Miracles DO Happen! God is ALIVE!

My goodness time flies! I have so much to rejoice about over here it is going to be a long post! Hang on til the end! This is good :)

The first amazing thing is that Joey has been and continues to listen to the song that has these lyrics -

When you walk into the room
Everything changes
Darkness starts to tremble
At the light that you bring
And when you walk into the room
Every heart starts burning
And nothing matters more
Than just to sit here at your feet
And worship you
We worship you

Chorus:
We love you
We'll never stop
We can't live without you, Jesus
We love you
And we can't get enough
All this is for you, Jesus

When you walk into the room
Sickness starts to vanish
Every hopeless situation ceases to exist
And when you walk into the room,
The dead begin to rise
'Cause there is resurrection life
In all You do

Bridge:
Come and consume, God
All we are
We give you permission
Our hearts are Yours
We want You
We want You

We had really been struggling financially in February.  Medical bills from the 2013 year were piling up from Joseph's surgery, appointments, and blood work. I started a Bible Study called "Experiencing God." During the first week, I was moved to use my Christmas money to pay medical bills and start payment plans on the ones I could not pay off right away. Ouch! really God, I never have money for myself to splurge on things and I had been debating for a month what to do - well I did what I was told. I kept all bills from going to collections and moved forward. I felt a huge sense of relief after doing that. I now knew that if any more bills came, they would have to up to the Lord to pay.

Joey & I had been blessed with a weekend getaway to Fredericksburg at Christmas. We were both excited to go, yet knew we still had to pay to eat, gas, etc... The week before we were to leave I found out that we were given $150 to help with childcare expenses from Any Baby Can - an organization that helps families with special needs kids. I thought to myself wow that is great. Surely we can eat on that for a weekend. As I continued to pray about the weekend & really spending time with Joey, God laid it on my heart that he has more in store for us for the weekend. Well, he sure did show up in a mighty way! We found out we were getting a tax refund. As I prayed about how much to allow us to spend, God told me to tithe to ourselves - 10%. Sweet! That was more than we had planned on taking. The rest paid off a credit card and more bills :)

The day we were leaving, Joey sends me a text that he received an unexpected bonus at work. What? Seriously! Awesome! We were both on cloud 9 and just blown away at Gods plan. Then Joey walks in the door and says Jenny this envelope was taped to the door. Inside was $100 bill &

Matthew 22:37-39

New International Version (NIV)

³⁷ Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’^{[a] 38} This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹ And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’

What? Joey goes and checks the front door (of course, the natural thing to do) & the mail. Yes, in the mail was an unexpected respite check. Now by this point we are looking at each other with our mouths wide open saying Praise you Jesus! Thank you for providing for our family.

Seriously, this was amazing! Fredericksburg was marvelous! The day we returned from the awesome weekend, we found a statement saying one bill was to be paid immediately & guess what - we had the cash.

I seriously can not tell you how many little incidents have happened since then that make me just smile knowing God cares about everything our hearts desire!

Joseph's equipment was delivered and he loves it! He was waving to everyone as I pushed for a walk downtown. He could see and was positioned correctly in his wheelchair/stroller. He was in his stander five minutes and smiled with his hands on the wheels and tried to push himself. Oh pure joy fell over me. I was just amazed at how much freedom he must have felt being up off the floor. His tray we out on with some toys and he was even more excited!

 

 This equipment did not come easy! I have been fighting with BCBS for 6 weeks to get this approved. I used to verify insurance at an outpatient rehab place here in town when I was in college, little did I know that was part of a divine plan to prepare me for this phase of my life. I appealed twice and finally won :) The plan was to have this equipment be the first thing hit the insurance in January because it would meet the deductible & the rest of the year would be covered at 100%! An incredible organization - Variety of Texas - agreed to pay our portion of the equipment, which was the amount of the deductible. Again - we serve an absolutely amazing God! As you know, this did not work out according to the plan, and medical bills went to insurance before the equipment, yet I have no doubt in my mind when it's all said and done, the money will show up when it's needed!

 

 

 

Jordan also got some new equipment! She has her first bicycle! I had been getting impatient trying to find one for her that was the right size, princess, etc.... Joey came to look at a few with us at Wal-Mart & said we should really wait until we have the right one, this one is too small for her. Being the nice wife, I agreed reluctantly. Well, Joey was right, a bigger, better bike was on sale at Target for $30 off. Thank you Jesus for that blessing!

 

 

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Of course, I always think of my Memaw on this day. She loved the Irish!

 

 Love all her funny faces!

