Not Me! Monday #1

So, Not Me! Monday is this fun little thing MckMama over at My Charming Kids has got going.. Click on the button above to check out what she did NOT do this week (wink, wink) and the "not doings" of others.. In the meantime, keep reading for mine!

I did NOT get so distracted last week that I could not possibly get to the first "Not Me! Monday" of the New Year. I would certainly never blow off something I had been looking forward to that much.

I did NOT waste a ton of time on the computer this week following and catching up on other people's blogs. If I HAD been so inclined as to do that, I would certainly NOT have spent 75% of that time looking at the blogs of single ventricle heart babies born around the time Seth was. Because, really, am I that BIG of a glutton for punishment? I think NOT.

I also would NOT have been wasting above said time when I should have been bill-paying and thus would not currently be looking at late charges. (Because I AM more frugal than that and I am not that stupid.. or distracted.).

I did NOT spend an unusual amount of time crying this week because I most certainly know better than to let myself get all over-tired and emotional. (Mind you, if I HAD spent a bunch of time crying, I certainly have a decent reason).

I did NOT continue to put off grocery shopping resulting in weird meals and more eating out. I would certainly not make a habit out of doing that to my family.

This IS quite cathartic.. I bet I could go on & on but I"m thinking I should end this with:

I did NOT stay up way past midnight, knowing I had to work the next morning just so I could get my Not Me! Monday post written THIS week!! (And for those of you keeping tabs, I most certainly have NOT been playing the "3 months ago right now" game with myself most of the day today.. because that would be, well, pretty darn "human"!).

God is good.

All. the. time.

There are so many interesting (for lack of a better word) things to learn on this journey called "grief". One of the thing that amazes me is how I can be gob-smacked (I'm sure I've heard that word somewhere) out of nowhere. Like tonight.

I was at a sports practice of Sean's. Cary & Kayleigh were running around like little maniacs. A woman came in and sat down a little ways from us with her beautiful baby boy. Pretty soon, Kayleigh was over there; smiling at baby, touching him, holding his hand. Every now & then she would say something but from where I was sitting, I couldn't make out the words. I moved closer to keep tabs on the situation. Kayleigh ran off. The mom & I said "Hi", made some small talk. I introduced myself; here, we'll call her Mary & baby, N. I took a deep breath and asked how old baby N is.

"Nine months."
"So, March... ?"
"March 27th."

Silence. Honestly, I felt sucker punched. That baby is Seth's age. To. The. Day.

I sat there, debating whether or not to say anything. What to say anyway? "Oh, Your beautiful baby has the same birthday as my dead one." No, that's not quite right. "My baby was born that day too.." But then to explain where he is now?

Here's Kayleigh again, touching baby, holding his hand. She kept looking at him, like she KNEW that he should be/could be "her baby 'feth'". M said to Kayleigh, "You're very good with babies". Ah, here it is, my opening. I took a deep breath, "well, she had a little brother at home and he died".

And this is where God shows up, trumpets practically blaring! M had a baby boy die too and he would be two years old tomorrow. How amazing is God? I'm sitting there, sucker-punched, wounded, missing my baby boy so badly I almost can NOT breathe, and sitting next to me, is a woman who knows my pain. We had a blessed conversation from that point. She shared her story. I happened to have a little photo book (of Seth & family) my friend, J, sent me at Christmas which I shared. I have an open invitation to hold sweet N whenever I'd like to, and if I wouldn't, that's okay too.

It amazes me how God uses this journey. As much as it hurts, it's exciting to see where He leads and how this will be used for His good in our lives!

Thankful Thursday

It's been a rough week. I worked a couple of extra days and the weathers been yucky and it's just been hard. It's late but I want to do Thankful Thursday. I need the change of focus. So, here we go!

1. I am grateful I have a job. I work the two days a week that Leland is home so we don't have to worry about childcare. I won't go into the whole story but just landing the job was clearly from God and I'm grateful.

2. I am grateful Leland has a job! In this recession and difficult time, we know many people who have lost jobs or had hours slashed. I thank God that we haven't had to worry about that (yet).

3. I sm thankful to live where we do, in a country of such convenience. Ther are MANY places in the world where a person can NOT run down to the corner grocery store and pick up milk and bread. And if the corner grocery store exists, there are many places where people work DAYS to be able to afford milk and bread!

4. I am thankful for chocolate. Today was one of those days and a little bit of chocolate, a mocha, etc. was a lovely pick me up.

5. I am grateful for BloggerVille. I've "met" some good friends and been exposed to some amazing women. There's a pretty impressive community out there of pretty impressive gals!

Oh, there we are! That wasn't as hard as I thought it would be (although it DID take some effort). Thanks for joining me. Click the button above to find other Thankful Thursdays!

Baby Smiles - Walk with Me Wednesday

Welcome to my first ever, THE first ever, Walk with me Wednesday - Down Memory Lane. I LOVE the fact that Lynnette has decided to do this and open it up to all of us. I am a terrible historian, a lousy "record-keeper". I wish I were better at it, but I'm too much of a perfectionist. So, I'm THRILLED to have the opportunity (and excuse!) to do it here.

My first memory is a memory of mine but it also illustrates what a gift siblings are to each other. All of my babies smiled at about the "average" time, between 6 & 8 weeks of age. I remember Sean's very first baby smile. I was holding him on my lap, facing me. His little head in my hands, I was chatting away to him and he SMILED at me. I remember that giddy feeling, like when you had a crush in high school and the boy you like smiled at you! Sean was a very serious baby, we had to work hard for those smiles so they were all precious.

