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22 lbs and counting

To some of you 22 lbs doesn't seem like a big deal... some of you might want to lose 22 lbs.... Americans eat on average 22 lbs of candy a year...the Israelis eat over 22 lbs of turkey in a year... Americans also eat 22 lbs of tomatoes (mainly in the form of ketchup) in a year .....22 lbs in our house is a big number any way you look at it. We weighed in today for Claire at just over 22 lbs... we have not seen that number on her since she was one! yeah! And yes.... still seizure free! Hallelujah! Keep packing on the pounds Claire. Her therapists continue to be surprised and impressed by the progress she is making.... We will take every baby step we can get.

And the countdown to Christmas continues. Another link from our paper chain gone. The excitement is building. Are you waiting in expectation of some great gift you have hoped for? or are you waiting in expectation for the celebration of Jesus' Birthday?

2 months

As I sit here in a rare moment when all 3 girls are asleep for a nap at the same time I thought I would reflect a moment.

2 months and Claire is still seizure free! What an extended Thanksgiving we are having. She continues to do well. Gaining strength almost daily. She loves sitting in her chair and playing, viewing the world. Today we got her in her chair and let her play her favorite computer cause and effect game. She really loved being right up at the computer. Much easier for all of us instead of me holding her in my lap.

And now to Molly.... she is crawling and pulling up and talking more. My oh my. As Russell said the other day, we are so glad we decided to have a 3rd child. What a sweet and lots of times funny little blessing she is.

And Miss Hope....we have moved on into our 1st grade phonics and she is doing great. In fact we will probably finish this out by Spring Break. She is a joy to watch as she learns and discovers new things. She is really growing up. She continues to amaze us with her vocabulary (always big), her bigger than life persona and her unending love for her sisters.

We are onto the countdown till Christmas. Hope pulls off one chain from her paper links every day. She can hardly wait. Although I think she is most excited about Georgia and Maggie (my brothers 2 dogs) coming to Grandmommy's house for Christmas. The presents under the tree are killing Hope that she can't open them yet. I mean after all what good are they doing sitting there looking all pretty when I could be playing with them.

But somehow admist the busyness of Christmas and the "I want" attitudes.... we have managed to find a time almost every evening to remember the advent. A couple of years ago we started with Hope a daily advent reading... this year we have expanded that to lighting the advent candle, reading the scripture and Daddy leading us in prayer. It is exciting to see how Hope is getting into the spirit of Jesus' Birthday and gaining an understanding of some of the scripture we are reading about Christ's birth. May we all take time daily during this season to remember just exactly why we celebrate this blessed.

And on that day in the city of David a Saviour will be born to you and you shall call his name Jesus.

New Wheels!

Look at Claire in her new "razzleberry" pink wheels! This is her new totally customized chair. She absolutely loves it. It fits her so well and gets her up being so big. And of course Hope is so proud too... she helped us pick out the color of the chair. She always is wanting us to put her in it so she can push her around the house in it. We took Claire to our church Thanksgiving dinner in it last night, and she got "oohed and ahhed" over.

And yes... we are now... 51 days seizure free!

One Month

Who knew all that could happen in just one month's time....

Claire has been seizure free---yeah! Thank you Lord for your unfailing love. Your faithfulness endures for all generations. May we have many more days. Because of her being seizure free we have seen Claire laugh, cry, roll all over the room... and even begin to bear weight on her legs. Almost all who know her think she is a different child. The other day at church one of the ladies, Charlotte, who just has a heart for our family but truly for Claire, came to find Claire and give her some sugars.... as she was kissing Claire, Claire leaned over to Charlotte and smacked (kissed) her on her cheek! Oh how sweet!

Molly has learned to sit up and even begin to creep on the floor. We have started more solid foods... so far we just prefer our bottle really.

