Monday, June 29, 2009

Update


Fear not, for I am with thee. Isaiah 43:5

Thank you all so very much for your prayers. My mother-in-law is doing wonderfully well. She came out of ICU yesterday afternoon; we all got to talk with her last night. She sounded great and was just bubbling over with praises to God. What a comfort it is to know that as Christians, we never walk alone. Due to the ability to block nerves at the spine, she is currently pain free. She's yearning for something to eat or drink (she's been without anything since Wednesday!), but she's satisfying herself with munching on ice chips. To the doctor's eye her cancer appeared contained, and he thinks they removed it all. As it comes to mind over the next month, would you please continue to lift her up in prayer as she heals and adjusts? I can never find the words to express the depth of blessing I feel at the warmth and love of friendship offered by sisters in Christ that I have never met in person. I most humbly thank you.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

For Granny

How sweet are Your words to my taste,
sweeter than honey to my mouth!
Psalm 119:103


My folks (Mimi and Papaw) drove up to see us last week; on the way they stopped off for a visit with my in-laws (Granny and Grandad). Granny always has a package of goodies ready to send to the grandchildren. This time the goodies included a box of Dum Dum candy canes.


Meggie got her first taste of sugary goodness!
(I captured the moment for you, Granny.)




Mmm! Good!
(Oh Granny, I wish I could have caught the movements
of her little mouth working over that sugar stick.
She was some kind of cute!)




And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding,
shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:7


I would also like to ask my readers to pray for my mother-in-law. She has been a part of my life for 27 years; she is a second mom to me. She was diagnosed with cancer a few weeks ago. She will be undergoing surgery tomorrow to remove the cancer. It will be life altering surgery.

When my father-in-law called with the news, I told him I would be praying that the Lord would give her peace with the diagnosis. She called me to chat last week while she was waiting for my folks to show up. In the course of our conversation, she told me she felt tremendous peace about everything. When the goodie package was opened there was a little Christmas decoration tucked inside the box for me. PEACE. She always says we think alike.


Frances ~ We love you with all our heart, and we are praying!

. . . because I know it's one of your favorites.

And we know that all things work together for good
to them that love God,to them who are the called
according to his purpose. Romans 8:28


. . . because it's one of my favorites.

My soul finds rest in God alone;
my salvation comes from Him.

He alone is my rock and my salvation;
He is my fortress, I will never be shaken.
Psalm 62:1-2


. . . and just because.

. . . God has said,
Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.
So we say with confidence,
The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid.
What can man do to me?
Hebrews 13:5b-6

I love you so much!

Friday, June 12, 2009

Brotherly Love


What does a big brother do
when he thinks the apple of his eye is cold?




Share the warmth.

Monday, June 01, 2009

Little Bit


At 7.6 lbs. Miss Megan is itty bitty for a two month old. She's actually off the bottom of the growth chart [I guess we'd put her in the minus 1 percentile ;o)] ... not exactly unusual for our family ... but she's following the growth curve consistently and up two pounds in six weeks.



Her doctor was very pleased
and even complimented her on her chunky thighs!
(Isn't that what every girl wants to hear?)




Meggie seemed pleased!

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

8 Weeks Old

Megan at 8 weeks snoozing in Daddy and Mommy's bed.


Megan ~ newborn.
See how much she's grown!


We are a family that has fallen in love ... off the deep end, over the moon, sky high ... in love. I don't think any of us can get enough of our Meggie girl.

As some of you realized, Megan was born at 36 weeks. Everything was going so well we thought we were going to make it to her 39th week, but the high risk doctor became quite concerned over the amount of amniotic fluid which began to disappear rather rapidly. So JR and I were sent straight from the the peri-natologist's office to the hospital for the C-section.


Here's my sweetie when we were waiting to go back for surgery. He looks a bit intense, doesn't he? Facing a C-section is a little scary. Even though we look forward to holding our precious baby we both dread the surgery.

