Trusting Him

I’m not one to worry about the weather. I’ve grown up hearing my Grandparent’s along with my mom and dad’s stories of the tornadoes they were in throughout their lives.  In college (I think or high school) a tornado touched down not even a mile from our house, it just missed us leaving only small debre in our yard. I’ve honestly just never been afraid. In fact I find the weather exciting. When the sirens go off most times that means in my head “Lets go outside and see what is going on”. Anyone else reading this from the Midwest don’t judge me, you do it also! :) However, over this last week the Lord has definitely been testing my faith.

Joplin Missouri is only about 2 hours from here and the devastation is just incredible. I have a few friends who’s family live there and lots of them are either dead, homeless or still missing. It’s some of the saddest conversations I’ve ever had with anyone. The part that has bothered me the most is how the hospital in that city was torn apart. I know tornadoes can do whatever they please but I honestly never thought they would take out a hospital I guess. We practice "Code Grey" at the hospital often (it's called when tornado warnings go into play) but really, who really thinks actual damage will be done. The hospital that was hit is one of our sister hospitals and the stories we keep hearing are horrific! All I keep thinking about is how I would ever be able to stay in nurse mode working, not able to go home and be with my family. As I try to wrap my brain around that sole thought the Lord continually has been asking me, "How much do you trust me? Where is your faith?" It was so easy to trust when it was just Mike and me, but now with Brody, it's a whole nother story. God promises to take care of us, I know that. If that means on this earth or with Him, because we have a relationship with Him, we will be fine. I can only do so much to protect my son, ultimately he is the Lord's and I have to remember that. I need to stop worrying and begin clinging to His words, "May the God of hope fill you with joy and PEACE as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit."

All this to say, last night there was more bad weather. Again Mike needed to keep reminding me that I had to trust the Lord. The sirens went off and for the first time I think in my life we took shelter. Mike, Brod, Gunner, Trig and I crammed into our bathroom (it's the center most room in our home)  and waited out the storm for about 30 minutes. The storm passed and we were fine :) Thank you Jesus! I do wish I would have snapped a picture of all of us. I still don't know how we crammed into the bathtub. Also earlier this week Mike and I developed an emergency plan involving a family contact person in Iowa and a place to meet if Mike and I were separated. Hopefully we will never need this plan...but we are ready! :)

Finally below is some pics we had taken while we were in Iowa last month with my sweet niece and nephew. Enjoy :)

Sick

I'm not sure what I was thinking but I truly believed that when you became a mother all sickness just disappeared from you. Well.....I got a great dose of how wrong I was this week! Monday morning I woke up sicker than sick! I had it all fever, chills, vomiting and other things I don't care to mention. Lets just say the whole day I was either in bed or camped out in the bathroom! Thankfully Mike was able to work from home and hang out with the B man. It just killed me hearing that sweet little boy play and laugh and not being able to kiss, tickle or love on him. Mike is a great nurse though! He definitely wins the prize for Mr. Mom! He did it all! Laundry, dishes, Brod's bath, kept the house picked up, various runs to the store for Sprite, Gatorade and soup, and yet still had time to hand me a cold rag every time I visited the bathroom! I'm so thankful for such a great husband! The fever broke Monday night, Mike took the morning off yesterday as I was gaining some strength back, I still napped every time Brody layed down and today...well we are almost back to normal. I'm having a hard time eating/drinking anything but I'm forcing it down due to my poor son needs to continue to eat meaning I need to produce an adequate milk supply for him. So all in all we will all survive! Needless to say....YES....mommas do get sick and how cruddy it is!! But with a great and loving husband it's not the end of the world :) I'm not sure why the Lord has blessed me with such a perfect guy, but I'm beyond thankful for him!

