On New Year's Day I opened my Bible and journal and spent some time thinking about the year ahead of me. In the past, the transition to a New Year has been difficult for me. I haven't always gone into it with an open mind. As I said goodbye to 2014, my heart resembled a grey cloud on the verge of spilling tears. Stormy days. Unstable emotions. The storm clouds had been building since Christmas. The heaviness. The rumbling in my spirit. Waiting, just waiting, for release. Fresh rain to wash Continue Reading
Our Christmas List
I remember Christmas being such a magical time when I was a child; and I'm reliving that magic now that Jackson is old enough to experience it himself. There is nothing quite like seeing Christmas through his eyes. Most mornings I wake up to find him standing in front of our tree saying wow! I can't get enough of hearing him say Ho Ho Ho! And he has perfected his wish list to Santa: train, truck, toys and race car. This year we've cut way back on the material things to better enjoy Continue Reading
Preparing My Heart {For Christmas}
Christmas music has been playing in my house since mid-November and the majority of my shopping has been finished since then too. We hauled the decorations out of the attic and decked our halls before we headed out of town for Thanksgiving. It's not that I wanted to rush past Thanksgiving. I just wanted to come home, sit by the glow of the tree lights and soak up the meaning of this season. What I want this year - like every year - is for my heart to be right this Christmas. And Continue Reading
Harder Than Apraxia
Last week I told a friend and my counselor that I'd choose Apraxia over the other diagnosis any day. Don't get me wrong, Apraxia hasn't been a piece of cake, but Jackson is finally stringing words together and can find ways to get his point across even when he can't find the words. But Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD) trickles into every area of our lives. Its effects are as far reaching as the newborn days when we thought all the screaming was colic induced. Now we know it was more Continue Reading
When You’re Weary
Life with Apraxia is a marathon (not a sprint). Jackson's been in speech therapy since he was 18-months-old (he will be four in December) and it wasn't until August that we really started seeing big strides in his speech. God promises that our lives will produce fruit when we entrust our stories to Him. But the process can be messy. Jackson's speech has improved tremendously, but this is reality: we're on a difficult road and there's not an end in sight. October was a hard month for Continue Reading