So Blessed...

We had a wonderful Christmas! Weddings, big family Christmas parties and spending time with family for days upon end. It was fantastic! For such a time of struggle for not only our family but a lot of families, God was good to us. We were able to get some really great gifts that just blew us away and then their were some gifts that were straight from the heart. AMAZING... The kids had a great time opening presents with family on Christmas Eve and playing outside in the cold! Nothing more important than sitting around with family enjoying the glorious day of our Saviors birth!

Christmas day the children were so excited that they had gotten from Santa everything that they had asked for. They knew though that this was going to be a hard year for Santa with the economy in all, so they asked for some pretty reasonable things this year. I do have to tell yall, Meryn got two babies from Santa... don't ask about why there was two, there just was. Anyhow, she got a BABY ALIVE! And yes, she really pees and poops!! But yall would have loved to see her, she had baby alive on her hip while she leaned in to give the crying baby a bottle like it was nothing. Too funny... This was classic mothering going here. She was like, "I got this!" Hilarious! I will post pictures when I get a chance.

Hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and hope everyone rings in the New Year with love, kindness, and thankfulness in our hearts, that we have another day and another year upon this earth. God Bless!

A Good Report

Most of you know, but for those of you who don't my son Allan has had his share of ups and downs since birth. He developed acid reflux at the tender, tender age of 2 weeks old, that lingered until the age of 15 months. Then at 4 weeks developed a sensitivity to regular formula thus for leaving us no choice but to try soy. When that didn't work we resulted to the expensive form called nutramigen. Then had to take a jump to a brand called neocate. All I can say is... very, very expensive!! When it was time for him to move on from formula, we tried our hand a cows milk, but his little intestinal tract was not having that! So needless to say we were soy bound. Without going into all the details Allan became ill with a staph infection and had 9 long nights stay at Texas Children's Hospital. It was very much a grave situation for his life and for our family. It was touch and go there for a couple of days, but the power of prayer and our faith in God pulled us through and proudly I can say my son is alive today and doing well. If it weren't for our faith in our Lord Jesus and the wonderful nurses and doctors at TCH, Allan would not be here today. Praise be to God, glory in the highest!

Well about 8 months later we learned that Allan was having speech difficulties and was needing to be evaluated. So needless to say he was evaluated and it was determined that he needed speech therapy. We were extremely saddened by this news... but again our faith gave us hope and encouragement that Allan and our family would prevail from this hardship as well. We went through all the battery of tests to find out if he was deaf or had some sort of fluid on his ears, or did his tongue need to be clipped in order for him to have speech. None of these were the case. It turned out that Allan has a rare speech disorder called Aproxia. Allan will have been in therapy on January 16th for a year now. I am pleased to announce that he is doing wonderfully as his therapist Kristie Gatto puts it. It has been a rough road in the speech department. There were days I would cry during the day at different times or cry myself to sleep wondering if I would ever hear my son tell me that he loves his mommy.

Well I am happy to give the Good Report that we are now at the stage in his vocabulary that he now tells his mommy that he loves her. I couldn't have asked for a better Christmas gift than that! All the prayers and Allan's hard work and determination to exceed and find the strength to be like all other children and have a voice to be heard has finally paid off. And, a extremely huge THANKS to Kristie Gatto at the Speech Emporium for all their hard work and effort to help my child talk and succeed in life. So I am thankful and very blessed this Christmas that my son is now talking pretty much in full sentences. May the Lord bless each and everyone of my friends and families lives this Christmas season, no matter how small that blessing may seem. It will be a blessing all the same. God Bless!

Natalie

So it's Coming Along

Well today was a great day, but otherwise busy one at that!! There was a lunch date, runnin' by the store to grab something yummy for dinner, getting some gas in the ole truck, then a brief stop by the bank. All this and we get home and I no sooner put away the groceries after cleaning out the fridge to make room for the groceries and my sister calls and says why haven't you gone to pick up Gilly. Gillian by the way is my niece for those of you who don't know.

Then I say, "what, I'm not supposed to pick up Gilly today!" Of course I wasn't doing a lot or have a lot on my mind today or anything! So correction... I was supposed to get snatch my niece up from my mothers house today. So I forgot, so it's coming along.

Natalie

New At This...

So I guess I am trying my hand at this now... After the holidays I will have this puppy lookin' good!