Hope has learned to read more words. She loves to read to us every night "Dick and Jane" before bedtime. She has studied dinosaurs, thanks to Grandmommy and a visit to the Dinosaur Valley State Park. And she earned her official AWANA Sparks card for memorizing her first verses, mottos and song.

In one month we have seen the end of football season (almost) and the beginning of basketball season. And with that comes the changing of Daddy's schedule... hopefully for the better so we see him more often.

One month has brought cooler weather most days, Halloween, birthday parties for next door neighbors, ringworm from our new kitten has come and gone (sorry Shanae) and Thanksgiving is bearing down upon us before the next month is out.

Thank you God for all of the time you have given me with my precious daughters and for the changes that we see happening in just a month's time. May Russell and I be able to impart godly wisdom and unconditional love to our daughters in this short time that you have entrusted them to us.

Tickle Bug!

Oh when the tickle bug arrives at our house...let the laughter begin. Why is is that children love to be tickled... they love the torture of not being able to breathe from laughter and every fiber of your body hurting. But those giggles are sometimes the sweetest sound you will ever here. Lately, Claire has been laughing more and in fact she has found that she has a funny bone in her body. Today I discovered that she is ticklish above her knee in the vulnerable area for what we call, "Horse Eating Cabbage." (In honor of Grandaddy, I can still remember that feeling like it is happening now. And of course he has the most hilarious look on his face and sound from his mouth) And oh the giggles she made. She had Hope and myself so tickled over her laughter we couldn't stop. What precious moments. May I be blessed with many more giggles, smiles and laughter from all my girls.

Priceless

We have waited a long time to see this from Clairebear... and Aunt Shanae was finally able to capture it for all time!

As Shanae said... this is officially the best picture ever!

Just Because

Just Because....

We love being silly... Hope sporting her Daddy's russian hat

Hope loves her kitten, Sprinkles

We celebrated Daddy's Birthday!

Just Because....

I love my girls all snuggled up in their pajamas....

Mom kept asking me to post new pictures of the girls....

Fun at the Zoo

A week ago last Thursday, I got to take all 3 girls and some friends of ours to the Fort Worth Zoo for Homeschool Day. We had the best time as you can see....





Hope even got to ask the zookeeper for the jaguars a question. I was so proud of her for actually doing it. Most of the animals were out and about for us to view and observe. Hope chose the zebra to do an additional study on at home.

When Italy becomes Holland

I was listening to the radio the other day for a fundraiser for families with children with terminal illness or chronic disease etc. And one mom was on and she said she is often asked what it is like having a special child and this is how she summed it up ( I wished I had thought of this)

All your life you have wanted to go to Italy. So you finally plan a trip. You are ready to see the gondolas, the Michael Angelos, the Sistene Chapel. You buy a Italian phrase book. You pack your bags--you are so excited. The day of your trip arrives. You board the plane and after the flight ends, you are ready to land... only to hear the stewardess say, "Welcome to Holland". "What?" you say. "But what about Italy? I wanted to go to Italy?"

After you have been in Holland awhile, you realize it isn't too bad either. After all they have windmills, and tulips, and Rembrandts. And you have met a whole slew of people you never would have met before if you had gone to Italy. Now you are still sad that the dream of Italy is over, afterall, all of your friends are getting to go to Italy. And that dream is hard to let go of. But Holland has beauty if you stay awhile. It is slower pace than the flashy Italy. But it really isn't so bad. And look at all of the new things you have learned, and seen, and experienced. You are a better person for having gotten to go to Holland.

Boy that mom truly did express what living with a "special" child is all about. Although we are still in the midst of our experience in Holland. I can reflect and say I am glad we are here. I do miss Italy occassionally. (OK a lot some days) But then I am so glad that God blessed us not only with Claire and "Holland" but also with Hope and Molly in "Italy". Maybe we get the best of both worlds!

