's 1st birthday. It was an absolutely wonderful day! Last year, about this time, Prudence was clinging to life in an incubator at Forsyth Hospital and this past week, we got to enjoy seeing her crawl, stand, play with Peaches, get in a pool, scream at the ocean waves, eat her birthday cupcake, sweetly fall asleep on her daddy in the pool and play with Curtis. We went down Sunday to spend the day with the Perez/Lamb family in Rodanthe on the Outer Banks. We were so excited to be invited to celebrate Prudence. And it was such a fun afternoon. Curtis got to be in a pool for the first time, which he was not too sure about, but eventually warmed up to. Lucy loved swimming around with her Papa Ash on her "boat" and going fishing. At one point, all 3 children napped and we got to have a quiet afternoon in the house resting :) We walked down to the beach where Lucy loved the waves splashing around her, although Curtis and Prudence both did not care for them at all. And then came the birthday party. I love one year old's parties. I love watching them with their cake. It's the funniest thing to see their excited faces as they taste the icing and get it all over their faces. Pru was no exception! It was a wonderful, perfect birthday party!

On Tuesday this week, I went back down for the night since Isaac was duty. This was a fun adventure. My birthday was Wed and the plan was to leave after breakfast Wed morning so I could get back and celebrate my birthday with Isaac. Well, Wed morning, we woke up to flooding and major storming. So I waited a little, and had a birthday breakfast of pork chops and gravy, eggs, toast, and sweet potato butter made by David and Tara, such an amazing breakfast! The rain was not letting up at all, so I thought I'd try and leave before it got any worse. I packed and began to load the car but got soaked so I gave up on that. At that point it was looking like I was going to be flooded in for the day. We ended up driving in to Manteo and it took forever, the flooding was so bad, but luckily by the afternoon it dried well enough that I was able to get my car out and beat the next storm system coming through. I finally made it back home, although I'd missed our date for the night, thankfully we were able to reschedule with our babysitters. It was a huge adventure and a fun one. If I couldn't spend the day with Isaac, spending it with Brenna and her family was an awesome substitute!

Ultrasound Training Part 2

When I began volunteering with the Keim Center 2 and 1/2 years ago, I was told there would be opposition from the enemy. I experienced it some, but not much. It wasn't until I began ultrasound training that the opposition became real. Satan has some pretty awesome tactics, not just attacking me, but the other nurses, our babysitters and even their families. I explained some of it in my last blog and how God completely worked everything out in His timing. We experienced much the same thing with the ultrasound class in Fredericksburg this past week. The plan (funny, we should never makes plans) was that my director, Shannon's, mom was going to drive up from Richmond to watch Curtis at the hotel both days during the class. Shannon texted me on Monday saying that her mom couldn't get out of a commitment on Friday and wouldn't be able to come to Richmond. So I tried not to panic and we worked on an idea. On Tuesday, we decided I would stay in Richmond Thur night and leave Curtis on Friday and we'd pick Curtis up there on our way home. That was the plan we were banking on as we left on Wed. Everything went well with the drive, Curtis did pretty good. He did great at dinner and went to sleep pretty easily Wed night. Well, he decided it was party time at 4AM so we were up for the morning which was gonna make for a long day of class, but it was ok, nothing I couldn't handle without never ending coffee. Curtis did great with Shannon's mom, he even ate some liverwurst :) which cracked me up. She got him to sleep, which was amazing. And I was able to feel comfortable, not worry and pay attention to class. The first day was all about the legal implications to what we do and a lot of the history of the pro life movement. I really enjoyed all we learned and all the info was incredibly helpful. I was on information overload, but that's to be expected after 8 hours of class. Around 4:15, I got a text from Shannon. He dad was going to the ER with blood clots in his leg. Needless to say, Shannon's mom needed to leave and so I left class just a little early and got Curtis. Thankfully, her dad was ok and did not have to be admitted, but we needed a new babysitter...at the last minute...in a city we weren't familiar with. We had everyone on the job looking for someone. Shannon had enlisted some of the staff at the Keim Center to find someone. One of our instructor's had a call in to one of her friends to maybe watch him. And my friend Tori had called a friend of her's who lived there to see if they knew anyone. God perfectly worked it out that a girl in campus ministry was home raising funds and had the whole day completely free. And even more, He worked out that we could have our room until 2 and our sonographer from the Keim Center was going to stay, so Curtis could stay in her room after that. Curtis loved his babysitter, and I, again, could easily pay attention learning ultrasound basics while Curtis was being taken care of.

It was so amazing to see how God worked everything out. I admit, I panicked and just assumed the worse, so easily not trusting in Him to work things out. But he did, in His perfect timing, not mine. And because of Him, I was able to learn more of the skill that will help me show women the LIFE that is inside of them. I am so thankful for all the things he worked out, so thankful for letting me get through the class, so thankful for the growing friendships that He's giving me through the Keim Center, and so thankful that, one day soon, I'll be certified and will get to perform ultrasounds on the women of this city showing them their sweet babies.

In a week and a half I have part 3 of the training, 2 days of testing. I have some studying to do between now and then, but I am looking forward to this final step.

10 months

Curtis is 10 months today. Like every other month, so many things are new, so many things have changed. It has been quite a busy month for us all with doing my ultrasound training and figuring out how to juggle all of that. With that, we did have some firsts for both Curtis and myself. Curtis took whole bottles from a few of his baby sitters, which was awesome since he had not done that since he was 4 months old. It was also the first time we had been away from each other for that amount of time. I didn't like being away from him for so long. I didn't like only getting to spend an hour or so a day with him. But am thankful for the reason that it was like that. The training went well, and we begin the 2nd leg of it tomorrow with a drive to Fredericksburg (more on that later). 

A few more new things and some things that just crack us up: He's begun eating more solid foods and chunky purees and seems to like them. He actually tried roast tonight. That's been the only thing he voluntarily puts in his mouth, I think mostly because he can't pick up the other stuff easily, but he will eat it if I feed it to him. He's begun babbling much more, so we're trying to work on "mama" and we're working much more on sign language, hoping he'll pick it up soon. We've let him play in the kitchen some and he absolutely loves the kitchen spoons and ladles with the pots. It's a great way to keep him entertained while I'm trying to wash dishes. And probably one of my favorite things is that he thinks he has to go everywhere head first. Anytime he's sitting on our laps, he goes for the floor head first, so we hold his feet (of course) and he walks on his hands till he's far enough away from the furniture to get down. It's pretty entertaining to watch.

Doctor's appts this month have been fun. He was almost 21lbs and 29 1/4 inches. And the best news, he is murmur free! We had an echo confirmation a few weeks ago to confirm he no longer has his VSD heart murmur, which makes this mama incredibly happy!

This next few months will be pretty exciting as we have Prudence's first birthday to celebrate and Curtis'. At the end of this month, we'll head to the Outer Banks to celebrate Prudence's life. We are looking so forward to that day, and know that it truly is a gift from God. Then, just 3 weeks later, we'll have an early birthday party for Curtis. So lots of exciting things ahead :)