Bath Time in January

My kids have always liked bath times....and now that they can be a lady bug and frog afterward it has gotten so much better. We almost always have baths on Monday nights for both of them and one other night for Sunshine alone. They get pretty silly!

 Princess is showing to be pretty photogenic!

The new songs

The new songs in the blog play list are from the movie Fireproof...I LOVE that movie! We watched it again last night and while I had some regular distractions that were not there when we went to the theater to see it (2 to be exact, AG & EE buy name) it was still amazing. I do hope that each and every one of you take the time as a couple to watch the movie together! Check it out!

1 and 6000

Does anyone remember back one year ago? Can you remember what you were doing? Can you remember what stage in life you were at? We do! It was a very traumatic time in our young lives. We had a 17 month old and a 14 month old, were 31 and 23 and planning our sons funeral! I know, you look at him today and it is very difficult to believe. I remember many of my thoughts, specifically wondering why God would have us go through miscarriages and failed adoptions just to have us bury the son we longed for. I wondered how my daughter would do when her brother was no longer with us. I thought about what we wanted incorporated into his service and what we wanted people to most remember about him. I worried that because we hadn't been able to finalize his adoption yet if the state would let us have his funeral. Jason and I talked about who we would have do the service. Jason was my pastor at the time and I wouldn't want him to have to officiate his sons services.

And almost over night this all went away, well not away but God allowed us to discover how to rebound from the deathbed and within a week he was talking, walking, eating, and gaining weight. A MIRACLE!

I cannot believe the amount of emotion that I struggled through during those difficult times, but I am thankful that God allowed us the opportunity to raise EE for Him and to have the chance to 'meet' him and get to know his silly but wonderful personality.

Being a Mama is my very favorite thing in the entire world and I pray that the Lord would allow us to work with the amazing Family to Family Adoption Inc. agency in Richmond Texas again sometime...sooner than later (hopefully!)

Please remember that Gods timing is most important above all of our hearts desires. We did not even know that we were going to be parents 48 hours before our daughter was born. We did not even know that our son existed until he was 6 days old and 15 minutes before he came home with us! If we would have planned things we would have planned thing much differently...but now that this is the way God has paved our path we would not change it for anything!

Back to the title....it means ONE miracle and SIX THOUSAND visits to LOVEBEINGMAMA.BLOGSPOT.COM! Thanks to the faithful readers...feel free to let me know you are there by way of comments!

Happy Valentines Day!!!

I know that this is picture from Christmas, but it was send to me in an email and had not beeen shared on the blog yet...SO, our family would like to wish you all a Happy Valentines Day!

Some closure

*Lots of reading ahead...

As many of you may or may not know, I have been working with a ministry here in town called the Bella Pregnancy Center. They help expecting ladies with things like pregnancy tests, ultrasounds, counseling, Earn while you Learn which affords them the chance to learn about being a parents and needs of a developing child and they can in turn 'buy' donated items through the Mommy Money or Daddy Dollars they acquire with their 'homework.'

Anyway, I have just been a part of the fundraising committee so far. They do most things through volunteers, but do have a few people on staff including a nurse to perform the ultrasounds.

Well this starts the part that I want to share my thankfulness for. Tuesday evening we had a fundraising meeting, the first I have been able to attend since November because of the move, and I was able to be early. (I know, me early..not usually!) But, it just so happened they had another meeting before our meeting in which they invite community members in to share what the ministry does, inform them of how they operate, and give them a tour of the building they have been blessed with. I got there in time to jump in on the tour. Now in the last few months that I hadn't been able to be there, quite a few things had changed. But where my story really starts is when we stopped by the ultrasound room. Jodi, the nurse, was talking about what she would generally do with a client and walking us through it. She got to the point of bringing out the little true to life babies from different stages of development in the womb. She passed a baby of somewhere around 30 or 35 weeks of development around. It was incredible! The baby was actual weight and the features (eyes, ears, nose) were all so detailed. But then she went backwards, and I was able to see a baby at 8 weeks of development. No one in that room could have even understood how speechless I suddenly was.

That baby was not just a blob of tissues like my doctor of the time led me to believe. That baby was slightly smaller than my thumb (I do have small fingers) and you could see the perfect little toes, the arms, details in the face...now I do believe that life starts at conception, but NO ONE ever helped me understand just HOW developed our little babies were! After the rest of the group moved on to the next room I strayed back into that room to have a closer look at that little baby. I know that one day I will be able to see my babies in heaven, but for someone who at that time had no children and wanted to be a mom SO bad....I counted this a blessing. It was the closest to understanding what was going on so many years ago.