Sad Day--Happy Day

Saturday was a sad day! After much family discussion, we decided it would be best if we returned Perdy. We decided that in our small house and no fence yard, that Perdy just didn't fit well. We could not adequately provide for her "big" needs. Plus Hope was scared to death of her every time she jumped up for some lovings. So Hope and the girls went to play with friends, so I could make the 2 hour trek to return Perdy so another family could adopt her. Of course this wasn't done without much tears on my part. Good thing Hope wasn't there or we might have had to float home in a boat.

Now to the good news, with the discussion about returning Perdy, we asked Hope why she did like Perdy and she said she liked it when she laid by her and when she slept in her room, so we determined that a kitten might be the better choice. So we found an ad for some kittens in Wichita Falls, so off the girls and I headed Monday and got us a cute female kitty--Sprinkles. And boy does she love Hope, she snuggles up to her all the time, lays on her bed. Just exactly what Hope wanted!

Exciting News!

First for Miss Hope! Pop! Reading! Just like that it clicked in her little head and she has read what she calls "non school books". And Boy was she excited! We could hardly get her to go sleep the other night, she just wanted to keep reading--and if you know our house, we have lots of books!

Next! We are now the proud owners of Perdy! Our new 4 month old adopted/rescued dalmation! She is a cutie--- one brown eye, one blue eye! and the sweetest personality! We will see how well we all adjust to the new dog, house training and everything.

Now to Miss Claire----Oh Canada is what we are singing right now. We have started Claire on a new medicine that we must purchase from Canada because currently it is not FDA approved in the US. So far so good. She had another EEG yesterday, and some good news it that her brain waves are beginning to organize, which is why we are not having as many spasms nor as many random movements. And the doctor said once organized, it should not go back to being disorganized. So we are quite excited that it has improved. Plus the first time ever, the doctor feels that Claire is physically stronger! Yeah!

40 years!

Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad! 40 years! wow! What a great example you two have been in your married life. I am happy to be called your daughter. I wish you many more wonderful years together!

Homeschool fun--- Hope and I are enjoying our time together for homeschooling. I think she enjoys the 2 hours of one on one time she gets with me each day. Right now she is practicing her handwriting--not one of her favorite subjects. (It wasn't mine either) She has done so well in learning how to read... lots of praise and encouragement help her out. We have also fallen in love with Five in a Row... our unit study program where we read one story 5 days in a row and do some sort of project each day with it; i.e. social studies, language arts, math, science and art. Our story this week is Madeline. So far we have studied about Paris, France; architecture, vocabulary (solemn, appendix, and disaster) and today will be our math lesson on grouping and dividing--too fun.

Claire is doing ok... still having a couple of seizures now and then. They are actually more seizure than spasms... the doctor says that is actually a good thing, it means her brain is getting into a more organized pattern. She has also stopped having so much of the miscellaneous random movements---she now is more still, centered and more normal arm and leg movements. I do believe this week we will probably be adding the drug Vigabatrin (only available from Canada) to her list of medicines.

Sweet Molly--she is on the move now---rolling all over. The other night I had left her on her quilt to go help Hope with some thing, when we returned to the room, Molly had rolled half way across the room and has stuck up against her car seat! Wow! Hope was so excited.

I have to share about Saturday morning... Molly was napping, Russell at work, and it was pouring rain (our share of hurricane Ike)... so Hope and Claire and I went out the porch and sat down and watched it rain and then we did our favorite thing---began singing all of those precious childrens songs... "deep and wide," "this little light of mine," "Jesus loves me," and on and on. It was a great time with 2 of my favorite girls, out enjoying God.

Rolly Pollee

My baby has learned to roll! Molly started rolling over back to front on Tuesday! Yikes--we better watch out--Claire has already been rolled upon several times! She hasn't quite figured out yet that she can roll over and over .... but I'm sure that time is just moments away! :)

Hope has had over one week of homeschooling and so far so good. We have had a couple of moments of staring one another down till the work gets done. And we had to call upon Principal Daddy one day. But so far she has learned to read over 23 words, write several letters. And we have learned about buoyancy, repititon, drawing water, China, and Ohio. All very exciting things.

