O Love That Will Not Let Me Go

As I am finishing my 30th week of pregnancy I am SO happy to say that Walt is doing well. He had a great check-up, but because he is so active I entered the doctor's office far from nervous. He kicks so hard! He is stubborn though because as soon as his daddy's hand goes to feel him kick, he stops! He is already a momma's boy!

As we bring the summer to a close and August slowly approaches, my family is dealing with so many emotions. Yes, we are all excited about Walt coming, but his arrival will never take away the broken heart that we all have from losing our sweet Magdalena. August will always be so hard for that reason. I think that I am getting worse about dealing with people, situations, and just life in general. On top of being sad, tired, and hugely pregnant, I am on the edge and irritable. I say this because Noah wrote in the last post how nice it was to have Kim come and stay with me, but really it was a huge sacrifice for her to deal with me for a full week. Not only did I freeze her out of the house, she saw me at my worst. People usually won't want to see this side, this extreme, so I avoid it at all costs. But poor Kim. She got a week full of it. (Thanks for being a true blue friend, Kim!) I know that very soon I will be going back to work, and although this will be hard physically, I am ex...

This past week I went with a group from Huntsville, AL to Merida, Yucatan, Mexico on a mission trip. It was very hard to have to leave Julie for a whole week, but God was very gracious to both of us. Julie's friend, Kim (pictured), came in to stay with her all week and they had a great time hanging out with with their friend Aimee. I am so glad that Julie has such wonderful friends to be there for her. God really does provide for us and meets our needs! I had an amazing time in Merida. It was so great to be able to see the old city where I lived for so long and where Julie and I spent our first year of marriage. As I drove around the city on various errands, it was very emotional for me as so many great memories came rushing back. Merida was already quite large but is growing steadily and prospering which is nice to see, but all of the new buildings and construction had me confused at times. The group that I went with is from First Presbyterian Church  and they are an amazing ...

Today I am officially 28 weeks and 2 days, but Walt is growing so well that he is three days ahead measuring 28 weeks and 5 days. He is about 2 pounds 14 ounces, which puts him in the 58 percentile. Noah and I were so glad to see that sweet little face of his, and it is obvious that he is going to be a very active little guy. Now, I begin going to see the doctor every two weeks (until week 36 when I begin going every week), but unfortunately there are unlikely to be anymore sonograms. We will have to wait to see exactly what he looks like when he makes his grand entrance. As of now we are not sure whether or not he has Noah's little nose like Magdalena did, or if he will have a nose similar to those on my side of the family. He does have a little hair that we found on the back of his head! How cute!

The Ronald McDonald House sent us this picture of Noah when he dropped off the first batch of pop tabs. Now we have just as many so it is time to go again! (on the floor you can see a huge garbage bag full too!) This is amazing! And I am so excited about all of the families that will benefit from everyone collecting their tabs! My bean story... To liven up the summer I am cooking much more than I normally do (before I rarely cooked), and I am trying new recipes! Well, I found a recipe for apple, raisin oatmeal that cooks overnight in the crockpot. I was so excited about it because I just knew that Noah would love it! When he got home from work we went to Kroger to get two ingredients that I needed. Neither of us knew what a vanilla bean was, but we knew we needed it for the oatmeal. We ended up laughing in the isle becaue ONE bean was $11! We had no idea, and for a new recipe we didn't want to risk it. We kept thinking that maybe the oatmeal needed just a piece of the b...

Noah and I are still in the process of looking for the perfect grave marker for sweet Magdalena. It is hard for us to really spend a lot of time on it, and I don't think that either of us likes looking or thinking so long about it. All we know right now is that it needs to have balloons on it. When learning that we needed some help thinking about it, Magdalena's Gigi immediately recognized that we needed to put balloons on it. That is one of the most perfect items to describe her. She loved her balloons! But through tears today I was looking again and came across this poem that I thought I would share. I have to stop looking for now. It is just too hard, but reading these words was a good reminder. I'M FREE Don't grieve for me, for now I'm free I'm following the path God laid for me. I took His hand when I heard him call; I turned my back and left it all. I could not stay another day, To laugh, to love, to work or play. Tasks left undone must ...

I never realized just how big I was until I saw this picture. As I watched the numbers on the scale increase I guess I thought all of the weight was hidden, but between the the weight gain and the swelling it was bound to show. It will all be worth it when I finally get to hold sweet Walt in my arms! Walt spent his first 4th of July celebration in Georgia, where Noah grew up. With all that has been going on in our lives, Noah and I haven't been able to visit in a while, but all of the details fell into place for us to go. I knew that traveling pregnant was going to be hard, but the night before we left I couldn't sleep. I kept thinking of all of the things that could go wrong while we were gone and what could happen to Magdalena's things. It is silly because you can't prevent such things from taking place, but I realized that there was nothing else in the house that I cared about except for what I have in 3 large Tupperware containers, pictures, and videos. Thos...

As I promised earlier, here are some of the pages from Magdalena's scrapbook. I have only gotten to her pre-birth photos! There are going to be many pages once I get to see her sweet little face in the book! If you have a favorite scrapbook book page that I could get an idea from, please, send it to me. I am not very creative so I am always looking for ideas!