Fingerprint Friday... in pictures...

There is a song by Steven Curtis Chapman that says:
I can see the fingerprints of God
When I look at you
I can see the fingerprints of God
And I know its true
You're a masterpiece
That all creation quietly applauds
And you're covered with the fingerprints of God
So look around you and see where YOU can see God's fingerprints. Is it in nature? Kids? Animals? Where do you see them? Here's how to join.

For me this week... it is the photos on my camera.  The moments that God allowed me to capture, for us to remember.  Photos are incredibly precious to me now.  Josie saved in a moment as a newborn, Sarah tiny and brand new.  And they are my only chance to gaze at Marie's face now.  Every photo is a blessing, and though I have a million snapshots in my head that I treasure it feels good to have the pictures... the recording of our lives.

My fingerprint this week is us in March, and the moments I was blessed to capture. 

 

At the Butterfly Pavilion for Marie's birthday.  Josie's dream has been for a butterfly to land on her finger...  I caught the moment...

There were the most beautiful flowers...  It is impossible not to think of Marie there among those flowers and the butterflies and all that beauty.

Sarah's personality is really starting to shine through.  She loves her new rain boots...  this is her after church one Sunday, still dressed up but outside to play!

Sarah is loving lipstick too... the other night I let her do my makeup.  She was thrilled with herself.

Another moment.  I asked her for a "big smile" and this is what I got.  Cheesy, fully of sass, sweet Sarah.

We are celebrating Lent.  Josie is doing a paper chain with a link for every day until Easter.  Every night after dinner we read the link which has a prayer, a conversation topic, a question etc. and add the link to the chain.  We talk about Jesus and the sacrifice and how blessed we are to be saved by grace.

Looking at this picture now I see Marie in her swing...  This really symbolises life for us now.  She's not really gone, still a part of our family just not physically here.  I am incredibly grateful to Jesus.  Because of His gift I am able to live with the hope of seeing my little girl again.

Luke hooking up the flatbed trailer.  They are pulling the old grapevine's out today.  Hauling them off.  A new start of sorts, cleaning up.  Change is a little scary but I'm ready for them to be gone as most were dead anyway.  It will be good to see flowers blooming there this summer... 

We are blessed by the work put before us.  The grapevines being torn out, a new shop going in.  The wheelbarrow is full of bulbs I am going to try replanting (hopefully it will be successful) and I have day lilys and poppy's I salvaged from where the shop went in.  Tomorrow I am hoping the weather is nice and I can be outside getting those plants in the ground. 

Missing...

Today I am missing our Marie like crazy.  I think it's March, with spring coming on, and memories that do it.  I think of her and how the weather getting warmer would have been so good.  We wouldn't be trapped inside for winter anymore.  I could maybe take her outside and we could sit on the steps.

Marie, March 23 2009.  Eating blue marshmallow peeps.

The last March we had Marie with us was rough.  She was in the hospital here for pneumonia, it was a scary time.  I am so glad we don't have to worry and watch her go through that anymore.  It's funny, because now I look back on that time and I am just so sad for her.  So sad that my just-two-year-old girl was in a hospital struggling for breath.  Sad that she had to fight so hard.  Sad that that's what it was like for her.  Sad that she's not here.

It's very double edged, rejoicing in where Rie is now and missing her like crazy and just longing to see her at the same time.  I feel guilty, I still struggle with not asking God "why?".  I work hard to just praise God in His infinite knowledge and power.  He had reasons for calling her home, He knows more than I do.  I cannot understand and I must trust my Good Father and He is.  God is so Good.  It's just hard, and sometimes it's a lot of work not to be angry, not to feel sorry for us.  I don't want to live that way.  I want to be content, I long to accept God's will, and I want to serve gladly, waiting for the day we are all together again.

It is so hard to, when I am missing Marie so much to think that she is four.  Four years old already!  And I don't know what she would have been like at four.  All I know is Marie with tanned skin and light brown hair at almost two and half years old.  Marie who still had some baby left in her.  Marie that I miss so much it hurts to breath sometimes.  Marie...

I miss saying her name, and I repeat it to myself now.  Just to keep it familiar on my lips.  I think of who she might be, how she would be with her sisters.  Then I have to stop myself because for Marie it would have just kept getting worse.

She was doing so good that last summer, but even then the part of her brain that controlled her breath was dying.  It would have kept dying.  It would have gotten harder for her.  I can't bear to think of what she would have had to go through and that is probably why I am so careful to praise God for her healing.  She didn't have to suffer through all those might haves.  She got to dance instead.

I just miss her.  Because she is not four.  She is still my baby, just a toddler.  And they say the pain gets better.  It doesn't.  I just get better at dealing with it.  At living with it.  No matter how much time passes I am still going to have arms that ache to hold Marie.  The rest of my life will be that way.

I just have to work at being glad despite it.  Sometimes that is really hard work.

Fingerprint Friday...

There is a song by Steven Curtis Chapman that says:
I can see the fingerprints of God
When I look at you
I can see the fingerprints of God
And I know its true
You're a masterpiece
That all creation quietly applauds
And you're covered with the fingerprints of God
So look around you and see where YOU can see God's fingerprints. Is it in nature? Kids? Animals? Where do you see them? Click here to join!

My fingerprint this week came on Wednesday.  Late Wednesday evening my tiny 5 1/2 pound niece made her appearance 7 weeks early (she couldn't wait, I think she must have wanted to come when the crocus were blooming).  They are in a good hospital and there are doctors there who have so much experiance in caring for her tiny body and immature lungs.  We are praying that she grow strong and healthy and can come home soon!