Miss Claire, went 10 days seizure free, then we started having a couple of breakthrough seizures. So we have gone back to giving 2 shots a day for another week to see if that will stop them, and then hopefully as we begin weaning off the medicine again, we can maintain. If not, we will be looking at another option...

9 Days and Counting

9 Days Seizure Free! Yippee! We are so excited around the Ratliff house to say the least.... Claire is doing great---she is tolerating the shots quite well and she has figured out how to go to sleep on her own---finally!

Started homeschool Kindergarten on Wednesday and Hope did great. She was so excited to finally start school. We took pictures of her and then she got to sit in her very own hot pink school desk for school. She has been able to read her first short story thanks to Hooked on Phonics--love that program... it gives instant success. It is crazy to think that we can have a whole day of kindergarten in 2 hours--wow! Gives plenty of time to play with the other girls. So far we have scheduled school to be when Molly is napping--thank goodness for naps!

Home Again, Home Again--Jiggety Jog

Sure is nice to have the whole family together again. Mom brought Hope and Molly home yesterday. And boy was I sure glad to hug their little necks. And I think Molly had grown enormously!

Praise the Lord--- Claire has been seizure free since Friday afternoon! I can't remember the last time she has gone that long! She has been quite a bit irritable, whiny, etc. But what a nice trade off!

The Lord is good, His love endures forever!

I think we will start Hope's school tomorrow! So we will be taking on Kindergarten at home, monitoring Claire's weight and blood pressure 2x a week, plus once a week lab work. Please give me strength to do it all and to manage our time wisely!

On our way home

We got discharged today! yeah! We will be making our way home. Claire did great. We started her steroid treatment on Thursday and she has tolerated it well. I have gotten to give her last 2 shots---yikes! The second time was better than the first for both of us. But I think I will be looking forward to this time to be over. There is a reason I didn't go into the field of nursing! ha! We should hope to see some results maybe in about 3 weeks but of course some kids need the full treatment before seeing anything.
God has been good... and as a great friend of mine said... He is such a show off sometimes. This treatment is quite expensive, like several new cars expensive, the first 2 vials of it were covered by our insurance... but our insurance starts over Sept 1, so we were going to have to pay out of pocket for the next 2 vials, however, God allowed for the company to agree to ship all four vials up front--so we have NO expense! Thank you God!
Thank you God also for this trip, our many friends, doctors and nurses who made it possible and has helped with all sorts of things along the way. We are fully trusting in God to complete the journey!

Day 2 over--Finally!

After a long day, and I mean long--we are home now and enjoying some quiet time. We started this morning at 6:30 at the hospital for the MRI, blood work and spinal tap... At 12:30 we finished and got a quick break for lunch. Claire did well, got to be sedated for the whole time and woke up with quite an appetite. We laughed in our wait for Claire to be done, we got to see other patients check in for surgery, have surgery, recover and leave all before we got to go see Claire again. Then we got to meet with her doctor again this afternoon. Of course we do not have the results from her blood work or spinal tap (some will take up to 6 weeks) but her MRI did not show anything of great significance, that we already knew. So we begin tomorrow morning her 3 month steroid treatment. We get to check in at the hospital and stay through Friday night probably. This will mainly be to check her as she starts the steroids and to help teach Russell and I how to give her the injections. Hopefully within a few weeks time we should begin to see results. Our prayer is that when this treatment is over her seizures will have stopped, we can stop the steroid treatment and all other seizure medication. And then we can begin the work of playing developmental catch up. Her current diagnosis of infantile spasms isn't great, but Claire has already beat the odds to some extent. She probably won't ever be what we would call normal, but we do believe that at some point she should learn to walk and talk to some degree. Our little Clairebear is a fighter and stubborn too, and the doc said that should serve her well.

