The Miller Family

My sister, Joni, was married to Brent Miller on October 13th. I would have posted about it sooner, but I didn't want to post it until I had some of her pictures done. The wedding was really nice and Joni looked radiant. Aside from the beautiful bride, Bryce was pretty much the "star of the show". When Joni and Brent went to light the candles, Bryce yelled "oooh, good job!" Then during their first dance, he looked over at them and said "Wooooweeee Mommy!" It was really adorable. Anyway, the events of the day went over pretty much without a "hitch". There are always little things here and there, but nothing major and nothing that we couldn't take care of. The wedding was very pretty and everyone had a great time at the reception.

Faith was the flower girl and she was very excited to have her hair all curly, so she had a great day. She also had her very first ever "boy-girl" dance with a boy who wasn't her Daddy. Seems like she has a bit of an "adoring" for AJ, who was the ring bearer. I think they danced three times, once because Faith fell and was crying and AJ told her if it would make it better that he would dance with her one more time. Seems like our gender figures out very quickly how to use tears to their advantage! Anyway, to bring this to an end, the wedding was great, my baby sister is married to a great man and we're all very happy for them.

Meet Tillie

This post is for those of you on the SB Listserv. I wanted to be sure to get some pictures of Tillie on here so you can see how adorable she is :) (Yes, I may be partial, because I'm her Aunt, but I really think this one could win the beauty pageants.) As we have discussed already, Tillie is 20 months old. She was diagnosed with Spina Bifida while still in the womb. Her lesion is S1, she has Chiari II, shunted hydrocephalus with one revision, AFO's, Caths 6 times daily, bowel management program and slightly clubbed feet. Now that I have that out there, I'd like to add that she also has an irresistable laugh, an extremely sweet spirit, amazingly beautiful baby blue eyes, she has captured the hearts of so many people through her personality, she's strong willed and says "honey" more precious than I've ever heard it before! She is a huge blessing to our family and we've learned so much from her. It gives you a totally different perspective when you watch these children fight for things that we think should be natural for them. I think that is part of God's purpose through these amazing children, to teach us some of the things that we overlook as we go about our busy typical lives. I personally have been blessed with two nieces who have disabilities and I love them both dearly. Being a part of their lives makes me want to work in therapy, but it's a distant "dream" these days. Anyway, meet Tillie, she's amazing and if you ever have the chance to meet her, you are truly truly blessed!!

Parent/Teacher Conference & Report Card

We had our first Parent/Teacher Conference last night with Faith's preschool teacher. It went very well, she said that Faith is doing great. Her report card was great this period, she only had one B, so we were very proud of her for that. Mrs. Schrock said that she doesn't have any big problems from Faith, that Faith does very well with participation in everything and seems to be learning quickly. She does talk a lot and we were prepared for that to be an issue, because Faith is such a social butterfly, but Mrs. Schrock said it's really nothing to be worried about. They will start their "reading books" soon and they will work at their own pace on these. I love when they have an opportunity to work at their own pace, because it shows what they're capable of and what they need to work on. I am all for group schooling, but it does have it's pitfalls and working together at the same pace is one of them. So, I'm very excited that they're starting these books, because I'm interested in seeing how Faith progresses. Anyway, just a little update on Faith, she's doing great and Mommy is very proud of her!

If you haven't seen Transformers yet, it's a must see, especially for any guy you know who use to carry around a Transformer figure as a child. I usually cannot stay awake for a movie at 11:00 pm, but this one was worth it. I was literally eyes to the screen for the entire movie. It was really good.

Reasonable Service

A friend of ours, Betsy, posted this recently. I can't tell you all how many times I have felt this way. It is so hard to know for sure what God's will is in your life. I feel so many times like I am just "flying blind" in this life and praying along the way that it's what God intended for me to be doing. I can't wait until the day I can say these words that she has so eloquently written in her post. This post makes me want to do more for God, serve more, give more and study more of his word. This is a great post, Betsy, thanks for sharing it.

http://jacobsfamilyupdate.blogspot.com/2007/10/reasonable-service.html

Faith's Appointment

Faith's appointment went well today. Although, as our luck would have it, she had a bit of a coughing fit in Dr. Lux's office and he seemed concerned about it. I really thought she just caught a bit of the virus that I had, but it turns out I was wrong. The doc looked at her and said the coughing was asthma related. I knew it was a possibility, because her "asthma attacks" are just coughing fits in the night, but since it was never too bad during the day, I just always have said it was her allergies or a cold. So, we got the opposite of what we were hoping for today. He has added QVar (inhaler) twice daily to her already 3 daily meds. But, on the bright side of things, he did say that as the plants die out in the winter, we can experiment with her Zyrtec and Singulair and maybe be able to take her off of those two during the winter months. This was the first time he has witnessed Faith's cough and he seemed to be uncomfortable with it. As he was talking about it and how serious it can become, I wondered to myself if I sometimes overlook things just for the sake of keeping her off of medication. But, I guess this is what most parents do. Another thing I didn't realize was that some of her hospitalizations were probably the cause of asthma. Dr. Lux said that children with asthma are at a much higher risk for being hospitalized with viruses, basically they effect them much worse than a child without asthma. This sounds like something you'd think is common knowledge, but I hadn't ever really thought of it. Anyway, I got a lot of answers today for why she's been so effected by viruses, sometimes it seems like she just can't kick them. But, now that we know she has asthma and she's on an action plan, we should be able to avoid these things much easier in the future. So, it's a learning process. And, as for the meds, as long as it's helping her to be a child and not worry about being sick, then I am really okay with them. I just don't want her on anything that isn't necessary. He wants to see her again in January.

Our busy life....

I haven't posted in a while, so I thought I should throw something on here to let everyone know we're doing well. We've just been busy.

Let's see...on Friday, Faith got to go to the Pumpkin Patch with Aunt Jamie and Tillie. Aunt Joni and Bryce were there as well. She had a blast, the Pumpkin Patch is one of her favorite things about fall. She'll go again next week, so she's excited about that.

We went to our niece Sierra's 1st birthday party on Saturday. All of the kids had fun. I think it was Faith's first experience with a Pinata and Pin the Tail on the Donkey. Everyone had fun with these games, even us adults. Seirra seems so big, I can't believe that she's already a year old. They grow up so fast.

The Birthday Girl

Today we had my sister Joni's bridal shower here at the house. I don't have any pictures, I got busy entertaining and forgot to take them! We had a great time and Joni got some great gifts. Joni will be getting married on Saturday. My baby sister is finally going to have a complete family, we're so happy for her!!

So, that's been our past few days. Tomorrow we head back to Springfield for a follow up appointment with Dr. Lux. Faith has been doing great with her breathing practice, I'm hoping well enough that he can take her off of some of the medication. We've only used her inhaler once since we saw him last, so that is encouraging. So, we'll see how it goes.

I want to say a quick thank you as well to all of you who have been praying for Payton. She's a trooper! She is such a sweet little girl. We're thankful that she's doing well and hope and pray for a very quick recovery!