Wednesday, April 16, 2014

6 months in one post!!

Well regardless of the fact that our life has been moving at record pace for the past 6 months, this blog has most definitely seen better days. My apologies, dear blog, for leaving you in the dark for such a vast expanse of time.
Thanks to my frequent flying on facebook, I believe I will be able to jog my memory enough to summarize the last half year. Here we go.
A few big events worth mentioning: 
-Abe survived a fall down the stairs. He immediately attempted to do it again.
-Emri, (with no reasonable explanation with the exception of answer to prayer) started eating primarily by mouth instead of through her g-tube.
-Abe turned 1 on October 29....he had his cake, smashed it all over the place, and ate it too. SO hard to believe our little "baby Abee" is no longer a baby!
-Found out that Abe, at 1, weighed 3 pounds more than his 3 year-old sister. 
-Brett turned 29!! 
-My sister and her wonderful man were married on November 30. Emri was the flower girl and WALKED tall and proud down the isle. It was, of course, an incredibly touching moment for our family. Abe was the ring bearer...he only dropped the box once and stopped mid-isle to visit his grandpa. It was a very special day that will not be soon forgotten.  
-Abe survived a fall out of a home depot cart...onto cement. Worst. Mom. Ever.
-WE MOVED INTO OUR HOUSE! December 6 was the day we moved. It was extraordinarily stressful and incomprehensibly blissful all at the same time. Our upstairs remains, to this very day, a "junk zone", but once in a while we have ambitious thoughts about going up there to organize it all. Oh. And the slide is awesome.
-We got a puppy named Jack! Long story short...we have always wanted our kids to grow up with a dog. We wanted him to be well trained-so I took him to "grad school." It was a little embarrassing...but he graduated. We love him dearly...but he is still a work in progress.





-December 20-We got SNOW! Emri wanted to go outside and build sand castles. 
-December 24-We had our first official Christmas with our little family of 4. Last Christmas was spent at Johns Hopkins Hospital with Emri, who was recovering from her spinal rod surgery. We treasured the time spent together. 
-December 25-Brett's two brothers and their families flew here from Denver! We had a great time celebrating Christmas together and Emri LOVED the time spent with cousins. It was a special time for the Van Andel family!



-Emri had her very FIRST day of school on January 13th!! She loved it then and continues to love it now! She jolts out of bed to get ready for school and, without fail, has a giant grin on her face when I go to pick her up. She has a personal aid to help with her stability, which puts my heart at ease dropping her off. 





-I turned 26. Bring it on!
-Found Abe in the dryer, laughing hysterically.

-We watched the Seahawks WIN the SUPERBOWL.
-We spent a night at Children's in early February due to Emri getting so sick with a virus. She did great and recovered quickly after. Emri got an echo while we were at Children's showing no additional growth of the aorta and the same amount of mitral valve leakage as the last echo. Thankful for this!!
-February 23 was the first day of our Lynden snowstorm!! We had a great three days watching it pour snow. We got like 2 feet! The kids made it out once...for a total of 3 minutes.
-Abe achieved "double ear infection" status!
-Emri and I had the privilege of speaking to a group of nursing students at Skagit Valley College about marfan syndrome! Emri got super spoiled with a TON of doc McStuffins gear...including her very own doctors coat. 
-Abe rammed the side of his eye on a window ledge (all according to Emri as the sole witness) and gave himself a nice black eye.

So there you have it! 6 months summed up into 20 bullet points. Despite acquiring plenty of pesky viruses this winter, Emri has stayed away from the hospital all but once...which we have been so thankful for. She continues to blow us away with her strength and her gigantic personality...she just loves life and doesn't stop singing about it! I have determined that Abe wakes up every morning thinking, "how am I going to give my mom a heart attack today???" He is our little stunt man, continuously looking for new ways to injure himself.

We love our God and continue to strive to serve Him in all that we do, say and think. Our latest memory verse that we have been working on with Emri has been Psalm 19:14.

"Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer." 

Always a good verse to have fresh in your head. 
And now, it's time for bed. It was nice writing a blog that contained no surgery drama and only one hospital stay! Praise the Lord for the health and strength that He has given us over the past 6 months! Thanks for reading!