One Day Down

Our first day at Mayo is over. We started off bright and early this morning for an EEG. The hope was that we could get Claire to go to sleep without sedation for it--and yeah--God answered prayer and Claire slept on her own for the whole process. However, we did need her awake for part of it, and we had no success in awakening her... she choose to stay asleep until we were in the car on our way home! ha! Just like stubborn little Claire to do things her own way.

This afternoon we met with her doctor and spent about 2 hours just talking about Claire. Right now the doc would like to try a steroid treatment for her---one way to get her to gain weight. And then she scheduled several blood tests, metabolic tests, genetic tests etc. Plus her MRI--all to be done on Wednesday. Right now the doctor is not seeing any new reasons for why Claire is having these seizures... but we will wait to make that final decision. She does feel we have been doing the right things in trying to treat her.

As usual, Claire is being a little trouper. She is currently enjoying some down time to just get to play. It has been such a blessing to stay here at Carol's house. We have our own quarters, but then just a place to come crash between appointments.

Tomorrow is our free day, and we are planning on seeing some sights, and Carol has even offered to babysit sweet Claire so Russ and I can have dinner and a movie! I think we will take her up on her offer.

God is so good to allow us this trip. And if for no other reason than to realize we are doing all we can do for Claire at this moment. She continues to "work" her magic and draw people to her, which then gives us a chance to share about our gifted child.

We Made It

Here we are in Rochester, MN....after 15 hours on the road we arrived in this beautiful city. I think we are all glad to be out of the car for now and able to have some down time before it all starts tomorrow morning.
First thing tomorrow, 7:30, Claire will have her first EEG.... and after that is the doctor's consultation.
May we all get rest tonight, for we have to be up early tomorrow.

Now! Happy 4 month birthday Molly. Hope you are enjoying the party that Hope and Grandaddy planned for you---with brownies and candles too!
I love you girls

Clairebear

Sweet Clairebear

On this day before we leave for the Mayo Clinic I wanted to share my thoughts with you. Two years and 3 1/2 months ago, God blessed me with a beautiful little girl... Claire Campbell, who quickly earned the nickname Clairebear. Although these past 2 years have been filled with struggle and trials, you have perservered. Every time I look at you, I see the presence of God and I am reminded of several things. The Bible is filled with verses which speak to my heart and give my strength for the days which we have already lived through and the days in which to come:

"Be still (Claire and Mandy) and know that I am God, and I will be exalted among the nations. " Psalm 46:10

"For God created your inmost being, He knit you together in my womb. I praise God because you are fearfully and wonderfully made; His works are wonderful, I know that full well. " Psalm 139:13-14

"Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you" Psalm 143:8

"In this I greatly rejoice, though now for a little while we may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that our faith--of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fired--may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed." 1 Peter 1:6-7

Clairebear--Your daddy and I are so very proud of you and it is an honor being your mommy and daddy. We love you.

We do not know what this trip holds for us. But we are praying for God's will to be done. We are praying that somehow, someway we might be able to share about the love of God with someone else.

Gifted

Today after Molly and Hope left with mom and dad, Claire and I ran to the library to check out some info for Hope's school. While there a lady came up to Claire to check out her curly hair, and then she said.... "she's gifted, isn't she?" Now I know she meant that she is a special needs child, but it struck me that yes, Claire is gifted. She is gifted in that through her presence, she draws people to her. She is gifted by God with a quiet spirit, incredible strength and perserverance. She is gifted because she is a child of God.

This week leading up to us going to the Mayo clinic, I have been praying that God would give me verses of assurance and strength. And today this one came to mind:

"Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows." James 1:17

Thank you God for gifting me with Claire and for gifting Claire with perfect gifts.

Can they really be this sweet?

Oh my girls! What sweet faces they have! Could just eat them up. I so love how Hope is such a good big sister... she watches over the 2 little ones with much love and kindness. What a little mommy!

Claire is doing well.... the seizures have slowed down some---so that makes for good days around our house. We are anxiously counting down the days till we leave for Mayo---8 more night nights as Hope would say.