I had to confess my deeds of sneaking back in to the director and the nurse after our fundraising meeting. I went to tell Jodi that I was so thankful for getting to be a part of the tour because no doctor had ever taken the time to explain t me what my baby was like, they only talked to me about the post miscarriage details. I couldn't hold back the tears, I still cannot...she couldn't either. She has had at least two successful pregnancies, but she had also had 5 miscarriages in between.

I am thankful to have seen that tiny little baby that day. I am thankful for the sense of closure it gives to know that I have not been crazy this whole time to think that I have babies in heaven and hold to that fact. I am thankful for the little conversation that the nurse an I had that evening with few words but it spoke so much. This again just shows me a way of how God takes care of the small things in our lives. I didn't have to be early to that meeting, I didn't HAVE to be at that meeting at all. I could have lived the rest of my life without this connection to our 4 precious lives that my wonderful husband and I created, but God didn't allow that. Instead he gave me this chance, that opportunity to come as close to holding our little ones as I could have ever come with them being so tiny.

I am sorry for the wordy post, but this 'Thankful Thursday' post is a great way to start in my book...I am thankful, as a mother, to have had the opportunity to have a small, but mighty, connection with our 4 babies nearly 4-5 years later! (December 14th 2003, August 20th 2004, January 20th 2005, & April 26th 2005)

***This is a picture of an 8 week old baby in the womb. See more pictures at this site. The one below is one from the same place, but I thought it was too cute since we do sign language in our home. The firs baby is signing 'owl' and the second is signing 'I love you.'

Husband & Wife

1. When is your engagement anniversary: January 3rd, 2002

2. When is your marriage anniversary: August 10th, 2002 (7 months & 7 days from getting engaged!)

3. How long have you known your spouse: About 8 years

4. Did you have a cute or otherwise funny part of your getting together: I told him that I loved him before we were even together...or at least I wrote him that I loved him!

5. How long did you date/court before you were engaged: About 7 months

6. Where did you meet your spouse for the first time: At FBC in Elkton

7. What is your spouse's full name: Jason Daniel

8. Do you have any children yet? We have 4 babies in heaven and 2 wonderful adopted children!

9. Do you have any house pets: Not any more 8-(

10. What does your spouse do for a living: He is an Electrician

11. Do you live in the country or town/city: We are just out of the city limits

12. What is one of your favorite activities together: Car shopping, though we will always buy our vehicles from Goodrich Motors and we are not in the market!

13. Do you have a favorite vacation spot: It used to be the Black Hills, but we live here now...I did really enjoy our Chicago trip last June and look forward to our Tennessee trip in a couple of years.

14. How many siblings (including in-laws): I have Zach & wife Christy, Robin & finance Rick, Jason has Jeremy & wife Jennie, and Melissa & husband Eric .

15. What church do you attend: At this moment we are looking for a church, but have been attending North Point Christian Church

16. Are you of the same faith as your spouse: Yes

17. What town is your current address: Spearfish

18. Do you work or stay at home: Both, I run Pumpkin Patch Daycare out of our home!

19. Where did you honeymoon: THE BLACK HILLS...haahaaha

20: Leave a piece of marriage advice: ALWAYS, be yourself!

So Excited!

I am so excited for this Friday to come! I know it is Friday the 13th, but it marks a very special day for this family! It is the day we are going to take back the status of a FAMILY! We are going to go to a hotel & indoor water park for Valentines weekend! I couldn't be more excited about spending Valentines Day with my wonderful Husband AND my children! It is a long time in coming and this time we are not just checking in one night and checking out the next morning either! I will give you a review of what I think of the Dakotas largest indoor water park after this weekend, until then...enjoy the fun pictures and check out the hotels site!

Photo Shoot

Last February I did a photo shoot for Princess & Sunshine to put on their Valentines and with the stress of moving I had to focus on something happy....SO, on the 9th of Jan I decided to give it a whirl again! While I still treasure those pics, I love some of the shots I got this time as well! All for different reasons, they captured who the kids are at this point and time...enjoy!

This is one of my favorites of Sunshine of the day! Not sure what it is about it, I just like it A LOT! This is what you get when you ask him to smile these days
Or the more modest closed mouth grin

Roar!!!

Not a yawn, just another silly smile

He cracks me up

Then we have Miss Dance

She was telling Sunshine that he should come and SIT DOWN!

Is this CHEESE or what?!?

She is a poser...can you tell she is my daughter?

