Filled

Our life is so filled with friends. We are amazingly blessed with people who have invested in our lives— separately, as a couple and now as a family— and have been a source of strength and encouragement through this roller coaster ride. It’s humbling and very hard to know how we can ever be thankful enough! We celebrated the 80th birthday of our “Chicago Grandma”— Faith McInturff. She’s been to every special event in our lives since we were 8 or 9 and still threatens to jump in the car and drive to Ohio whenever we’re going to have a party! It was great to be able to celebrate with her. Not only did we see our Chicago Grandma, we also saw most of our adopted Chicago family. The three girl “cousins” have all had babies in the last year. The twin boys were also preemies who spent a lot of time in the NICU so having a friends like Kevin and Jill who have experienced some of the same things that we are currently has been more helpful than I can say. I kept thinking that God knew 20 years ago when our families became friends that Jill would have this opportunity to walk beside me through this time and she absolutely has—at least an email a week to encourage me or tell me that what’s happening is “normal”. Again, how am I so blessed? The kids and I spent three days at Lake Mohawk with Leigh (Wee-Wee) and her family. We absolutely needed to get away and spend some time with my sweet friend. Libby swam in the pool— one of her favorite words—and Leigh and Eric took Libby on their boat. Apparently she didn’t smile or talk the whole time but would say “more?” any time Eric slowed the boat down. A speed demon already! Will enjoyed lots of snuggles from them and had lots of naps in the sun! He was very fussy while we were there so Thursday I took him to the doctor. It turns out he has thrush! I had no idea what it looked like but now that I know, it was SO obvious and I feel bad that it took me four days to take him to the doctor. I hope his mouth is on the mend. The doctor did feel like he was a little hypotonic (floppy) in his upper body. He also doesn’t have great head control on his back. On his tummy, he lifts his head and moves it so I don’t know what do think. He’ll start PT, OT and Speech Therapy next week. It’s nice to have a plan but there’s always a reason to continue to pray for strength for THIS day and not the days that could be ahead. We’ve been able to see more friends, were blessed with meals until September 4th (almost four months of people caring for us in that way!), and have been able to get out of the house for walks around the neighborhood. I don’t know what we’ll do when the winter comes!