You never know....

Monday: Well, you never can tell just what life will hold, can you?  Just a few days after posting my upcoming announcement post...Here...where I specifically announced that I was NOT pregnant...I found to my shock and disbelief  Sunday, December 20th that I most certainly WAS pregnant.  Very ironic, no?  On Wednesday, I started spotting and without TMI ...it turned into more. Though I still wasn't certain that I lost the baby. Monday, I had a sonagram which was inconclusive....could've been too early...then I went for blood work to check my levels...but my gut feeling was that we lost the baby.  I took like 3 First Response Tests that say pregnant...and yesterday I took two Answer brand tests that say pregnant (though the line is fainter)2 Walgreens tests that say "negative"...maybe a faint line on one of them...so who knows...my cycle has been super irregular lately...so I wouldn't be sure until the blood tests came back, Tuesday morning...or I'll have to wait and go back and test again.  I know a lot of women experience miscarriage.  Thankfully, up until this point I have not. 

My first reaction to my pregnancy was shock, happy, shock, scared (remember I have 4 already)...shocked again...then acceptance...and happy again...and planning...or rather re-planning...I like to do that...plan.  I like to know what is going on...and God continually reminds me that I need to live more in the moment.  Since Wednesday, I have been wondering what's happening...this isn't what my body experienced with the other children.  So I've had a few days to accept the possibility of a miscarriage...

One surprising thing about this situation, and I believe because people are praying for me, is my peacefulness at the out come.

Tuesday: As I suspected my levels were way down. Only a 9...but after 5 positive maybe more pregnancy tests...a week & a half ago...it should be MUCH MUCH higher.  The doctor is sure I had a miscarriage.  I was fine until I talked to Matt.  Then I broke down.  This has been much harder that I thought it would be.

When I first found out I was pregnant, I wasn't devastated, but I wasn't jumping off the walls with joy and excitement either.  Like I said on Monday, I was shocked, and in utter disbelief.  I would even go so far as to say disappointed.  Maybe that sounds very un-motherly to you, but I am the mother of 4 my youngest being 9 months old...I am about to start school...and while more babies might have been God's plan...it certainly wasn't mine.  HOWEVER, I quickly accepted my circumstances and thanked God for the little one growing inside of me...and sincerely decided to make the best of it.  Reluctant acceptance quickly turned into excitement and happiness...imagining how this little person would fit into our lives...and looking forward to continuing to experience God's provision for our family both financially as well as how I would handle having the strength, patience and grace to raise now 5 children.  I had the picture in my mind that we were no longer a family of 6, but of 7.

 Wednesday: It has amazed me that I can already love and accept  and grieve a child that I wasn't planning...and with all honesty didn't really want in the first place.  Strange, this motherhood.  So I am sad, I am grieving  a child I won't know...thankful to God that this happened sooner than later...and thankful that it wasn't traumatic, as I understand it can be.  I am thankful, this experience didn't come when we were planning our family--it would be a much harder process.  I guess God knows what I can and cannot handle.  This is just another part of my story and so far the lesson for me is...that God's plan is not necessarily my plan...and I need to allow for HIS change in my plans.

Doing Christmas

My friend Mary over at Giving Up On Perfect is doing, or did do...this little Carnival, that I am a little late on, but better late than never, right Mary?  (See...I'm giving up on perfect...he he.) So, I love hearing how other people do Christmas. You can read some stories on how other people are giving up on a perfect Christmas here. 

Anyway, I especially like hearing what those with several children do to make it special, and those challenged with doing Christmas on a tight budget do.    I love hearing stories of those families that take the plunge and do something really meaningful, like take the amount of money they would spend, and give it to those in need.  I think that's really brave and humble, and hard.  We aren't one of those families.  We haven't gotten there.  I think it would be really neat to do when the kids are older and could understand better the true meaning of Christmas and what a gift God has given us through Him.  But not yet.

Now that we have 4 children we have to be even more budget conscience than before.  We started a new tradition, and it may change over the years, but for the past 2 years we've given the children 3 presents each.  My thought was...that young children could understand the concept of the 3 wise men giving baby Jesus 3 gifts, so if 3 gifts were good enough for Jesus, than 3 gifts could be good enough for them.  So we give our Children 3 gifts on Christmas morning.  Santa also brings each of them 1 gift. (That's another issue that I won't get into now...)

I love Christmas stockings, don't you?  My mom was the best at finding neat girlie things to put in them.  My husband's family tradition is to put an orange in them...so we do that too.  This year I decided I wanted to revamp the Stocking stuff...because I usually over do it, and probably will again, but I'm trying.  So stockings this year consist of new undies, socks, lip smackers (for the girls), $5 in dollar store items each, candy cane, special small toy--like a hot wheels for Miles, and this year I'm making them each a Christmas Ornament.  I'd like to give them one each year to take when they get married.  I don't think I made it any simpler, did I?

I miss Christmas with my family back home.  They are having our Christmas party tonight with my cousins and Mimi & PopPop. Christmas Eve has become our own time, which I am loving.  Like my family when I was little, we got new PJ's the night before Christmas...we do that for our children and now we get a new movie, this year it will be "UP" and watch it on Christmas Eve together with popcorn and hot cocoa.

