Welcome Ty Pennington!

Extreme Makeover: Home Edition is coming to Gainesville!! The door knock date is set for December 7th and the big "move that bus" date is schedule for December 14th. MOPS was asked to take part in this incredible event, so several of us will be doing some volunteer work next week to help make a dream come true for a local family (who we will meet for the first time in 5 days)! I am sooo very excited that I was chosen to volunteer. I will be volunteering for one six hour shift on Sunday, December 13th. I may very well be doing something like picking up trash, but I am thrilled beyond words to take part!! This morning Grant and I attended the pep rally, which left me even more inspired!

Eight months ago our lives forever changed in a spilt second, and our community came together to give us "hope"! I continue to be amazed at the outpouring of love and generosity shown to our family, and I am thankful to be able to share some of that with someone else. I am know this will be the BEST ever Extreme Home Makeover!

Welcome to Gainesville CBS, Extreme Home Makeover, and Ty Pennington! The Gator Nation will not disappoint you!

That's True L-O-V-E!

So Grant is playing on the floor and randomly starts laughing, from previous experience as a mommy I have learned that usually means "trouble". I look over at him to find Visken licking spit-up off his face...either Visken is really over this "diet" he is on or that is true L-O-V-E!

What do I say?

Jake's mom called last night and we started talking about the upcoming holidays. She said she hasn't even thought about decorating her house for Christmas (which I must say is shocking, because she LOVES decorating for Christmas). I then shared with her that last Thanksgiving Jake, Ethan, and I put up the Christmas tree together. Ethan was so stunned that there was a tree in the living room. The next morning he was still in awe and kept saying "tree, lights"? Jake's mom then apologized for bring up something that must be so painful for me to remember. This is what I told her in response, but I wanted to share it with all of you because I realize there must be times that some of you are afraid to share things with me because you don't want to cause me more pain. I am really-really-really grateful that I still have wonderful Ethan stories to share. It is good for me to talk about him and unfortunately the only way Grant will ever get to know about his big brother is by telling these stories. I never want this to stop, for then it will be as if Ethan has been forgotten from the hearts of others. So please don't ever be afraid to share something with me or our family, and don't ever apologize. A story about Ethan or something that happened to cause you to think of him helps us know how very much he is still loved and touched the lives of others! Thank you all for loving us through the worst moment of our lives.

America's Next Top Baby

Well we did something crazy on Saturday and took Grant to his first open casting call. A friend of mine that I met through MOPS though is the editor for Giggle, which is a local family and parenting magazine. Grant woke up no more than 5 minutes before he had his pictures taken with the photographer, but he was happy and smiling as always. It will be interesting to see if he gets a "call back" to be in the magazine. Seriously they would be crazy not to pick him though! Maybe he will be our ticket to early retirement? :-)

On a side note as we were leaving the casting call, a group of teenage boys were riding bikes through the parking lot and one said "man, that is a cute baby"! How many teenage boys call any baby cute?

Jam Session

Who needs "Rock Band" when you have a pot, spoon, and baby piano. Super G jamming out!

Headstone

We went to visit a place yesterday that does custom headstones. I knew right from the moment we got there that this was going to be "the place". The outside lot was filled with very unique, absolutely beautiful headstones; many of the stones were either hand carved or engraved. Inside we met with a wonderful woman who told us right away that she too had lost a child and when she started working there they basically had only a handful of options to show grieving parents. She now has put together a book filled with incredible examples of what they can do for a child's headstone. We also met with the owner and talked with him about getting granite from Minnesota. We could tell he had been in the business for awhile as he started naming types of granite that come from Minnesota off the top of his head. One of them that he mentioned was rainbow granite, which he said is a "very unique stone, full of movement...no two pieces are alike". That was it! We knew instantly that was the stone we wanted. We talked with them about a few ideas that we had and are now waiting for him to draw something up for us. The girl in the office said that usually takes a couple of weeks as he puts some thought and time into his designs. I am quite certain just from what he was describing and what we have seen of his work that it will be as perfect as a headstone for E could be.

I still would have chosen you.

My many thanks to an old friend for sharing this beautiful poem with me. Even if I had known that my time with E would have been so very short and today that I would hurt to the very depths of my soul...I would still have chosen Ethan. Please don't ever feel sorry for me, as I firmly believe this was God's plan. I will be forever blessed that God picked me to be Ethan's mommy and will spend the rest of my life sharing his message and spirit with others.

If before you were born I could have gone to Heaven to see all of the beautiful souls,

I still would have chosen you.

If God had told me that this soul would one day need extra care,

I still would have chosen you.

If He had told me that one day this soul may make my heart bleed,

I still would have chosen you.

If He had told me that this soul would make me question the depth of my faith,

I still would have chosen you.

If He had told me that this soul would make tears flow from my eyes that would overflow a river,

I still would have chosen you.

If He had told me that our time spent together here on Earth could be short,

I still would have chosen you.

If He told me that this soul may one day make me endure overbearing suffering,

I still would have chosen you.

If He had told me that all that I know to be normal would drastically change,

I still would have chosen you.

Of course, even though I would have chosen you, I know it was God who chose me for you.

Thank you, God, for allowing me to be his Mommy.

Author Unknown.