Such a beautiful little princess

Miss Dance

Givin' some love

They were ready to be finished, but in all seriousness...they were trying to pose here, I don't remember what I asked for but it wasn't gangsta & pouty!

Their attempt to be 'professional!'

Pretty cute kids! Sunshine looks better now because he got a hair cut, maybe I will work on new pictures next week...

When you ask them to tell stories they get on their tummy like this, I asked them to tell each other stories and it made for some precious pics!

Over...

and over...

and over AGAIN! I could go on, but decided to stop at 3

Then Miss Dances moves fill her cup and overflow into Sunshine every once in a while

They like to hold hands...ever since we watched the J.on & K.ate P.lus 8 a while back when they saw some of the sextuplets doing it!

Sunshine cheese again!

I asked Princess to put her arm around her brother

It is difficult to get BOTH of them to look at the camera at the SAME time! A cute pic none the less

And one of random fun to finish the post!

EEs sleeping arrangements!

This is from early January, I always go in to check on the kids before J & myself go to bed for the night. I had to get my camera to take a picture of this one!

Working on the 'new' house

On Saturday January 3rd we worked on the house as a family...Princess and I had dance that morning and we brought McD's for lunch. Sunshine was sleeping so he got his later...here we have Princess & Daddy eating together! You almost wouldn't even be able to guess which part of the house this was anymore, it doesn't look that same! The kids wanted to help some how and so I put paint on their noses and it made them happy!

New Years Eve Sunset

The sunset on New Years Eve awe struck me. It seemed almost funny, actually. It was so beautiful, God's way of closing 2008 was amazing! Which to me was kind of comical since our life was upside down! We were just 3 weeks away from moving and had a ton of work to do on the new house, still had packing & cleaning to do at the old house. We didn't get it as clean at the old house as we would have liked, but how were we to get EVERYTHING done in 40 days? I feel terrible that it was not spic n span when we closed the door for the last time, if God can take 2008 and close it this beautifully...why then, did we not have enough time to close the door on a beautifully clean house? I do hope that the people of First Baptist Church can forgive us for the fact that we left a few bread crumbs in the cupboards or a few nicks in the paint from moving. We did want to clean that all up for them, but as I said...we just didn't have enough days!

But as I look back at these pictures I am thankful...thankful to our Heavenly Father that He is in control. I was intending on starting a new meme yesterday...Thankful Thursday! This was going to be my post, just not enough hours in the day!

It was almost as if this was a reminder to us that the while 2008 was a bunch of Craziness, God is our calm in the storm. I look forward to what 2009 has in store for us.

**I have noticed that some of my pictures from another blog of mine are being taken and used, so from now on the pictures on the blog will have a stamp on them!

December 28th, 2008

The Sunday after Christmas we went with Handsome's family to his parents church. It is difficult going back that direction as we have 2 churches we go between, both of our families, and many MANY friends that we like to spend time with. This time all of his family were going to be there, minus his brother whom had to work. We were going to try and get a picture of all the cousins since the last cousins picture I have is before the last three cousins were born ~ but we were not able to corral everyone all at the same time. I do believe later that day there was a cousins picture taken minus our kids as we ate lunch with my family.

Here we have Princess talking to some of the wonderful people at the church. And the people at Handsome's parents church are WONDERFUL...before my bloggy days they threw us a surprise baby shower when Princess was a month old. The wonderful things that they gave to us, I will never forget! She received her first pair of Levi's, a beautiful hand knit blanket, many MANY beautiful tiny dresses, dolls, blankets, sleepers and fun baby items! Oh the fun it was! I didn't know how to take it. This church is so helpful to many people and they do it with smiles on their face for the glory of God!

So the only pictures I took that day were of Princess, hopefully I will get caught up here sooner than later and get to the pictures of our new house!

We spent EEs 2nd birthday with Jason's family celebrating the birth of our wonderful Savior! I never remember to take very many pictures when with them because of all the commotion around.

Here we have Eric, Melissa (and Baby Girl), & Sophie! Looking at the book Grandma Hartung gave her.

Sophie waiting for her next gift

Little Katia, the youngest cousin until March 31st when she gives up her title

Nadia, Grete Lace, Alexa (behind GL), Katia, & Jennie

(Jason's brother, Jeremys wife and girls)

My birthday boy! I wish I could have gotten a picture of him from the front...he had this adorable Birthday Boy shirt with a truck and its bed full of birthday cake and candles! It was very cute, thanks Aunt Wendy!

My handsome man again on his birthday!