God's Child...

"From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another..." 
John 1:16 NIV 

Eva's baptism, Daddy's birthday: October 23, 2011.

Eva's Godparents, Aaron and Kendra (Luke's cousin and wife).

Eva wore the same dress beneath her gown that Marie wore when she was baptized.  The gown was worn by my father, myself and my siblings, and all our girls.

Now she is God's child...

These first days...

These first days have been such a blessing, such a gift.  There has been a lot of rocking, and cuddling.  Lots of kissing a brown little head.  Sisters have been in awe of this tiny sister, they call her "Littles" which is what Josie called Sarah when she came.  We have been enjoying the joy of it all...  It has been so different from Sarah's birth and that makes me a little sad.

We have been home, we haven't left.  Eva's first official outing was church yesterday morning.  We have been spoiled by wonderful friends bringing meals over.  We have been smiling, and sighing, and crying just a little.

This is so wonderful.  I look at Eva in awe, it's hard to believe she's really here.  The months of hoping, praying, carrying her and she's arrived safely.  Praise God!

On Thursday I got sick and had to go to the doctor.  I delivered Eva with the stomach flu and my defenses were down, recovery is tougher this time.  Thursday I had a fever and the doctor said, an infection.  Thanks to the antibiotics I am finally beginning to feel like myself.  It's been hard to not feel good when I want to just enjoy this blessed little window of time before life really picks up again.  I want to savor each and every one of these first hazy baby days.  And of course they have been bittersweet.

She is so beautiful, and she looks just like her sister. We prayed.  Josie prayed, and I prayed before she was born.  "Lord, let her look a bit like Marie".  Maybe with dark hair.  so that Eva in the coming years will have something to tie her to her sister.  She can say, I wasn't here when Marie was but I look like her.

And God answered the prayer, as He always does.  Eva looks so much like Marie my heart catches in my throat sometimes when I look at her.  What I wouldn't give to see them together... and I will.  I just have to wait for Heaven first.

Marie, March 2007

Eva...

We are just taking it easy, getting to know this new girl and enjoying this all as much as we can.  I don't know how it happened but I am just incredibly humbled by how much my Father has blessed me. 

The blonds...

Little monkey...

His arms are full...  Bittersweet. We wish that chair was more crowded.  There's still room for Marie there...

Evangeline...

"Look how she lights up the sky
Ma belle Evangeline
So far above me yet I
Know her heart belongs to only me"

October 8, 2011. 2:34pm. 8 lbs, 14 oz. 21"

Evangeline; Latin.  Meaning the good news, the Gospel.

Lucile; Latin.  Meaning: light.

Our new blessing... 

"To someone as beautiful as she
Who loves someone like me
Love always finds a way, it's true
And I love you Evangeline".  

                      Ma Belle Evangeline.

39 weeks... the hard way.

Today it is official.  I am one week from my due date.

And I haven't had much time to think about it.  Last week Josie brought home a nasty head cold.  Friday Sarah really seemed to catch it and by Sunday evening we knew something was up.  A long night Sunday and a doctor appointment Monday and it was confirmed Sarah has croup.  I have been up nights with her and busy days with her just trying to get through it.  I've never had a little one with croup before.  Her cough is better now, not as barky, but the steroid pills they put her on are terrible.  She's cranky, they taste terrible, I'm tired.  It's not a great combination.  She's still really not feeling good but we are seeing some improvement.

Luke worked 15 hours yesterday.  He was literally not home at all.  He's trying to get all the wheat sown way up north.  They just finished section 11 and Tolstrip... on to Barnika's today and back to the farm place tomorrow.  As soon as he's done with that it's time to start picking up the millet they swathed the beginning of the month.  There are three and a half fields, or another three days of work there.  He hasn't been home since Friday when they were able to start sowing wheat again.

We are a little overwhelmed.  I don't like this journal because it sounds like I'm complaining.  Really I'm not, we're blessed.  Blessed to be expecting, blessed that Sarah is strong enough to cough hard and fight this virus, blessed that Luke has work and we are provided for.  The truth is though that we have a lot going on!

Josie is struggling.  Anxiety is something she deals with all the time but lately it's been worse.  She has a hard teacher this year.  Last year she had a very sweet teacher who mothered her, this year her teacher is really pushing personal responsibility.  It is hard for my sensitive, anxious girl some days.  So there's been that too.  We really just need to get through the year with this teacher... and there's a lesson in it for her.  About how it's not always easy with other's in this world.  I just hate to see her worry over school.