And Miss Molly---she is growing and developing such a funny little personality. And boy is she ready to be on the move---we want to sit up big all of the time, and we are so close to rolling all over! yikes!

10 Years Encore!

It has been brought to my attention that I did not mention that we did celebrate our 10th anniversary earlier this summer by spending an enjoyable 3 days in San Antonio. We went with another couple friend whose 10th anniversary was in June. We had a great time of eating on the Riverwalk, shopping, visiting Sea World and sleeping in a lovely B and B. So great times before our actual anniversary and a nice dinner the night of our anniversary!
To many more years!

10 Years!

Happy Anniversary to us! 10 years! Wow! Seems like just yesterday we were waking up bright and early on a Saturday morning in Clovis to begin our journey of married life together. The wedding came off without too many glitches at 11 am. Yep you saw that right, we had a morning wedding---the church was beautiful with the sun shining in the stained glass windows.

A lot has happened in 10 years--- 1 apartment, 3 houses, 3 kids, 4 jobs, 1 cat, a few cars, 2 overseas mission trips, countless friends, too many football and basketball games to count, Easter musicals, VBS recreation and crafts, basketball camp, Branson and Platoro, family holidays, lots of laughter and some tears. Through it all God has been awfully good to us. Thank you for your many blessings. May we have many, many more years together and add to the list of memories above!

We celebrated with a night out to Red Lobster with dinner and dessert! And a few moments of lovely married comfortable silence! :)

Prayer and Peanut Butter

Apparently lots of prayer and 2 Tbsp peanut butter 2x a day helped Claire reach the 20 lb marker. We haven't seen 20lbs since last July or so.... yeah! Claire had her 2 year check up finally and she had reached that goal.. we are still concerned about her weight so the doc requested a couple of blood tests to check to see about her nutrition levels.... waiting to hear the results.....
Now Miss Molly had her 2 month check up and all is well.... She weighed about 11 1/2 lbs and was almost 24 inches long! way to go girl.

Pretty girls

Some new pics of the girls enjoying summer and from Claire and Molly's baby dedication. Such sweet girls if I do say so myself!

All Set For Mayo

The appointment is scheduled Aug 18, and we have received our packet of info. We will have appointments on Aug 18, Aug 20 and Aug 21. Will be a busy few days. Need prayer for rest and strength to handle whatever we will face.



One other request is immediate for Claire. She is having so many seizures a day and burning so many calories that we cannot feed her enough and she has lost 2 more pounds. Pray that the seizures would slow down in number and that we could feed her enough protein/fatty foods to help.

Mayo Here We Come

Today we received our Mayo Clinic packet in the mail. This included all of the information we need to make our trip successful; from appointment times to lodging. We will leave here on Aug 16 so we can make it for our Aug 18 appointment.
I think we are all excited about this trip and the possibilities it represents. I know it will a long and tedious journey, but maybe one well worth the effort. We are still seeing Claire have 2-6 seizures a day, although we have just gotten on the full dose of the new medication.
So stay tuned to any further developments!

Faithfulness

God is faithful! Good news from Molly's doctor, they could not find anything wrong with her hip! Praise the Lord. We will continue to watch it for this first year, but not expecting to find anything wrong with it. Yeah!

Still following up with Mayo on Claire. They were needing some additional information. So still waiting there.

