My Baby Turned 3~ Journal 2

So yesterday my baby turned 3. It was a day to celebrate. The last year was really tough on us. We took him to the Dr last April because he had a little rash. After having him at a pediatrician that was never in the office, and seeing the other Dr’s in his office all the time, we switched Dr’s. His new Dr. noticed that he had birth marks, like 30 of them. He referred us to genetics in Columbia at the children’s hospital. And from there we saw a lot of Dr's. We found out that he has a suspected diagnosis of Neurofibromatosis, he has craniosynistosis, and he had brain surgery for a chiari malformation in March. He has microcephaly, a Chromosome 16 micro duplication, and last week we were told they believe he now has Tuberous Sclerosis. But if you look at that little guy, you would never know there was anything wrong with him. That boy is so funny. He has the best personality. He is happy and watching him makes me enjoy my life more. When I was pregnant with him, I didn’t want another baby. I already had my son and I did not need another one. I had a threatened miscarriage with Tristan. Then, when I thought I might lose him, it was a different ball game. I did want him and I was heartbroken at the thought of not having another baby. (That didn’t stop me from getting my tubes tied.) hehe. But now I look at him, and even though he is not developing at the right speed, he is still so special. He has no idea what the letters of the alphabet are, or which color is which even though most 3 year olds do. But he knows what love is and joy. And he knows what trouble is too. Sometimes he gives me a run for my money, but he is just a sweet little thing and I pray blessing and healing on him every single day. I hope everyone else doesn’t see him as a disability, but as the silly little man that he is.


Word Count 356
6.26.13

I am tired~ Journal 1

I like to be encouraging and uplifting to others, but right now I am just tired. I am absolutely exhausted. I feel like I can’t catch up on sleep, or laundry, or the house. I will be leaving really soon to go to work and I just want to get in bed and go to sleep. School and work are taking it out of me. In addition to the kids and husband. Don’t get me wrong. I love my life and family, and I am extremely blessed. I don’t have to work; it is just something that we have decided would be best for our family right now to get ahead. It will give us the opportunity to get out of debt. We weren’t as wise as we should have been when we first got together. We got credit cards and I had no trouble running them up. I was a stay at home mom for 5 years. So now I am a full time college student, full time employee, and I still feel like a full time mom. I work from 11pm-7am, so when I get home from work, the kids are getting up and around which means on the days that I work, and I nap when/if they nap. Last Wednesday morning – Sunday evening I had a total of 11 hours of sleep. Please don’t take this as complaining, which is exactly what this is. I just am generally a very positive person, so I don’t have the opportunity to express any frustration I have often. Unfortunately the things that are on my heart and mind to blog about now are not very uplifting. I want to stress again that I am so excited for the future our family will have, but right now, it is just tiring. I keep on saying to myself and all of my friends, that it is just a season. I do believe it. We go through seasons, some easy and some hard. Some seasons are fun and some are sad. This is just a blink of an eye. In 3 years I will be completely done with school and both of my babies will be in elementary school. At that point I am completely confident that things will get a little easier. I am just today, very tired. 

Word Count 386
6-26-13

Know Your Audience Analysis

We are officially in week 4 of this semester. I have enjoyed the majority of our assignments and feel like I am beginning to know my classmates. Some of our class mates are so personal and very detailed in the struggles they have in their lives. One post that I enjoyed responding to was the Freewriting on One Potato – Two Potato – Three Potato – Four. Having a writer willing to share their heart, and me having the ability to respond makes me feel emotionally connected to them. Then there were some who are a little vague and broad. I have noticed in some cases, if a post is short and sweet, sometimes the responses are also short and sweet. Something that has surprised me, is that some guys have posted a lot of emotional and detailed things. Not to be sexist, but I have had an assumption that guys are not detailed, and that they are less emotional. My “What are you thankful for” post showed me that men can be as sentimental too. One post I had to chuckle at was the, “favorite food”. The question was what is your favorite food? Some posted to the point, there favorite food was blank. Then you had others like myself who posted about a variety of restaurants and types of food as well as history and why. In a class like this you get have many types of people with different personalities so it is expected to have such variation in writing and responses. The most apparent thing from the posts that I noticed, is that everyone loves their family. Whether it was “What are you thankful for” or “vacation” or “happiest memory” someone on almost every post, commented about their family. I am a very emotional and detailed person, so I have noticed sometimes in my writing I get long winded. I have also noticed from the Know Your Audience discussion as well as blogs, that we have a range of people, some very religious and some not at all, some liberal, some not. My writing is my own. I don’t write for others approval, I write to improve. I do not expect my writing to change based on who is reading it, because you cannot please everyone & my peers are such a broad group.