Three and a half years later, along came Cary. Sean was a big brother! And a great one, he was SO sweet to HIS "baby Cawee". It was obvious that Cary loved him too. Christmas Eve, 2001, I was holding Cary on my lap, he was facing sideways. Sean got up and came in the living room, walked over to greet us. He was SO animated with his baby brother! AND... Cary smiled at Sean! Sean was the recipient of Cary's very first smile! Cary was a much smilier baby than Sean, he handed them out like candy. But all those smiles were still precious and Sean got the very first one!

Almost four years later, along came Kayleigh! And how do you suppose HER first smile played out? She gave it to Cary! (You saw that one coming didn't you? Kayleigh was laying on her back on the couch. Cary came along to chat with her and pretty soon Cary's shrieking "Her smiled at me, her smiled at ME".. Now, I didn't witness it, but I did see smiles later that day and I believe it happened.

A mere two years later, here's baby Seth! One day, very shortly after coming home from the hospital, I was sitting on the sofa with Kayleigh and Seth. (I suspect the big boys were at school). We were just hanging out, having some cuddle time. Kayleigh was talking to Seth a bit. (And maybe he could understand her, I certainly couldn't at that point!). All of a sudden, Seth's face lit up. His eyes sparkled and he flashed a large gummy smile, RIGHT at Kayleigh! Now, in all fairness, Kayleigh was not quite as thrilled as her brothers had been when they received first smiles.. I suspect she didn't quite understand the importance of the moment. I was thrilled.. And excited that our family tradition continued. I think it's pretty darn special that all of my babies saved their first smiles for their next closest siblings. Something I always want to remember....

Click on the above button to check out more Walk with Me Wednesday Memories. (If I get a chance I'll upload photos later)

Just for fun

New Year, New Meme, New Attitude
This is easily the most easiest meme, ever!

Easy peasy: Take the first sentence of the first post of each month in 2008 and post ‘em on your blog, along with a link to that post. (Let me know if you play along!)

The above was copied & pasted from: Bread Crumbs in the Butter

I haven't been posting for a year so I'm going to cheat a bit.. When I started this blog, I uploaded the emails I'd sent regarding Seth during our pregnancy and his surgeries; I'm going to use the first sentence of the first emails of the months I wasn't blogging.. And I'll link to the post.

January 2008 We saw the perinatologist on Thursday of this week.

February 2008 Week 31 - So, we've started the twice weekly non stress tests (Last week).

March 2008 Week 35 - Another good round of appointments

April 2008 During Norwood..It's 10:22 am here. Seth's surgery started (incision wise)at 9am.

May 2008 Seth is doing AWESOME!! We are SO grateful for how far God has brought us and for all of you praying for us during this time!

June 2008 I was trying to come up with a clever heading for this and I just can't so I'm being boring and just sending out an update. Blah.

July 2008 (nothing for July)

August 2008 So, Seth is hanging out, weight wise, at 5.90 kilos (fluctuating between 5.91 and 5.88 or so.. today he was down on our scale.. just something else for me to stress out about!).

September 2008 September 11 - Glenn surgery day.
Seth had his Glenn procedure this am..

October 2008 Wednesday already?I apologize for not sending out an update after yesterday's neuro consult.. I'm feeling rather drained today and so I"m doing tonight's update in bullet format just to get it done.

November 2008 Good Grief. It's already been a week since I posted.

December 2008 Still here. Still struggling. I"m not even going to attempt to apologize for my lengthy blogging absence..

Wow. What a journey the last year has been. I'm glad I did this. It was good to see the highlights. Sometimes I get so overwhelmed with how it all turned out that I forget how we got here! Thanks for joining me!

Thankul Thursday 1/1/09 AND #1

Well it seems appropriate to have my first Thankful Thursday ever also be the first day of a brand new year. Happy New Year! These are the things I'm thankful for as we enter 2009.

1. I'm thankful for Seth. It took me awhile to get there, and I still have days when I don't understand why (I never understand why). But for awhile after losing him, I really struggled with wanting to erase that he'd ever happened, his time here just seemed so short. I'm grateful for the time we did have to love on him, for the lessons we're still learning because of him and for the people God brought into my life through our time with Seth.

2. I'm thankful for Sean, Cary & Kayleigh. I know that if I didn't have them when we lost Seth, I'd have still had the Lord. But every day I have a reason to get out of bed as Kayleigh is calling out "I go pee... I GO PEE" and Cary is demanding to be fed. (Sean's pretty self sufficient in the am, as long as he's got NFL network or PS3 he's good!)

3. I'm thankful for our families. We would have had a much more difficult time managing everything with Seth over the last year without the help of my mom. When push came to shove, my sister, my mom & my dad, all left their homes & basically their lives, and came to help us. I don't think I express that gratitude often enough.

4. I'm thankful for our church family. We are so incredibly blessed to be in fellowship with a group of people who are trying to truly love as Christ commanded. I was going to start thanking specific people except every time I came up with one I thought "Oh, then I also have to thank so & so" and we'll be here all day if I start that! I'm sure they know who they are but I'm extremely thankful for their willingness to come alongside us during an extremely difficult time, even if it wasn't convenient or easy for them.

5. I'm SO thankful for the Lord in my life. The Saviour OF my life. All the previous things I've listed are gifts from Him. How amazing that I am loved that much just by being. Thank you, Lord,for this journey but mostly, thank you for Your presence on this road.

And there we are! You can check out other Thankful Thursdays by clicking on the button at the top of this post. (This was good for me. I hope I can manage this every week.)

Memes in the New Year

So, just for fun, I'm going to try participating in some blog memes in the New Year. I've picked Walk with Me Wednesday & I'm going to try Thankful Thursday and possibly Not Me Monday. We'll see how it goes. I reserve the right to throw in the towel at any point!