This past week I was going through all of our pictures and writing the dates etc on them and it struck me once again how blessed we are with family. These girls have so many grandparents, aunts, uncles etc that love them and spend time with them often, it is really quite neat. Made me think of the scripture:

Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never faile. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.
Lamentations 3:22-24

A day for doctors

No one tells you when you have a baby about the worry and pain you sometimes face. First doctor was today. We took Molly back to have her hip checked on to see if we are looking at hip displaysia. Well after examination, the doc thought we should see a specialist, just to err on the side of caution. So Monday we will head out to the 2nd doctor to have little Molly's hips x-rayed and sonogramed. I would like to say I'm not worried, but there is a part of me that wishes we didn't have to do this... why couldn't this baby be as easy as Hope? Why do we have to face this little trial too? And then we have placed a call in for our other one, Claire, to the Mayo clinic for our 3rd doctor of the day. Looking at an appointment there in July or August---maybe some answers are just a couple of months away. Since starting this latest medicine, her seizures have increased from 2 a day to 4-6 a day--not fun watching your child have no control over her body and then completely wiped out from them afterward. Makes my heart break a little with each one her body endures. If I believe that God made us and formed us and loves us still.... and that we are created for his glory, then I have to believe that somehow this is for His glory.... but I sure cannot explain it. Why does it have to be so hard? And then for the 4th doctor, waiting on Claire's neurologist to call back and discuss this latest medicine change. We so need wisdom in the next step.....

"It is because of Him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God-that is, our righteousness, holiness, and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: 'Let him who boasts boast in the Lord." 1 Cor 1:30-31

Bittersweet

Ah how bittersweet life can be. All we know is what we have already experienced. With each passing day that Molly grows older, becomes bittersweet in retrospect to what we experienced with Claire. We missed out on lots of smiles and eye contact and even crying for hunger, holding and bedtime. I wouldn't change our experience because that is what God has blessed our family with, but I do long for those things to happen with our sweet Clairebear. Children truly are a gift from God and we do treasure the uniqueness about each one. Hope is so outgoing, a live wire. My social planner, organizer, smart and funny girl. Claire is sweet tempered, beautiful and a cuddler. Molly has a quick temper, but then a glowing smile. It will be interesting to see how she develops her special personality.

I believe God has answered our prayer for now for a bigger house and that answer is NO. Which is fine with us, we love our humble house. So now our next prayer is whether or not to take Claire to the Mayo clinic this summer. We feel we need to see if there is anything else we should be doing for this sweet little one. And if the answer is no more than what we are doing now, then maybe we will have achieved some peace of mind. For the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

Ready for Kindergarten

Today was a busy day.... started off the morning with Claire's therapy... she is doing so well. And she has just the sweetest personality to go with it. Then it was off to the elementary for Hope to do her kindergarten evaluation to see how to place her in a class. She had a great time, in fact, she was ready for school to start today. She asked if she needed to bring her backpack and lunch box-ha! Of course our big debate is whether or not we are going to homeschool her coming this fall. Still waiting on God's direction for that. But I think we will wait on that answer until we settle some other issues; like selling our house and buying a little bigger one here in town. Three girls and one bathroom, we might need a bit more space--ha!

My how time flies!

Molly is already one month! wow! And Claire just turned 2 and before long Hope will be 5 and on her way to Kindergarten. Where has the time gone. Plus this summer Russell and I are celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary. Seems like just yesterday we were heading off to college, I still feel like 18! ha!

Molly has started smiling a lot! She is just a little doll...although we call her our "hot tamale" because she likes to lie around in only her diaper. Claire is good... we got her a new chair to help her sit up more, can't wait to use it. And Hope, what shall I say about her!

Russell is busy counting down the days till school is out and summer vacation has begun. We are all looking forward to our trip to Branson in just a couple of weeks. And all of the other fun things this summer holds; sports camps, family time, swimming etc.

Let's see how this go

Ok Stephanie---here goes! Trying my hand at the blog.....

Today is Claire's 2nd birthday! yeah! And my what changes we have seen in her over these last 2 years. She really is growing up and now with Molly here, she really looks more like a big sister each day.

Molly is good---eating, sleeping, and awake some each day. She is such a cutie pie if I do say so myself.

And little Miss Hope---my helper and little mommy. She loves to sit and hold Molly as often as she can. But boy does she hate it if Molly is fussy.... I guess in her thoughts these sweet babies should be as quiet as her baby dolls--ha!