Sweet days.

Things are still going well here. This week has been busy, and next week will be worse. Next Monday we have to take Marie down to Children's Hospital for her Cardiology appointments. She is getting an echo cardiogram and EKG. We are not looking forward to it, especially having her in the hospital. I'll have to find a mask for her somewhere... we're praying that it goes well and her heart is still "just fine", and that we don't pick up any bugs while we're there.

Josie is getting really excited for preschool. Her first day will be September 3. She's looking forward to soccer starting, and got new school clothes this week. She got too tall for just about everything over the summer, I can't believe how big she's getting!

As for me, somehow I'm still all over the place. Luke and I were talking last night. Because of GOD'S GRACE Marie is doing well now, but for us this is a time to decompress. To feel, to fear, to be grateful, to cry, to laugh and to take pictures. Because I am not in "crisis management mode" I find myself more vulnerable right now. Little things are more upsetting, but at the same time I am so happy, thrilled to see her do well. It's just the way it is I suppose.

I've been thinking a lot lately, about how life has changed. Maybe it's because October is nearing, and that is the month that last year, our world turned upside down. I feel God at work, I actually feel Him near me now. I never did before. Lately, I've been praying not so much for things, but just for my heart to be opened.

Because Marie is stable as she can be right now, this is the time for me to do some healing. I'm praying that my heart can be open, that Jesus will enter and heal the broken parts. That I can be filled with love and light, and I am able to live my life as God would like me to.

My evening devotion last night talked about the words that leave our mouths, and how if they are empty they do nothing. But if they are full, if we submit and allow our mouths to speak the words of God then our words will leave us doing good work. They explained that that is what the great men of the Bible did. John the Baptist submitted to the Lord, allowing the Lord to speak through him. What a beautiful idea.

I hope that the words that leave my mouth are His, I hope that I can be used for that purpose. It was really food for thought. Now after all this, don't ask me what verse my devotion was talking about. I am so bad at that! It's okay, I'm a work in progress ;)

I'll leave with this, a quote I found on a caring bridge page that I visit. This beautiful family lost their baby girl to Leigh's in January 2008, she was so much like Marie.

Fr. Benedict Groeschel: 'The most bitterly disappointed people are those who thought that this brief, fragile life was going to bring them the joy reserved for the blessed in heaven".

We have a lot to look forward to.