 

He's just too stinking cute :)

 

 

 

Jordan has made great progress with her dancing skills! She loves tap & ballet now!

 

The Bluebonnets are absolutely breath taking right now!

 

 





Army Crawling!

Metabolic Geneticist Results

Joseph's Organic Amino Acids were in the low side of normal & his n-glycates were normal. His o-glycates were abnormal but not diagnosable. We will be getting a full panel of o-glycates done again as well as more chromosome testing when we go back in June.  The dr may have us do the tests before the office visit, but I have not heard back on that yet officially. The reason we are doing all of this is to determine why he has hypotonia. If nothing diagnosable comes back on these tests, then we will just know he has hypotonia and keep moving forward either way.

 

 



Change is a GOOD Thing!

Here's a family update -

Jordan - 4 years old! Wow, I just can not believe she is four. I love her personality & am excited to see her flourish this year. She loves reading. Her favorite center at school is book center. She loves to sing! Her favorite songs are right now are the songs on the soundtrack to Frozen. It is a fabulous movie & I am ready for it be out on DVD! She is behaving a ton better & loving being around Joseph. This is HUGE - seriously she wants to hold him, love him, kiss him, etc. It is the sweetest sight to see. She is growing up so fast.

Joseph - 13 months old :) He is reaching up to play with toys & turn things on. He is able to push up on his stomach and hold his head up for long periods of time. He is trying to army crawl & getting frustrated when it does not work. He gets everywhere by rolling. He is super fast! He is able to stand with support for a few minutes. His core is still really weak so he locks his legs to stand. He kicks constantly. He really likes kicking in the bathtub. He will even do it on command. He smiles when I say kick kick kick then he starts. He is sitting much better & continues to improve on being able to sit without propping. He is now lifting his head if he is in the crawling position. He can not quite stay up on all fours but he is trying. His medical stroller (wheelchair) has been approved by our insurance! His stander will be approved soon. The insurance company originally excluded some options that we need so we had to submit it again. These will make daily life so much easier! We are not giving up on him walking at all - it's the exact opposite. I wanted to get the stroller so that when we are out on a walk, the zoo, etc.... he is supported and in the proper position. He just flops and slides in the regular strollers. This one will make him be upright and working on posture. The stander will be used for a minimum of an hour a day. It will make Joseph work on standing in the proper position. He will gain strength and mobility by being in the stander upright. He is learning to drink out of a cup with a straw. He is able to do this with a cup called a sip a mug :)

He makes progress and continues to work really hard. He has an appointment on March 4th with the pediatric metabolic geneticist. I am excited to be going to see Dr. Gibson. He is highly recommended by everyone. We will be looking for answers as to why he has the hypotonia.  He will look from things like chromosome issues, proteins, enzymes, etc... I am hoping that we will be able to get a full blown genetic test done to be sure there is not an issue with one of his chromosomes.

Me - oh geeze - where to start? The main thing is that I am feeling much better after a visit to my doctor to adjust my medicine. December and January were really hard emotionally. I was crying all the time when I was at home or church. I have adjusted behaviors and paired with the new dose of meds, I feel like myself again. I am not on Facebook anymore. If you thought I was being rude and deleted you as a friend - sorry. I made the decision and it has really changed my life. I notice myself more involved with my kids and not sitting around staring at a screen. Basically - keeping life simple, organized and actually scheduling me time at home. I am more cautious about committing to something and trying to be less busy.

Prayer requests -
the most important is for our family unity
Jordan to continue to thrive at school, be more happy, and improve behavior
Joseph to continue to improve physically
Finances - medical bills are piling up so I just need peace about them and paying as we can

The Celebration Continues...

I took cupcakes to Jordan's Class at First Protestant - she loved everyone singing to her & the sweet treat :) All her friends said thank you Jordan & response was oh mom they love me!

 

 

 

 She had her friend Leigh Ann hang out with her on her real birthday! Her first sleep over :)

At our church, when you turn 4 you get to come in the sanctuary and worship then go to children's church. Emilee was so sweet - she saw Jordan and said "its your first time! yeah!" and she took her hand to lead the way. I absolutely love kids sweet hearts and spirits!

Jordan's 4th Hello Kitty Birthday Party

 

Snow & Princess Jordan

We were pleasantly surprised when we woke up one morning to SNOW! Seriously, I was clueless that it was even a possibility. We got dressed and played right away! Jordan and I sang the song from Frozen - do you want to build a snowman?

Jordan & Joey went to the Princess Ball at our church! Seriously it is the absolute cutest thing ever! Dad's and their Daughters at a fancy dinner & dancing. Jordan loved everything about the evening :)