Christmas Morning with a house full of young children is well, there's nothing like it!  We open stockings and presents and make a huge mess, and while I miss going up to my parents and having brunch and lazily laying around their house--full of laughter, cheer...now I make brunch for my family and we have more than enough laughter & cheer to go around.  It's different now, and it's not perfect...but it's good.  Still good.

The Announcement

So, maybe it's not a huge announcement to you...but it is a big deal for me.  In less than a month, I will be going back to school.  I have wanted to finish school for a very long time, but really had no direction.  I never felt any leading from the Lord one way or the other.  I never had any direction on "what I want to do when I grow up".  But now I do, and I'm going for it.  So it will take me a good amount of time to finish... Since I have children and a household to take care of and anything could happen in between, right.  This semester I'll be taking 4 classes.  I've decided to get my Bachelors in Nursing.  I had a whole year of pre-requisites under my belt, but unfortunately only 3 will transfer into the Nursing Program I want to do.  God Willing, my goal is to finish my degree in the next 5 years...I'm pretty sure that's doable, don't you?  Eventually, I think I'd like to be a Nurse Practitioner. Which means that after a few years of clinical work I would go back for a Master's degree.  But, I'm taking it one semester at a time...so we'll see.  Wish me luck...

Only 8 days til Christmas...Really?

For just about every one this time is super busy!  I can't believe it's been 2 weeks since I posted.  Best to just get a notification when and if I blog, right?  We had a wonderful time with my Mother-in-law.  She was here from Dec. 2-7th.  We all enjoy having her here.  It just barely snowed while she was here, so the kids thought that was cool.  Matt took a day off and we went  to Fredricksburg, Tx.  It's a really cool town with lots of neat shops, restaurants and even a WWII museam...Fredricksburg looks like a quaint little German town, they have a "Christmas Market" and a parade of lights the 1st Saturday of the month of December.  I wanted to go, but we had other commitments later that evening.  It was a great drive and the kids were pretty good (until the very end anyway--but I'll take what I can get) and we decided this might need a second trip back at some point.

We put up our Christmas Tree just before Nana got here...and I spent a couple of days cleaning up and decorating around the house for Christmas.  The children picked out colored icle lights to put up around the house, and everything is very festive.  Miles, otherwise known as the crazy little guy, asks every day for a toy...and everyday I tell him he must wait until Christmas.  It has been a VERY long wait for him!  Time is a hard concept for 4 and 5 year olds!  Two days ago his teacher sent home a simple countdown project they had made.  It has really helped Miles understand that Christmas isn't SOOOOO far away!  Anyone could do this project, and if I had known about it sooner, I would have made it myself.  This will definately be on the list of "Things to do"...  Here are the basics:

Make a construction paper chain.  Staple it to a larger "Christmas Shape".  The Shape also had a cute poem about Santa on it with instructions to pull one link off each day, and when you get to the top...it will be Christmas! It's a great visual for impatient kids.  Well, I've got a sick one home today, and having someone come to watch her and the baby while I go to the dentist (again) today...so I must go for now  but I do have other exciting news to share in the next few weeks (NO I AM NOT PREGNANT!)....so stay tuned.

I know I just posted this picture...but I just like it! A LOT!  We don't get many of ourselves lately...so this was special ( and we learned to use the timer on the camera, YAY!)

You have to know by now...that I am super inconsistent.  I really try hard to be consistent, but with 4 kids, husband...well, let's just say I'm consistently, inconsistent.  What I'm getting at, was that I really thought I could post about the The Love Dare every-other day, but with the holiday's and all of that...it's just darn near impossible.  I'm also slightly behind.  Still on day 12, and to be honest, some of the days don't have enough info or "emph" to have anything special to share.  I continually have to be more thoughtful of my husband and meet his needs...one of the dares was basically to write down all of his "pros & cons"  (a little late for that, I thought).  The next day we were to burn the "cons" paper.  It's been very thought provoking and helped me to be more intentional.  I'll keep sharing as I do the love dare, but it won't be every-other day...I need more realistic goals.  More like once a week and more if there is something that really pops out at me.

Hope you like the Christmas Decorations Here!  Thanks to April!  Check out her blog, she's having a FAB giveaway over there!

A Feast of Thanks

This was my beeeautiful Thanksgiving Table...eat your heart out Martha!

 

Napkin rings were from last year's Turkey Day project (check out the table last year) toilet paper rolls, construction paper, glitter...yay!  This year we made Turkey/fingerprint place cards from Disney's Family Fun Website.

We had a fabulous Thanksgiving day.  We woke up and made monkey bread...The Bean & The Crazy Little Guy...helped.

It was really not a super stressful day...I prepared all the cassaroles & veggies the day before, so I was able to enjoy Thanksgiving Day.  I cooked for me & my family & my mom.  That's it.

The Menu:

Turkey

Mimi's Homemade Stuffing

Greenbean Casserole

Mashed Potatos

Candied Sweet Potato 

Gravy

Quinny's Stuffed Cranberry Sauce

Dinner Rolls

Pumpkin Pie

It was delicious if I do say so myself!

 The Next Day we went hiking in the Texas Hill Country!  It was one of the Best Days we've had on a family outing.  I am thankful for God's love & salvation and his generous blessing in my life...my family.  I am thankful for a wonderful husband who loves me and treats me like a queen and 4 beautiful, happy (well, sometimes) & healthy children.