 I am so glad that I don't have to worry about Marie getting this virus that Sarah is fighting.  She just couldn't cough.  Then I feel guilty about  being relieved about that because it means she 's not here.  And I miss her and wish she was here but I am so grateful for Heaven...

So we've hit 39 weeks but the last week has been hard. My next doctor appointment is Monday and my due date is Wednesday, the 5th.  I will talk to the doctor about our options for induction if/when I go over my due date.  I have had to be induced with all three of our girls so far as my labors don't progress.  After going nine days over with Sarah I am going to ask they not let me go past 41 weeks this time.  Poor Sarah was starving at birth, her skin was cracked, and there was meconium in her fluid so her lungs were compromised.  She just baked too long and I would like to avoid that with this little one if I can.  That and the hospital is an hour and forty minuets from here so it would be comforting to have some sort of plan. 

Please continue to lift Abigail up in your prayers as she is still fighting pneumonia...

Another week....

School started and another week has flown by.  Luke has been in the tractor spraying weeds, getting fields ready to sow wheat in September.  The millet is ready to cut, we went to Nebraska to the big county fair.  I am 34 weeks and getting baby clothes ready.  Sarah will be two, Marie will be gone two years...

Life is weird.

This summer I have felt like I've walked this path before.  Being pregnant again, my due date only just about a month later.  Only Little Mama is not here with me.  And I remember falling asleep in the afternoons with her talking herself to sleep.  Rubbing the back of her neck behind the curls because she'd calm down then.  And chocolate kisses in the afternoon, snuggling her to sleep at night when she'd hold on to my hair or hold my necklace in her fist.  And today I bought her new flowers for her tombstone, for her anniversary.

That is something no mother should ever buy.  I should still be holding her here.  I should still be kissing her goodnight and washing her clothes and painting her nails.  Life is weird.  Two years and this life, while blessed, is not as full without Marie in it.  Everything is different now.  I have changed.

I am now a compulsive list maker.  It helps me to keep my anxiety in check.  I never had anxiety before and I loved thinking I was this free spirit who could just roll with it all.  Not so much.  Now I make a note, I cross it off, I have to.

I check over and over again at night that doors are locked, babies are breathing, lights are off.  I always turn around before I leave the house, I double check before I close the garage door.  I cannot shake the feeling that I have forgotten something.

I question myself more.  Am I doing a good enough job, am I good enough in prayer, am I leading my daughters the right way?  Am I a good example to them?  Somehow Marie gave me confidence in those things, I struggle to find that now.

I keep to myself in ways I never did before.  I am closed off with my emotions when asked how we are doing.  The same as we were, we still hurt.  But that's the hard answer and I don't want the conversation so I say fine.

And again I am getting ready for a baby and praying it will be healthy.  I am snuggling a two year old (almost!) again.  I am getting used to Josie being back in school... and life cycles back to where it was before.  And I should be used to that, the wife of a farmer.  Every year we cycle through the same work in the same seasons again...  And I suppose it will be this way until I go Home...

I cannot believe another year has come and gone... how have I gone without kissing that freckle on her forehead so long?  Though we are better at coping now the pain is still the same.  And this weekend we will celebrate and mourn.  The Bittersweet...  And life cycles on. 

Random... and pickles.

Tonight is back to school night.  Josie will take her school supplies in, meet her teacher, then we're coming home and having tacos.  I cannot believe the time has come.

Tomorrow I will be 33 weeks.  It has flown but it is dragging all the same.  I am looking forward to meeting this new little girl.

I am struggling with feeling guilty about that excitement.  With Sarah I was so grateful for just the day, and how Marie was doing, and I really never daydreamed much about the little life within me.  I was grateful for hearing she was growing well, I was praying like crazy that the baby thrive, but I never felt that giddy excitement.  I feel so bad that I didn't do that for Sarah, and guilty for feeling it now.  Mama guilt is complicated.  Extra kisses now make up for it.

Tonight we are having Carne Asada Tacos using the recipe Clarissa turned me on to.  I never make salsa to go with them and cook the meat in the crock pot.  My family doesn't seem to mind.

I am pretty sure the terrible two's have arrived.  My sweetheart has been a handful lately.

