You may remember this picture on my sister Melissa's blog. There's a story behind it. I didn't want to share it on her blog, as I want to keep her blog about her and not about me.

When I was in Indy for a couple months, we were walking through a "Hobby Lobby" store. They have every decoration known to man in that store. I told her that I wanted to get a sign that said the word faith on it, and I wanted to set it next to an empty picture frame in my living room. For me, it signified holding out faith for our future child, a child that would actually live here on earth with us. I really felt like I should do this. We saw this sign, and I loved it. Miss, being the kind person she is, wanted to buy it for me.

So after she went into the hospital, I took the sign in for her room. This picture of it was in her hospital room when she had her chemo and bone marrow transplant.

When I returned to PA in March, I put the sign in my living room next to the empty picture frame. Some of you may have noticed it there. I placed a small empty picture frame next to it. It stayed just like that for the next two months, then we found out that another little one was on the way.

There is not power in the sign itself, but faith the size of a mustard seed goes a long way. And encouraging sisters are priceless! I hope I have and can continue to extend that same encouragement to her!

My Sister Melissa

Please pray for a miracle for her. She and Doug both need prayer for peace of heart, soul, and mind right now while their world is being turned upside-down.

www.danceintherainmelissa.blogspot.com

Please pass the word to all you know who believe in prayer! We need to stand in the gap for her now to try to beat this thing!

Remember WITH GOD ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE!!!!!

Thank you in advance, my friends!

Mother's Day

As kids while growing up, Mother's Day meant giving Mom a card that Dad had picked out for us. I remember seeing Dad give Mom a box of Russell Stover chocolates. Of course, I would sneak into it and try to claim all of my favorite cream flavors. (Not surprising, huh?)

Later, especially while I was in college, Mother's Day brought a phone call home to Mom and Grandma. I'm sure at least one time in there I apologized for not getting a card out in time. Across the miles and hours apart, you really grow to appreciate your family and loved ones.

And that is true even now, as we are 10 hours apart. I appreciate them even more and am so thankful for the blessings that they are.

In the past few years, Mother's Day took on a different meaning. It brought pain and was a reminder of what Mike and I wanted so badly. It meant watching others get recognized in church and standing up all around you as the mothers were recognized during the service.

Then last year, even after Tyler had left us, I was finally a mother on my first Mother's Day. It still wasn't a happy one obviously. I vowed that morning before church that if mothers were asked to stand during the service, that I would. Not standing would mean denyng my son. Fortunately, there was never a need for that. But I celebrated my son that day.

And this Mother's Day...

I celebrate something different...something new...a new thing...

Just a few days after posting "A New Thing" below, we found out that we are expecting another baby!

From that moment of finding out, we felt so many emotions. But I can tell you how I've been holding on to that verse that I posted below. Knowing that this is a new thing has already given me so much peace...peace replacing the doubt and fear that I had been feeling before. It was amazing to see how God gave me that verse right before I found out, to start preparing me and changing my emotions.

So now, this Mother's Day, we remember Tyler...

And we look toward the future with this new Baby we have been given now. This new life growing inside of me. I am thankful for every ounce of fatigue, every bit of sickness that I am starting to feel. It has already brought us so much joy!!!!!

And so much joy to get to share our "Mother's-Day news" with you!!!

Melissa

Please be praying for my sister, who has her 90 day post-BMT scan tomorrow. We celebrate that she has seen improvement over scans in the last couple months, but still, we all eagerly await the results of tomorrow's scan.

Read her words here.

Thank you!!!

A New Thing

About a month ago, I had a doctor's appointment. Being back at the same hospital where I had Tyler got me thinking about some things again. I walked out of the building afterwards...the same doors where I left when I was discharged a year and a half ago... and those fears from the past crept in. What if I were to get pregnant again? Will it be a healthy pregnancy? Will I have a baby that actually lives with me this time? These thoughts ran through my mind as I walked across the parking lot.

Heavy-heartedly, I got into my car. I turned the radio on, and heard a verse being read on WGRC--

"Forget the former things;

do not dwell on the past.

See, I am doing a new thing!"

(Isaiah 43:18-19)

Oh, sweet peace in these words!

I don't usually hear things like this on a daily basis, but what great timing from my Heavenly Father to hear this when I did. Thank you, God, for that! It just confirmed the peace for me that I had already been feeling lately...that a new thing is about to happen.

