Thankful

I am having one of those moments when I just want to document my gratitude.

I'm thankful we are done with school for the year. One more year down, we made it!

I'm thankful for our wonderful library and this collection Jacob got us into about 7 years ago now.  They are what we call "letter books" and there is one for every state and tons of other topics too.  We currently have 145 library books in our house!  It's a summer tradition for the kids to read them.

I'm thankful I met a nice mom at the library who homeschools her five kids. After talking to her for a few minutes I learned that the cute little toddler she was holding in her front carrier is completely blind.  You just never know what people have going on!  And then another lady at the library approached me and said she was days away from adopting a little girl with Down syndrome and had prayed she could meet someone to talk to about it!  I told the kids when we got home that "God used our family to help someone today" and Xavier said right away, "God used Ellie".  So right, Xavier!

I'm thankful that the kids still get a kick out of the "treasure box" with fun toys for a reward for reading 10 books.  Someone picked an "Old Maid" card game and on the way home they were cracking up in the van guessing the names "Doctor Dan", "Painter Pete", etc.  

I'm thankful that Ellie is happy on her swing and even takes her iPad and toys up on it and swings as she plays/watches!  This photo is blurry because she was moving so much!  She's taking a bite of her lettuce.

I'm thankful our neighbor brought over some cupcakes leftover from a work function.  Our home is a good place to bring extra food!

I'm thankful for all of you that still visit here out of love to check in on Ellie!

Medical Stuff

About once a year or so we have to think about "medical stuff" with Ellie.  We used to think of this stuff all the time, every single day. But the frequency with which we think of her having certain conditions that go along with Down syndrome spreads out more and more with time.

But last week she had a check up and three things came out of it that I'd like to ask that you pray for. One is, it appears she's having some eye issues - one of her eyes crosses sometimes.  So we need to have that checked out. And the other two are screenings - bloodwork again and possibly another sleep study to rule out sleep apnea. Both of these last two things will present challenges so if you could please pray that all goes smoothly and both things are as uneventful as possible for Ellie. And that the outcomes are all good and she continues to do as well as she has.

Other than that, our girl is tall!  Taller than 90% of 5 year olds with Down syndrome!  She definitely gets that from Jeff.

Thank you for your prayers, I'll update you in the future on all the results.

Mother's Day

 Mother's Day this year had an extra special and exciting twist!  On the way to mass Sunday I said, "Wouldn't it be great if the baptismal gown I made sold in the church shop today?"  When  we arrived at church I slowly walked around the corner into the shop and could see the dress was gone!  A grandmother had just purchased it for her new grandchild's baptism!  I was elated!  I received compensation for the gown and floated into mass, full of gratitude!

It was certainly a gift to sell something I had made.  I wanted to come home and make another one!  But the day was filled with more gifts - homemade cards, some sewing tools I had picked out and my favorite restaurant for dinner.  For fun, when I picked up the food I paid with the cash I had received that morning!  Moe's chips and salsa never tasted so good!  :)

Beautiful poems and drawings!

 Before I could start another baptism gown, I had to finish up a quilt I had started for the hospital.  Going back to the number one reason I started sewing in the first place, making a quilt for a child going through something similar to what Ellie did is incredibly fulfilling.  The fabric comes in the mail which makes it super easy to piece together and construct.  This is my second one I've done.  The first was dedicated to a boy, Walt, who lost his medical battle last year.  This one would be dedicated to a sweet little girl whom I never met but have a connection to her Mommy.  Ellie and Nora were both born April 17, 2012. Nora lives about an hour or so from where I was born in Kentucky.  Nora had heart issues and lung issues and an extra chromosome too.  Nora fought for a little more than 2 years and her Momma's blog is what inspired me to start blogging.  That and terrible cell phone coverage in the ICU :).

This fabric had little robots all over it and the back had a newspaper article about the superheros that stopped the robots from destroying the planet.  Nora certainly had super-hero powers the way she fought so hard those two plus years and I loved writing her name on the little tag that will soon circulate through the Cardiac Intensive Care Unit at Egleston Children's Hospital in Atlanta. Ellie gave it a few hugs before I  mailed it off.  I expect my brain will continue to think of Nora while singing Happy Birthday to Ellie each year.  

 To end on a musical note - Ellie has some exciting news!  I discovered a grant that will pay for piano lessons for her!  Here is her first lesson after the other three had their lessons with "Ms. Heather".  Ellie is marching to "Old McDonald" while "moo-mooing" :).  She has had two lessons now and runs into the room when it is her turn!  We sing, clap and spend a lot of time using other musical instruments along with the piano.  A xylophone we've had for years is coming in very handy!

She's so happy and is responding to it all very favorably!