I made eighteen jars of pickles yesterday and tonight I am pulling the cucumber plants.  That is a total of 30 jars of dill pickles.  That is insane.  For Katie, and anyone else who might care, this is my recipe for pickles.  It is a compilation of a recipe found on food.com and Luke's cousin's wife Kendra's spicy dill pickles that are awesome.  I just altered it enough to make a ton!

SPICY DILL PICKLES (this recipe is to make 7 quart jars at a time, for more than that you just keep making another batch of brine because you want it hot)  Beg, borrow, or steal to get a large water bath canner with the rack.  It's just too hard otherwise.

for the jars

fresh dill

jalapeno peppers, enough to do at least one pepper per jar

minced garlic (I just by the jar at the grocery store)

dried dill (because it should be dilly, otherwise what's the point?)

for the brine

8 1/2 cups water (distilled)

2 1/4 cups white vinegar

1/2 cup pickling salt

Steps

1.  Fill water bath roughly 2/3 full with tap water.  Start it boiling, it takes forever.

2.  Fill a small pot with some water and start warming your lids.  I do mine until they just boil and pull it off the heat.

3. Get the brine going.  Mix water, vinegar, and salt and bring to a boil.  Remove from heat.

4.  Get your jars hot.  Do this either by running them through the dishwasher and using them just as they dry or by putting them in a large pot of boiling water.

5.  Slice, dice, get your cucumbers ready.  And dice up the peppers.

All of this will take hours.  It is a slow start.

6.  To prepare jars add to the bottom of each 1 diced jalapeno, 1/2 of a spoon of minced garlic (I just use a spoon from the silverware drawer), a dash of dried dill, and a nice piece of fresh dill.  Don't be skimpy.

7.  Fill jar with sliced cucumbers, try to get it nice an evenly filled, no huge gaps anywhere.  Don't stuff it so much there's no room for the brine.

8.  Pour in the brine (use a funnel).  Add a hot lid and your mason jar ring and set aside.  

Once you have 6-8 jars you are ready to put them in the boiling water bath.  Add jars to boiling water, add water as needed so that when the rack is fully lowered your jars are covered by an inch to two inches of water.  Bring heat back up.  Once it begins to boil I process my quart jars for 20 minuets (if you live over 6000 feet you have to adjust that time).  Pints would process for 15 minuets.  

Once done remove jars and set on a towel to cool for 24 hours.  If the seal hooray, if they don't put them in the fridge and eat them in the next week or so.  

Josie and I are going to work on the baby's blanket (I have made one for each of the girls) and then I have to do her back-to-school mani/pedi.

Times flying...

26 weeks already.  It's amazing to think that baby girl #4 will be here in just a few months!

Fingerprint Friday...

It has been a very busy week!  Between vacation bible school, dance recital dress rehearsal, machine pitch (t ball) practice starting, and gymnastics kicking off we have been in the car a lot.  It sounds like Josie is involved in everything.  This week, yes.  It was sort of an overlap week in activities.  Next week will slow down and we can take a breath.

Today we are heading for the front range and a dentist appointment for Sarah.  Tomorrow is the Landon's Hope walk and we will spend the morning remembering Marie...  I am looking forward to it. 

I realised today that I have not taken any pictures this time with baby number 4.  That won't do at all.  I love having a record of each pregnancy with my girls and No. 4 will not be any different.

So, my Fingerprint this week...

22 weeks, baby girl number four.  Not a great photograph.  Learning to be joyful with a broken heart.  Missing Marie and rejoicing in the girls that I have with me.  Thirty years old and still trying to become who God would want me to be.  Life is weird...  I am getting better at just trying to rejoice in what God gives me in the moment.  It is easy right now because as you can see, I am pretty blessed.

Blessed...

Today I stumbled across just what I needed.  Today a friend put her thoughts into words and they said what I have tried to say...

If you know me in person you know that I am shy.  I am too tall and awkward.  Clumsy, silly, and I stutter when I'm nervous.  I blush easily.  I struggle with saying things.  It is hard for me to talk about Marie openly, to talk about what our family has been through.  I struggle finding the words to express how my child was not a burden, how I was blessed to have her.  I struggle to find words to explain what we've been through and how it's changed us.  I try... but in person I fail.  I can write it though and in those words on a page I can lay my thoughts out.  So in person I feel I fail often at explaining just how much I love being the mother to the children God has given.  Just how much God has given me in having them. 