"There will be a day with no more tears,

no more pain, no more fears..."

(sung by Jeremy Camp)

Another "First"

This past Sunday morning during church, I could tell Mike had something on his mind. He was a little more serious-faced than usual. I asked him if something was wrong. He hesitated, shrugged, then said he would tell me later. Now, girls, any of you out there know that we cannot let that go. But I wish I had.

He leaned over to me and said, "Your due date was April 5th, right?"

I nodded.

Then I got it.

He would have been one year old this weekend had the preterm labor never happened.

I'm usually the one pretty good with rememebering dates, but this time I didn't. I tried to blink back the tears. It wasn't working. I slipped out for a minute, then came back in. Thought that did the trick, but it did not.

Why fight the tears at this point? I think people get used to see me crying.

I get flashes sometimes of the "would have been." And right then, I saw Mike holding our dark-haired, cute little boy. But then I looked over and saw Mike sitting, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, looking so sad.

You know, I've always wanted to be a mommy. I was the junior high kid that volunteered to help in the nursery, because that's how much I have always loved babies. But even stronger than that desire, is my desire to see Mike get to be a Daddy. He wants that so bad. And it would fill my heart with so much joy to someday get to see that happen for him.

The first Sunday of every other month is an annointing service. For anyone who is not familiar with this, it is not a healing service type-thing you would see on t.v. Anyone is invited to go forward for emotional, spiritual, or physical healing. The pastor stands down below the stage, annoints you with oil, and says a prayer for you. I told him why we were there...for continued healing for our loss... for the wound that never goes away, and to be blessed again with another baby someday.

After all we have been through, there is still hope. We still hope for another baby that will be healthy and live with us. People ask us if we are interested in adopting. I value the gift of adoption, but for now, it is not for us.

So, back to Sunday. After the annointing, others were praying with us up front. It's always an emotional prayer for me. Good thing the annointing is toward the end of the service, because given my puffy, "gone-into-the-ugly-cry" face, I felt better just leaving church after that.
As we were walking out, I could hear the words being sung at that point from the service. Words from a song that is hard for me to sing at times, yet freeing and releasing for me to sing as well. Mike and I both commented later how it could not have fit the moment more for us--

"You give and take away.
You give and take away.
My heart will choose to say,
Blessed be the name."

He gives and takes away. Now, nowhere in that tune is there a line that says you'll know why he takes away. I think that's way that song is hard to hear. It simply just says He gives and takes away, that's all. After what we've been through, that song can almost make me picture an unloving God that yanks things away after he dangles them like a carrot. The song makes me remember the times right after his death when we wondered why God never saved him. Why he allowed it to happen. Sometimes we struggle in wondering if God thought we would be bad parents. Yes, we know that's not true, but it's an honest thought.

But the song also reminds me of other things I've dealt with and decided through all this. Faith in God is not conditional on my circumstance. It is not dependent on whether I have the "warm fuzzies" in my heart or not.

So, my heart does still choose to say it. Because when the heart isn't automatically feelin' the good vibes in the down times, you can still make the choice to say it. You can still make the choice to believe in more than your pain.

You can still make the choice to press on, and HOPE. You can still make the choice to BELIEVE.

Because God is not done with us yet.

Trust me, this is not the end of our story.

"Be confident in this, that He who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it." Phil. 1:6

Coming Home Again

I will be very sad to say good-bye to my sister Missy on Wednesday morning. In fact, I'm trying to talk her into just knocking me out and putting me on a bus so we can skip the sadness. She's not okayed that plan yet...

But I will be so happy to see my awesome hubby Mike! Time and time again I am reminded just how thankful I am for him. He completely supported me as I took unpaid leave to spend the last couple months with my sister in Indiana. Not many husbands would be so unselfish to agree to that.

It seems like there are so many things that have happened in the past couple years with us that have definitely reminded me of how thankful I am for him. Turn up your volume and listen to this song. It's my song to him right now.

Some of the words...
"I'm lucky I'm in love with my best friend
Lucky to have been where I have been
Lucky to be coming home again
I'm lucky we're in love in every way
Lucky to have stayed where we have stayed
Lucky to be coming home someday..."

I'll see ya Wednesday night, babes!! I LOVE YOU!!!