What?!?

It's December already?? How did that happen? This past year has just been a whirlwind of craziness! It has been full of happy times and sad times. Last month my good friend Kathy passed away, she was 32 years old. Her faith in God during the past 11 months just AMAZED ME!! She trusted Him completely....it was inspiring. I miss her so much. The good thing is that I will get to see her again!! God is good :) If you want to read her full story go here. It will hopefully amaze and inspire you to SHINE!

Christmas is next week. It seems too soon! I am not even half way done shopping!!! Please don't forget the reason for the season~ JESUS! He was born to earth so that you would have everlasting life...all you have to do is Admit to God that you have sinned ( Romans 3:23), Believe that Jesus is God's son and He died for your sins (John 3:16) and Confess your faith in Jesus and commit your life to Him ( Romans 10:9) I did this over 7 years ago and my life hasn't been the same since...in a good way. Now, I don't want you to think everything has been all perfect or anything but I have been able to get through some times because of my faith in the Lord! He has carried me and will continue to do so as long as I let him. Isn't that AWESOME?! All you have to do is those 3 easy steps and the Lord will always be there for you. When you are enjoying time with your family and friends this season don't forget the REAL reason....JESUS :)
HAPPY BIRTHDAY JESUS!!

Thankfulness 1,2 &3

I am going to post what I am thankful for every day this month.

1. My family
2. My God
3. My warm cozy house

Fall is here!!

I am soooo excited!!! I thought it was never going to come! I love fall :) It is so beautiful. The way the cool breeze sneaks in and the leaves start to change colors.... just puts a big smile on my face. I love being able to open the windows and air out the house. The fresh air is so good! I love being able to sit out under the stars with a blanket and enjoy the cool crisp air. The kids love having bonfires and fall is the perfect time to do that! They really like the marshmallow part of the fire! We pulled out all the fall clothes because the mornings are really chilly. I also enjoy the break my checkbook gets from not running the a/c all the time :) That is enough to make anyone love fall.

THANKFUL THURSDAY

This is what I found this morning :) My husband is the sweetest!

Look @ what I did....

I found this ugly chair on Craigslist for $5






and I went to Hobby Lobby and bought some pretty fabric for $8 and a new cushion for $2.50 and I tore off all the ugliness and made it pretty :)
It looks super cute and Evelyn loves it! I even had some extra fabric and made a little pillow to go with it.....

My journey through miscarriages..

I have had 4 miscarriages. I have 4 beautifully perfect children in heaven! I can't wait to meet them :) I miss them often.

This is the story of our first baby...
I had my first loss at the age of 18(Dec 1997). DH and I were in the early stages of our dating journey. We were excited even though it would be very hard to raise a baby. Sadly though, we never got to do that. I started bleeding/cramping around 8 weeks. It didn't really click at first that something was wrong. When the cramping got unbearable though, I went to the ER and they confirmed that the baby was gone. I had to have a D&C done. I told DH to not come up, I don't know why....I regret that now. I wish he could have been there with me that day. We were heartbroken. I know some may think this is weird but we named that baby. No, we didn't know if it was a boy or a girl. We went with our gut feeling and that was that our baby was a girl...Abigail is her name.

I had 4 healthy beautiful children after that little girl was lost. I couldn't imagine my life without them. The crazy thing is that if Abby wouldn't have gone to heaven, who knows which of the other kids would be with us today. We all have a path in life and if one thing changes it effects everything after that too. Don't take this the wrong way but I wouldn't change a thing.
After our last baby, we decided that we wanted more :) So, we tried to get pregnant! Sure enough we did.
It was May 2006. We had only known for about a week and had told everyone in the world! We were overjoyed! Our joy was cut short though. I started spotting. We had bloodwork done and the doctor called to confirm that the baby was gone. Her name isSarah.
I figured that our odds were pretty good at having a normal healthy pregnancy since we had had 2 losses already. Why would someone who has had 4 babies and 2 losses have another miscarriage? I didn't think we would have anymore problems. God wouldn't do that to us.
We got pregnant again in November 2006. Right away we did bloodwork to make sure all was ok. I waited anxiously for that phone call....so sure that I would only hear good news. While waiting I started to have some bleeding. I started to get nervous. All the labs came back and things didn't look promising. We then repeated all the labs. We were told that this baby was gone . His name is Cooper.
At this point I am pretty pissed off at God. Why would He make me suffer? Why would He do this to me?? It just didn't make sense. I cried, no, I sobbed! I balled my eyes out. I had to tell my children that yet again, there would be no new baby for us. They were sad too. I figured there had to be a reason for all this. God,Why do you keep allowing this to happen? I soon realized my path was not to go that direction right now. I was to go another way. I was being called to help someone in a very big way. If I was pregnant I couldn't do this. This is just how my path was supposed to go and I started to be ok with that. In July 2007, I donated my left kidney. That is where my path had led me.
On December 31, 2007....we found out we were pregnant!!!! We were ecstatic!! We were also very cautious too. We told everyone. We told the kids and they were so happy!! So was I :) We went in for an ultrasound and they couldn't find a hb. We thought maybe our dates were off and we weren't as far along as we though. We did bloodwork, again. The doctor called the next day with the news.....the baby was gone. SERIOUSLY??? AGAIN??? How many times am I going to hear that?? Our sweet baby was in heaven with her siblings. Her name is Josephine.
In July of 2009, after seeing a doctor for secondary infertility, 3 unsuccessful IUI's and finally just giving up.......we had our baby, Evelyn Faith was born on 7-16-09. I can't wait to share the story of her older siblings with her :)
I am so blessed to be the mother of 9 children! I can't wait until I can finally meet them all.
It is so nice to know that I am not the only woman who has lost a baby. I have met some wonderful friends because of our sad connection. I want others to be comfortable talking about their loss. That is your baby and you loved him/her more than anything. If I had one wish, it wouldn't be for lots of money or world peace. It would be that no woman would ever have to deal with the loss of a child again.

Oh Monday...

how I have missed you, NOT! I hate mondays, they are just so blah! Today Evelyn decided to take off her diaper....it was full.....of POOP!!! UGGHHH!! She had it everywhere, on the carpet, on her leg, hand, arm, face and sippy cup! It was a disaster! I scooped her up and put her in a football hold, that way I didn't get any one me, and stuck her in the sink to take a bath. She thought all of this madness was funny, girl has a messed up sense of humor. So, that is how my monday started...don't be too jealous!
Our weekend was good though. We had Hannah's swim party on Saturday. She got to swim, play in a fun house and ride pony's! Lucky little girl :) She had a blast and so did everyone else. That night Adam took 3 of the kiddos to the racetrack for Christmas in July/Kids night. They were so excited. They had nickel races too, the kids got to go out on the track and pick up nickles. Some had special paint on them and you could get a prize. No prizes for us though, but we got about $5 in nickels between the 3 of them. Sunday we went to church and then to Six Flags water park. This was the first time we had been and it was AWESOME!! I had thought about taking the kids during the week but didn't know if I would be doable with just me, but it totally is. We will definately be going back soon!