Often I'm asked by strangers how many children I have... I always say three.  I cannot leave Marie out... I don't go into explaining that I have two here and one in Heaven unless the person I'm talking to seems to deserve to know, or need to know.  And now that I'm carrying our fourth I talk about my four children, and I talk about how there were twins at the beginning with this fourth pregnancy because I suppose there are five. And in Heaven when you see me walking I think that five will be there walking with Luke and I too... because although only three are here all of them are in my heart and that's what being a mother is.  It's loving them...

Today I read Clarissa's blog and her words spoke.  The child that died.  BLESSING.  Would you do it again?  YES.  Terminal diagnosis, special needs, 24 hour care, a burden.  NO, I LOVED EVERY MINUET OF HAVING THAT GIRL.  Being around her made me feel better than I have before or after in my entire life.  Being around Marie filled me, and you could see God in her.  And feel God around her... and that was BLESSING.

Having a baby born and a child die less than 24 hours apart?  I don't understand but it was HIS plan and I trust it.  Because of where we walked and how He carried us, and taught us to believe... BLESSING.

Clarissa is one of my best friends.  I am a little selfish and I enjoy spoiling Abigail... because Marie isn't here anymore...  And she lets me.  She is so strong and her faith inspires me, fills me, makes me keep moving forward.  Her words are beautiful...  Please visit her here... today this was my blessing.

And I am blessed, I am one blessed Mama...

Baby....

Yesterday was my ultrasound.  I had so much anxiety going into it.  I was praying that this baby just be healthy, I doesn't matter if it's a boy or a girl.  Whatever God sends is fine, just let this baby be growing well.

The nice thing was the the ultrasound technician is from here.  She was raised a few miles west of Luke and they know one another from "way back".  She was wonderful.  She took her time, she explained why she was doing what she was.  And baby, well... Baby is beautiful.

Tiny little hands were moving all over, and she showed us a profile, a little belly, a little spine.  All four chambers of a heart, two beautiful little kidneys, everything growing just as it should be.  And then we got to see the bottoms of Baby's tiny feet.  There is enough room now that Baby was just fully stretched out.  I had never seen the bottom of their feet on ultrasound before.  And then she said the words we had been waiting to hear...

It's a girl.

How blessed are we!!??  God has given us four beautiful girls!  It was wonderful seeing her, and most importantly, seeing that she is growing just as she should!  God is GRACIOUS!

We came home and told Josie our happy news.  She had a moments pause, she had really wanted a brother, but is just happy that there is another baby coming.  She and Sarah played well all night long and Sarah was so proud to show Josie the pictures of "Baby".

My mind kept reeling though.  This is so wonderful, but it is so bittersweet.  This happy news brought with it grief I wasn't expecting.  I wonder when I will begin to get used to that?  There is another little girl I longed to share the news with, to show the pictures of another baby sister to.  And she's just not here.  And that's the bite.  The bittersweet.  The tangle.  With happy comes sad, with rejoicing comes remembrance and longing.  And it's just life now I suppose, and taking the blessing with the pain is something I am learning to do.

 Last night I lay in bed and my mind kept calling images of Little Mama, brown hair loose, blue eyes crinkled, smiling at me.  Will this baby have brown hair?  Will I see Marie when I look at her?  Sarah and Josie favor one another so strongly, favor their Daddy so strongly.  Marie just had her own looks.  She was me, dark hair and skin with her father's blue eyes.  God made her so beautiful...  And I'm glad He lets her face remain so clear in my mind.

Four little girls, so blessed are we.  Four princesses.  Luke is so outnumbered!  I know that he longed for a son but he admits that his daughters have him wrapped around their little fingers.

It is amazing the turns a life takes.  You find yourself where you never thought you would be.  I never thought I would have four children.  I never believed I would carry twins, if only for a moment.  I never thought I would bury a child.  I didn't know pain and joy could be so close together.  I didn't know how deep God's love is until it held me...  We will continue trusting Him...  He blesses us.

Today...

Today I woke up and decided I was going to feel better about things and not let myself worry.

I did the dishes.

I made beds.

I aired up the tire on Marie's old BOB stroller.

I walked with my friend out in the country.

I sprayed weeds.

I took a shower.

I made lunch and Sarah actually ate part of her peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  I have been trying to get her to eat them forever.

Sarah and I planted petunias in pots by the front door.

Today I am happy.

Today I am choosing not to worry.

I am comforted by the wiggles from this tiny baby that I felt last night and I have felt occasionally today.

I am choosing HOPE.