I am grateful for a Good God who gives us the technology and knowlege to care for these tiny babies that come too early.

Thank you Lord for those things so that they may care for tiny M and help her to grow and thrive!  Guide the doctors hands Father!  Hold her close and make her strong! 

(On a side note, Little M is absolutely beautiful with all this dark hair like another dark haired Princess I know, and I am so incredibly excited to get to meet her!)

Spring...

Spring is in the air.  I can feel it and right now I can't wait to get outside.  I am even going to do my windows as an excuse to get out there.  That is a big deal.

We are doing well.  Sarah hasn't been sleeping the best but she sort of knows how to work Luke and I and we're softies so we pick her up.  Trying to quit doing that...

I had Josie's parent teacher confrence last night and she is doing amazing.  Socially and academicly she is where she needs to be and I am so happy for that.  I worried after going through the Marie being called Home that Josie would struggle.  She hasn't been much, and I think we have our wonderful councellor to thank for that.  I am so glad that we have him to ask for advice and for guidance as we still try to figure out living.

My crocus are blooming all yellow and they are beautiful.  I put a red bandanna on Cooper because he wore his blue one out and he looks pretty handsome (for a dog).  Luke is working out at the farm and it won't be long before tractors are rolling, fields needing spraying and millet needs planting.  Spring just seems to bloom with new life.

I have been working hard to count my blessings lately and I have so many...  I am so grateful that I feel blessed again.  It is good.  It feels good. 

My windows are calling!  Happy Wednesday!

Happy...

Things that have made me happy so far this week...

A little silly in Daddy's chair...

Fruit, washed and ready to eat.

That we even have fresh fruit in early March, and that I have clean water to wash that fruit in.  We are blessed and I am thankful.

Strawberries... God really outdid Himself when He made them.  And my 30 plus year old Pyrex bowl from an old home-ec classroom in the early seventies.  They are invincible.

Day to day...

Not too much is going on with us right now.

Last week we got ready to celebrate Marie's birthday and poor Josie woke up very early Thursday morning throwing up.  I got her cleaned up and back to bed but the entire process woke up Sarah (who is the lightest sleeper ever) and I wound up being up with her for a few hours.

We kept Josie home from school and Luke stayed home as well.  Thursday was a quiet day of remembering Marie.  We got her balloons and let them go in the cemetery.  It was sunny but started to rain just as we were leaving.  The flowers at her stone were beautiful and it was wonderful that she was thought of.  We left her a birthday bow, and of course, the balloons. 

That evening I got sick, Luke fed the girls leftovers and we watched videos of Marie.  We don't do it often because in the past it has really hurt to see her.  This time it was good and we were all left with smiles on our faces, not just tears in our eyes.  I suppose that is the passage of time.  The hurt is no less, or any easier to bear, but we are getting better at carrying it.  And honestly, I would not choose another cross.  It was good to see Marie smiling and laughing, we are so blessed to have those moments recorded.

The stomach flu hit me hard and I was out all day Friday and most of Saturday.  Luke stepped right in, and as much as I tease him about how lost he'd be without me the truth is he'd be just fine.  He was so wonderful.

We had planned to go to the Butterfly Pavilion in Denver to celebrate Marie's birth with some fun family time but the bug put a stop to that.  Josie has this Thursday and Friday off school because our high school girls are going to state with basketball so we are thinking we may go then.  I am looking forward to seeing Sarah take it all in, the butterflies, the bugs, just being in a different place.  She was so little when we went for Rie's birthday last year.

And, I'll leave with a few photos.  My girls are getting so big!


Sarah, all ready to go to the dentist in Fort Collins.  She had two teeth coming overlapping and along with nursing at night that caused a cavity.  We were referred to a wonderful pediatric dentist up there and they did a temporary filling.  When she is three or so they'll put a permanent filling in.  Until then they need to monitor it regularly.

Sassy miss...  I had to bribe her with the tutu just to get her dressed that day!

Josie with her cousin Kyle's Flat Stanley that was mailed to us from other cousins.  We had a hard time saying what Stanley go to see while he was visiting our town!  We finally wrote that he got to see tractors, wheat and corn fields, and the co-op elevators!

Thank you all for thinking of our sweet Marie on her birthday.  It means so much to us to know that she is remembered!

Four...

Today she is four.  And I have so many questions... how long would her hair be?  Would she still love Tinkerbell?  Would she be wanting to be more independent?  How tall would she have gotten by now?

And then I stop and think... What would her life really be like if she was here now?  Would she need oxygen all the time?  Would we be in the hospital?  Would she still be that wild, smiling, brown skinned girl she was at two that blessed summer when she felt good and we were so happy? 

Only God knows.  And He decided that she would celebrate her 3rd, and now her 4th birthdays in Heaven. 

In Heaven with choirs of angels singing, no sickness, no death, no heartache and no tears.  No pain, no night.  In Zion....

Happy birthday to you Princess Marie... the day you were born is the most special of my life and I am forever changed by loving you. 

Thank you Father for two and almost a half years with this child that humbled us, brought us joy, taught us, bossed us, comforted us while we tried to comfort her.  Marie was so... I cannot think of the word but just being near her made you feel good.  Thank you for trusting us with the miracle that is your child. 

We love you so much Mama...  We hope you love your balloons.  We can't wait to see you!  We will be there soon, until then we know you are safe and more loved than we can even comprehend.  Happy birthday Princess, the angels sang the day you were born!

First...

First buds of spring poking their heads out...

First sign of my crocus'...

First thing in the morning...

First haircut today...

Please say a prayer for Abigail. She was being sedated today to have some tests run... praying for good news from the doctors and that her precious little body handles the sedation well!