Mother's Day

My first Mother's Day was fun. I surprisingly didn't have to work but Mike did (big bummer!) being a Sunday. B decided to sleep in an extra 30 minutes longer so I enjoyed a great cup of coffee on the patio while reading my Bible. I couldn't of asked for a better beginning to the day! Once B woke up, I dressed him in a onesie that seemed very fitting ;) (See pic below) and headed to church. After church we went out to lunch at one of my favorite Chinese places. Once home, I opened a very sweet card that Brod made along

a hummingbird feeder! The feeder is something I've always wanted but never really thought of getting until B was born and I began imagining the fun we would have watching the tiny birds drink out of it this summer. We'll see if it works out as planned. If not, I know I'll have fun at least ;) Mike then told me to go take a nap (one of my all time favorite things to do!!!). I quickly ran off to our room where I slept for 2 hours! Once waking up completely refreshed, we all went on a walk and then off to small group. What a great day! I love being a mom and am so glad the Lord has blessed me with such a perfect boy! 

A growing boy

The Brodster had his 4 months appointment yesterday. He weighs in at 13 pounds and 7.5 oz and is 23 inches long (I think). He continues to hang out in the 25% for height and weight. He received two more shots :( but did so much better this time around. We gave him 2 does of Tylenol yesterday and that's all he needed! Praise the Lord because last month he was fussy the rest of the week and Mike and I were both on the edge of a meltdown.

We forgot a blanket for the sweet man and he gets striped down to his diaper and it was a bit cold in the room. We thought daddy's jacket would be the perfect remedy :)

The last week we've noticed that B was not satisfied by any amount of milk he received. He woke up every night (which is highly unusual) and would scream his little head off as soon as he sucked me dry. We ended up giving him additional frozen milk in a bottle to try to satisfy him. All week I thought I was failing at giving my son adequate milk and I hated thinking he needed a bottle after nursing because I wasn't good enough. I pumped and pumped like crazy to get my already dripping like a cow milk supply up more. We were very glad we had a Dr. appointment coming up. So all to say we brought our concerns to the Dr. Low and behold we leaned Brody is simply showing classic signs of being ready for food!! Who would have thought?! First timers!! We hurried off to buy some rice cereal for our starving son. Again, these first timers are so naive! Who would have thought there were a million different types of rice cereal?! Whole wheat, regular, apple, banana, etc!!! Thankfully an experienced mom was in our same aisle laughing as she overhead Mike and I in panic over these dumb cereals. Needless to say we settled with the plain old original rice cereal.

We waited until almost bedtime to feed our son his first bite of food. Rice cereal is a hit with the B man (not a hit with his momma though, don't judge me, yuk!!) He's a pro at eating, we never had any doubts though :) This rice is also a fan of filling B's belly, all three of us had a very sleep filled night! Well I guess at 4:30 am I woke to B chatting with his friend monkey on his bumper in his crib for about 15 minutes before re falling asleep. Such social boy!

It was a beautiful afternoon today and my pasty white skin wanted to get out an enjoy it. So B and I made a fun little fort for him to play in. Success! He was happy and I was happy :)

Four months

There aren't too many changes from three months to four months expect for:

• We look for a new love rolls daily on you :) Your such a chunk!
• You now have fun during tummy time.
• Lately, you have no clue what a stranger is. You will chat it up with anyone who is willing to listen. You become bashful though quickly or you turn on your flirting charm ;)
• You love, love, love being outside! 
• Anything and everything goes into your mouth. You have quite the slobber gobbers coming out of you mouth also. Lots of times we resort to placing a bib on you to save your clothes :)
• Your so close to rolling over! You just need a bit of a nudge from us and your over. The look on your face in priceless. You get so happy!
• You had your first few giggles!
• You hold things great in your hands and can bring everything straight to your mouth (your so smart!).

 The look of innocence.

The classic hand in the mouth.

 Grandma K made this Noah's Ark blanket for Brod. He loves looking at the ark. It's such a great opportunity to tell him all about Noah's Ark.

 

Trig and B have finally become friends!!!

 He loves looking at this picture book. There is a pic of a monkey he is looking at and Brod can never stop talking to him. His face lights up as soon as the page is turned to his monkey friend.