We were very blessed. At 36 weeks Megan was considered a late preemie, but there were no major complications. She does have a herniated umbilical cord/belly button which looks like a little stump around her belly button, but that is shrinking more each week and is almost unnoticeable now.

We were warned that her nervous system might be a bit overly sensitive for a while, and it was. In fact, she slept with us for several weeks because if she wasn't touching us she would shake and shiver. She had a few gasping spells that scared me half-to-death, but she recovered from them just fine. The hospital nurses told us it was just a preemie thing - (the immaturity of her ability to control her digestive and breathing systems) - and to suction her mouth, pull her upright and pat her back. Those were just small things that she gradually out grew.

The biggest issues were her bilirubin count and not gaining weight. We've had two other babies that were jaundiced but never this badly. Because the bilirubin kept climbing, our pediatrician ordered a bili-blanket for her. She was supposed to need it for two or three days. We had it for two weeks. We called her our little glow worm! She had to stay in just her diaper with a glowing, bendable-plastic mat wrapped around her and all of that wrapped in a blanket with the big, heavy, fiber-optic cord coming out of it all.

Meggie on her Bili-blanket
(You can click on picture to enlarge.)


With the flash ~
so you can see the machine.


Without the flash ~
so you can see her glow!


On top of that - either because of the jaundice or her early birth - she just wouldn't eat enough. I could n.o.t wake her up to eat; I have never seen a baby sleep this heavy. She went from 6 lbs. 1 oz. to 5 lbs. 6 oz. While that is neither a dangerously low weight nor a dangerously large weight loss (we've had one baby lose more the first few days), it was the continual, ongoing loss of weight that was scary. We couldn't seem to get her weight to level off. There were moments I even feared she could just slip away from us. And of course, a sleeping baby that won't eat creates a whole other nightmare for a nursing momma. I began to get quite concerned that she was causing her milk supply to diminish, but my knight in shining armor went out a rented a Medela pump. That seemed to be the turning point in the milk supply, in her eating and in ridding her body of the bilirubin.

By the end of week two we had finally gotten the bilirubin count under 12, and she didn't have to be hauled to the doctor or hospital every other day for a heel prick (which broke my heart to watch!). At the end of week three we lost the bili-blanket, and by the time she was four weeks old she was nursing like a newborn, still needing a lot of help but eating once she got going. Now at eight weeks, she is a good eater and she's starting to plump up. She sees the doctor on Monday, and I can't wait to see how much she weighs!









Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Introducing

Megan

Megan Grace Deputy
Born ~ Monday, March 30, 2009 at 8:20 p.m.
6 lbs. 1 oz.
18.5 inches long
bluish gray eyes
dark brown hair
beautiful

click here for more

Monday, March 16, 2009

Sunday Dinner


In the house they followed out into the kitchen to see if there wasn't something they could do toward helping with the dinner, but they found Mrs. Gray had it all in hand. She was just lifting out the roasted lamb, with the beautifully roasted potatoes surrounding it, and taking up the perfectly cooked lima beans from a double boiler.

"Yes," she said briskly, "Phil, you may get the three plates of tomato salad from the refrigerator, and carry in the roast and potatoes, and then come back for the dish of beans. There's the cover to the dish. You'll find the table is all set."

Then turning to the girl she said:
"You may go to the refrigerator and get the butter. It's on a plate there, and the little pitcher of cream, also the pitcher of ice water. I got it ready before I went to church. You'll find the bread plate in that little tin cabinet in the pantry. The bread is all cut. I knew you'd be hungry when you got home from church. Now, I'll make the gravy and finish the coffee. I turned on the percolator the minute I came in."

It was just fun hurrying about under such able direction getting that delicious-looking meal on the table, laughing and talking as they worked.

Phil Pilgrim didn't need to be told to bring in the percolator and the gravy boat when they were ready, and Laurel had discovered the three pieces of pumpkin pie, the plate of delicate cheese cut in small inviting squares, the plates of pickles and olives and celery. In almost no time at all they were sitting down to the table.

~ Crimson Mountain
Grace Livingston Hill
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