I believe I am blessed

I believe I am blessed. I have a lot to be thankful for. I have so much going on in my life, and I am busy. But I am blessed. I have a wonderful family. My boys are my world. I do not know how I would live without them.  They are truly amazing. My youngest son, despite the diseases/disorders he has is AMAZING. His courage is truly wonderful.  Everybody that sees him is immediately drawn to him. His smile is contagious and his laugh is hysterical. My oldest son is so handsome. He is unrealistically smart. At 3 he was writing his name and knew how to spell, colors, numbers, etc. And he is funny too. Sometimes we are a little hard on him and expect him to be more mature than a 5 year old should be. When he does something that a normal 5 year old would do, like skips the bottom 2 stairs and just jumps, he gets in trouble. He doesn’t get in trouble because it’s that big of a deal. But he has a little brother that watches and does absolutely everything he does. So when Oliver jumps and misses a few stairs, his 2 year old brother does the same thing and could get hurt. He is still so happy he has zeal about life. That I don’t see in people not even in kids. He loves God so much. When he is afraid of the dark or anything I hear him say “Jesus you are with me and I am not afraid”. He is a bold little kid and I pray I can raise him up to be a wonderful man! And my favorite of the 3 men, my husband. I don’t even know where to start to say how blessed I am by him. I know one day my boys will grow up, move out and get married and have their own life. But this man I am married to, we will be together until we die. He is by far absolutely AMAZING. He is selfless and puts everyone ahead of himself. He takes my breath away! I love him more than words will ever say. He makes me laugh and holds me when I cry. We have been on the brink of the end a few times, but we have somehow despite everything managed to hang on. We have been through moving, infidelity, job loss, death of parents, and many more struggles and even when we want to throw in the towel and say I’ve had enough, we don’t. We cling tighter to each other and to God and that is what has gotten us to where we are at today. I am incredibly blessed and these 3 guys in my life remind me of that every day. I am thankful and blessed that even though my life consists of burping at the dinner table and mud and bugs, that the smiles on their faces tell me, they know they are loved. I will love all 3 of these guys until the day I take my last breath. I am blessed.


521 Words

I believe!

I believe I am blessed
I believe I have an amazing life
I believe I am blessed with 2 amazing kids
I believe that God is revealing things to me daily
I believe life is hard
I believe I have had an easy life
I believe that my man is the best man in the world
I believe that life is too short
I believe I can do what I set my mind too
I believe AT&T is the best wireless company
I believe the DH rule ruined baseball
I believe blue skies make a day better
I believe there are angels among us
I believe life is a journey
I believe your circumstances do not determine your outcome
I believe stay at home mom's have the hardest job
I believe my best friends are the best friends that a girl could want
I believe laundry is the worst household chore
I believe my kids are beautiful
I believe tattoos hurt
I believe children's behavior is a direct representation of parenting
I believe people are different
I believe hurt people, hurt people.
I believe having everything perfect and clean results in less chaos.
I believe potty training is difficult.
I believe the dishwasher should be loaded and unloaded every day or 2
I believe pink is a pretty color
I believe men are bigger babies when they are sick
I believe in God.
I believe that this August is going to be one of the hottest.
I believe I am technological.
I believe my boys think that I hung the moon
I believe that I am random