missing dad

Early yesterday morning Bill was off to school for the week. Jennifer is sort of beside herself when her dad is away. Dad has only been gone two days and I bet I've been asked at least twenty-five times, each day, if dad is coming home. When I tell Jen that dad is not coming home and that he is at school, her response is always the same, "Dad no school!" A few times she will look at me and say "I see dad at school." I think she figures if we can go see dad at school then he will come home, makes sense to me.

So in memory of missing dad this week here are some of my favorite recent pictures of Bill and the girls. This took place one evening after supper. Bill reading the girls a book, with lots and lots of giggling happening.

I love this one! Mikayla is sort of attacking Jennifer. Jennifer thought it was great!
The house is just a little quieter without dad home...

sleepy girls

We often have people ask us if Jennifer ever sits still, if she ever stops moving. Last week she was not feeling so well so we got proof that yes she does, ever once in a while, sit still. We were eating supper and this is what Jennifer looked like towards the end. She was wiped out and could not even sit up anymore. For those of you that really know Jennifer you know this is rare site. Rarely does she simply lay her head down and act this tired. Thankfully she is feeling much better!

The next day as we were playing outside Mikayla was so tired she fell asleep in her swing! Kind of cute actually. She is not a big napper but after some time outside and falling asleep in the swing she slept for almost two hours, not to worry I took her out of her swing after the pictures so she napped in her crib.

one year ago

I must admit as I sit here to type this post I find myself wondering if I should type it or not. But yet what happened a year ago had a huge impact on our lives and a year ago it pretty much consumed our blog, so I decided I share a little of what's on my heart.

It was a year ago today that we were driving as quickly as we could to get to Michigan. Our son was being born and we could not wait to get there to hold him and love on him. Today Caleb James turns a year old. This week I have been replaying the events that took place a year ago over in my mind. I keep thinking that we should be planning a birthday party for our little boy. Yet, we are not. Instead I find myself wondering if he is having a birthday party today and who he is celebrating with. There are lots of emotions I find myself going through, it is a hard place to be let me tell you.

A lot happened while we were in Michigan for that week. It was one of the hardest things Bill and I have ever been through. It is one of the hardest things we will probably ever have to go through. We had to walk through each and every moment asking God to direct our next step. It is amazing how He did direct our every step, as hard as some of those steps were.

I think people often wonder if we would go through the experience again, knowing what the end result would be. The answer to that is tough. The pain we felt was great, we had loved on our son for almost a week and then we had to hand him over to our social worker. I don't know that I ever want to experience that sort of pain again. Yet, we had one week to love on our son, to hold him, to treat him like he was ours. I would go through all the pain again to have those moments back. The moments of rocking him to sleep after a bottle, giving him his first bath, just simply holding him. To whisper I love you one more time in his sweet little ear, yes I would go through the pain again.

This morning I was awakened by the sweet sound of Mikayla. I went in and got her out of bed and sat down with her in the chair. She was sitting on my lap looking at me with a sweet little smile on her face. Her eyes had little crusties on them, she had snot coming out her nose and a smile that lit up my heart. As I looked at her tears welled up in my eyes. We love that baby girl more than you can imagine, she is our daughter, we can't think of anyone else fitting more perfectly into our family. And yet today my hearts aches for the baby who is not here with us, for the little boy who should be celebrating with us. If Caleb would have come home with us we would not have Mikayla, it breaks my heart that we simply can't have them both. It is hard to put those emotions into words, to express how that feels is just slightly hard. I think people may think that even though we didn't get to bring Caleb home we now have Mikayla so things are good. While yes we do have Mikayla and love her more than anything, it is hard to forgot a child, even if we only had him for a week. Life just isn't that easy.

Recently we had someone ask us if we had any thoughts on why God had us walk the journey we walked. I am fully convinced that God has us walk through things in life for a reason. I am also convinced that we may not find out why we walk through things in life until we are spending eternity with Him. No we don't know why God had us walk through this journey, maybe some day we will be able to help someone going through a similar situation, but then again we will have all eternity for God Himself to fill us in.

Happy Birthday Caleb James, I pray that you had a sweet first birthday...

first swing ride

The past couple of days we have been working on our swing set so that both girls can swing at the same time. It was a job that seemed simple at first but as with most things, it ended up taking just a little longer than we thought. But this afternoon Mikayla got to take her first ride in the baby swing! She thought it was great!

Of course Jennifer thought that she needed to push Mikayla too. We had to remind her often that Mikayla needed to be pushed gently, not big high, as Jennifer calls it.

The only real smile we were able to catch!

Jennifer going big high on her swing.

Finally both girls can swing at the same time! Jennifer thinks it is great!

About to fall asleep in the swing. Mikayla is getting another tooth in and today was rough day for the sweet little girl.

flying a kite

While at the store on Saturday we got Jennifer a Toy Story kite. Let me tell you the excitement was more than Jennifer could take! She could not wait to fly her kite. Although it was windy on Saturday we did not get to fly the kite. So we took it with us to mama and papa's house the next day. It was a perfect day for flying a kite! It seems we were just able to let go of the kite and it was flying. Jennifer thought it was so great! Here is the kite flying high in the air! Hard to tell but Woody and Buzz are on there.Ben and Connor are looking on really wanting a turn. Jennifer was not happy about sharing but she did. The kite was let go of once but we were able to catch it before it flew away. And there is one small tree in mama and papa's yard and the kite only went in there once.
The next day Jennifer really wanted to fly her kite again, she was determined to get her kite to fly. It was very sweet watching her. It was hard to explain to Jen that there was no wind to make the kite go, she wasn't really having it.
The sweet girl ran back and forth in the yard trying to get the kite up.
Talking to Bill in the window, after not having any luck with the kite. I know she will be trying another day.

dying eggs

Our plan was to dye eggs over the weekend and well to be honest things just got a little crazy and it didn't happen. We were however determined to get eggs dyed because we bought a kit last year for fifty cents, yes that is right we went all out and spent fifty cents for this kit, so it was going to get used. This afternoon while it was raining outside seemed like the perfect time.

Jennifer and Mikayla are all set to go. Ok Mikayla could really care less, let's be honest.

Putting the first egg in, how exciting!

Hard to tell in the picture but there is dye all over the table, Bill let Jennifer do that egg all by herself, it sort of plopped right in.

Waiting to get just the right color before the egg comes out.

A beautiful pink egg.

Mikayla hanging out on the table, checking everything out.

Jen showing off the finished products. Now if we could just get her to eat the eggs that could be great!

Mikayla trying to get in on the fun!

"I think I'll pick this one."

Jennifer thinking maybe Mikayla should back off just a little bit after touching the eggs.

Who said dying eggs was just for at Easter time? We only used half the dyes so who knows maybe we will dye eggs again in a few months, we really wanted to get our fifty cents worth out of the kit!