Weekend Happenings

This weekend we have two very big events.

Thursday I have cancer screening. I have an MRI, chest X-ray, and bloodwork.
Friday I go to Wills Eye Hospital for my eye laser PDT treatment.

Obviously, our prayer is that the cancer has not spread, and that the laser treatment works the first time. Or that the eye tumor is completely gone! That would be nice. :)

Please join us in prayer for the coming weekend.

We are striving to follow Philippians 4, where it says...

"do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

Josiah

On Monday night at 7:00 Nathan and I went in to the hospital for me to be induced. It soon became obvious that things were already progressing naturally, and we were very thankful for that. They kept me in overnight and gave me several batches of antibiotics during the night. Around six in the morning I started having some pretty decent contractions. They still wanted to give me pitocin so at 7:30 they started giving it to me. Two hours later, and much faster than the midwife had anticipated, Josiah Paul was born at 9:28 on 11/12/13. Nathan was able to deliver him. It was an easy labor, and for the most part, I've had an easy recovery.

Nathan had a little brother named Josiah who died at 16 weeks. We were already thinking we would name our little guy after him when we found out about my eye. Josiah means "Jehovah Heals", so that just solidified in our minds that Josiah was the perfect name for this time in our lives. Nathan's middle name is Paul after his grandpa so we continued that. 

We are so thankful for a healthy baby boy. God certainly has given us a blessing in the midst of our trials!

Plan of Attack

I went to the midwife on Tuesday, hoping that she would be able to naturally speed up the baby's arrival. However, we found out that I have not progressed at all and so she couldn't do the procedure she was going to. Seems like the little guy is very content.

With the upcoming laser surgery I won't be able to nurse for 5 days, so the midwife really thought that in the long run, although neither she nor I really want an induction, it would be the best for baby and for me. She said that chances of him being able to continue nursing long-term after five days of formula would be a lot better if I had at least a week to get my milk supply in. So, with a little trepidation, we went ahead and scheduled the induction.

They wanted to induce Sunday night, but we are going to pick up Mom from the airport that day. So that pushed the date off to Monday night, with pitocin set to start Tuesday morning. This makes Nathan really happy because he really wanted the baby to be born on 11/12/13. It looks like he may get his wish!

I would much rather go into labor naturally before then, and that is what I'm praying. But I guess in the grand scheme of things, it really doesn't matter.

Eye procedure is still scheduled for the 22nd. Insurance approved the laser part of the surgery so that is a huge praise! Now we're just really praying that they will cover the injection, but we won't find that out till after the procedure has taken place and they have received the bills. Please pray that would be covered!

I should hear from the oncologist doctor here in town soon about scheduling cancer screenings to make sure it hasn't spread. He confirmed that the bloodwork came out good and said if there was anything too advanced it would have shown up.They are going to try to schedule everything for the 21st, but I won't know for sure until tomorrow.

So now we are just waiting, and trusting God to do great things. He is a great God, and like our dear evangelist friend reminded us, He is still the God of miracles.

October Happenings

This October we did so many fun, local, Fall things. Nathan seems to be a pro at thinking up fun things to do on the weekends to keep us busy, and these are a few things that we have been doing lately...

We went to the Apple Harvest Festival near Gettysburg a few weekends ago. We got to have applesauce, apple cider, apple fritters, apple sausage, and about anything else with apples that you could want was there. Lathie even got to do a Johnny Appleseed craft!

Later that evening we carved the pumpkins we got last month. We've been so busy that we just now got around to it. I had never carved a pumpkin before, and this was Aletheia's first time as well, so we chose a simple pattern. She had a hard time not tasting the insides... :)

Last weekend we went to historic downtown Gettysburg and Nathan showed us all the shops and some of the sights near where he works. One of our stops was at a cupcake shop, where Aletheia got to pick her own Happy Birthday Cakes (what she calls any kind of cake or cupcake).

 On the way home, we passed a Farmer's Market that has pet deer. Nathan always passes them on his commute but has never stopped, but this time he did. We had never seen live deer so up-close before.