Today is okay... 

Living after...

Yesterday was Mother's Day.  It was hard.  Anniversaries are hard.  And my second Mother's Day without Marie here was difficult.

Josie was so excited and gave me a necklace she had made in art along with a folder of coupons, a card, bookmarks, and a picture all talking about how much she loved me.  Sarah was a stinker, but that's sort of what she's into right now.  The terrible two's have hit my little princess early.  Josie made a frame in Sunday school with her picture in it. 

I kept thinking, Marie would have sung in church.  Marie would have made a foam picture frame for me and I would see her face smiling back.  Marie would have some craft she might have made, Marie in a summer dress and sandals, Marie in her Daddy's arms, the farmer's daughter... if Marie was healthy.  If Marie had been doing well enough to go to church.  If Marie felt good it would have been a very good day.  Because in my mind Marie is always as she should have been, and it is because I know she is healed.

Luke worked hard to make the day special.  He did dishes, made lunch, changed stinky diapers.  I sobbed in the car going to the cemetery...  We do it every Sunday but yesterday was hard.  Because I want her in my arms.  I want the rest of the world to see that I have three little girls and they're beautiful.  I want to kiss and cuddle little knees and feet that would be getting kissed golden by the sun because the weathers been so warm.  I can't equate the child that I love, the one that I fought for, prayed for, cried for, would have died for... I can match her up with the cold stone...

Sometimes it all still feels to horrible to have happened.  And it's been a year and half and I think people get sick of my carrying it with me.  But I can't put it down.  It's my cross, the one God gave me.  And I am better at dealing with it now but the pain hasn't changed.  It's deep, in my gut, it pierces my lungs, and it crushes my heart.  And it still feels the same as it did the day that I saw her last, just sleeping.  But she wasn't, she was gone Home.  And that's what I carry.

And I'm pregnant.  And I am so filled with worries.  Having another baby after having buried one is different.

With Josie I was so blissfully ignorant, nothing bad would happen.  With Marie I was too... through her pregnancy I was just so exited to meet her.  At my 20 week ultrasound she was shy, and so we didn't know if we would be having a boy or a girl.  I remember praying a few days before she was born "Lord, please let it be a little girl".  I was so in love with her name, Marie Isabel.  In my mind I saw a dark haired girl, eyes snapping.  And she was.  But I don't know that I ever prayed for Josie and Marie to be healthy.  I was naive and I just believed that they would be, that nothing horrible could happen to me.

And then we found out about Sarah.  And I prayed.  I prayed that she thrive, it felt like too much to ask God to make her healthy.  I just prayed that this child would thrive.  And she does.  She was a surprise too, at the ultrasound the cord was between her legs.  And there she was, another girl and I was in awe of her but worries of Marie were heavy on my heart.  We barely rejoiced at Sarah's birth and despite that she carried us through the darkest days I have known.

And now this baby.  I am 18 1/2 weeks along.  The beginning was scary, they were so cautious because my blood work was off and my numbers were too high.  There was the ultrasound where I saw the two circles, two lives so tiny their heart beats couldn't even be seen.  And then the next ultrasound when there was only one baby.  And I have been sicker, and I haven't gained any weight.  And I felt this baby move later than the others and because I know the dark, I know the fear, I know the weight, I know that bad can happen I worry.  Do I feel this baby move later for some reason?  Is this baby okay?  And I pray.  "Lord, please let this baby healthy".  Somehow now I'm brave enough to ask for that.  A healthy baby.  I ask God to let it grow, let it thrive, let it's life be used for His Glory.  But I'm terrified.  I don't know that I could loose another.  It's too much to consider so I try to avoid the thought.

Carrying a child after you have buried one is different.  There is joy there but so much worry.  Because I know now, I have seen with my own eyes how fragile our children are.  How fragile our lives are.  I understand fully that this child is not my own, it is only with me for me to love while I can.  And I don't want to let it go, let another go, ever.  Because the hugs that I cannot give to Marie make my arms hurt and I don't know that I can handle any more pain.

Every day I seem to do battle with this fear, this worry.  Every day I feel like I could sink into it.  Instead I just want to be happy.  I want to delight in this gift.  I know so many who haven't had one child, let alone the four I have been blessed with...  and I want to have joy.  So every day I feel like I fight for joy against my worry...

It's different living after the loss of a child.  Even though she's not lost, I know just where she is it's not here.  And that is the hardest thing...