Brody Update

I was discharged on Saturday afternoon without my little boy:(! It was rough, but it helped that I had such a sweet little girl to come home to. She was one of the flower girls at her Aunt's wedding on Saturday, she looked so cute in the pictures.

I think that she looks a little like Shirley Temple with all those curls. Emily is sitting next to her and Curtis's (Janel's husband) neice, Tenacious, is on the left. Kate was a dancing machine at the reception from what I hear.

Brody is doing very well. He is out of his incubator, and his IV is gone! Yipee!!! His blood cultures came back negative for infection (They didn't have my Group B Strep results back when I went into labor - they had just taken them that afternoon, so they were treating him for infection as a precaution. He is eating very well! I decided to give up on breast feeding, but more on that later. Yesterday he was holding his temperature in the open air. So now they're looking for 48 hours of steady body temp from him. Jeremy and I were at the hospital with hime from 10:30am to 6pm with him yesterday. I just hate leaving him there all by himself. We do realize that he's not alone - he's got great nurses in the Special Care Nursery, but it's not the same. If he were home, Jeremy would sit and hold him ALL day long. If all looks well today when we go visit and they anticipate discharging him tomorrow, then he has a rough day ahead of him - they try to schedule circumcisions for the day before release. (Apparantly, it makes them grouchy - Go Figure!) Well, I'm up early and I think I have time for devotions and prayer before Kate and Jeremy wake up, so I'll keep you posted.

But for now, here's a pic from our visit yesterday...

Getting Ready for Baby

I was greatly blessed on Saturday with a baby shower hosted by my mother-in-law and sister-in-law. The shower was nice - they had chicken and ham salad sandwiches, chocolate dipped pretzel rods, cupcakes, veggies, and some very yummy punch. The deocorations were lovely and I was gifted with 2 diaper cakes. They played 3 games. The first was called, "My Water Broke", there was a tiny baby frozen in an icecube, the winner was the first person to free their baby completely from the ice, and shout, "My water broke". The player could use any means to melt the ice - short of running it under warm water. The second game was Baby A-Z: you were to name a word that related to babies, birth, labor, or delivery for each letter of the alphabet. Instead of the fastest to complete the list being named the winner, the winner was the person who had the most words that matched my answers. The third and last relied on your knowlege of candy and candy bar names. A word or phrase was listed and you had to name the candy that best fit the situation (i.e. Cost of College Education...100 Grand, Sex Life Before Baby...Good-n-Plenty).

The baby now has lots of very cute clothes - footballs, monkeys, moose, frogs, and doggies adorn his outfits. I also have lots of diapers and wipes - they should get me through quite a few weeks.

I'm planning to start washing the shower gifts tonight. I've already stocked up on Ivory Snow (laundry detergent) and washed up the car seat, vibrating infant seat, swing covers and any clothes that I had that were neutral. Most people use Dreft, but I used Ivory Snow on Kate's clothes and it's what my mom used. On Sunday I made a list of batteries that I need to get all the baby appliances running again. The mobile, swing, vibrating seat, and fisher-price aquarium all take D batteries (I need like 20 D size just to get everything working) and that's not counting the small batteries that go in rattles, and other toys. I've started to pack my hospital bag, it's contents so far: nightgown, bedroom slippers, undergarments and robe. I'll be adding toiletries, and books soon. I think I need to pick up some under the bed storage for clothes and extra diapers for the kids' room. I'll probably start to pack the baby's diaper bag this week too - I may let Jer and Kate pick the coming-home-from-the-hospital outfit though. Hopefully, I'll also be able to finish up my baby shopping this week so I can move on to Christmas shopping.

God is Great! (All the time)

This may get a little deep for some of you, but I feel that I need to share this:

This week was the annual Youth Camp at my church. A huge part of our Youth Camp are the Praise and Worship Services, which without any coaxing from the adults or leaders become Altar Services. Most churches have Altars, where I grew up as in some Protestant and Catholic churches it's the place where you kneel and receive the sacrament of Holy Communion. But in some other churches, its a place of prayer and a place for you to kneel before God to pray and worship.

I've learned a lot about the Holy Spirit since I became a Pentecostal. It's amazing to feel the Holy Ghost move during a worship service, to witness the Baptism of the Holy Spirit which generally manifests itself with the speaking of tongues (Yes, I have witnessed it, but haven't not been blessed with yet), and to see and hear people cry out to God with their needs And cry out in praise.

I've been fighting God, not wanting to be honest with the people closest to me. During my prayer time and the time that I've spent in His Word - He constantly showed me this and told me to take care of it. There is a scripture verse that says if you are at prayer and remember a quarrel with another to leave and make things right before returning to prayer. I wasn't ready to give it up. I wanted to praise and worship Him on my terms and not His. Let me just tell you that God does not work like that. We must be obedient to God and His word to receive His blessings.

At the beginning of Youth Camp, Kate and I went out for the evening service and as the youth gathered around the altar, I went and prayed with them, but knew that I was not right with God, because I refused to do what he asked of me. I watched Jeremy who was a counselor stand at the back of the group with his hands in his pockets during the song service and prayed that God would touch him and encourage him - that he would be bold in his witness this week and would take a step of faith and begin to pray with the youth at the altar.

God is faithful! I still wasn't obedient to God's command, but tonight I witnessed Jeremy raising his hands and praising God. Then I witnessed him kneeling down in prayer with one of the teens and God showed me that He is faithful even when we are not. I told God then and there that I was sorry and that I was willing to do what he required of me. He even gave me the words to say. When I did, I knew that God was with me because I felt his presence and remembered his words, "I will never leave you nor forsake you."

As a reader of my posts, I'm sure that I can consider you one of my closest and best friends. Tonight, however I can't close without asking one question because what kind of friend would I be if I didn't ask, "Are things right between you and God?"