Warmth, snow, letters and stones

We are back in the frigid cold state of Minnesota. It is freezing outside! This is ridiculous! Needless to say, we enjoyed our vacation thoroughly. It was WARM and wonderful and tons of fun. Dan and I were able to sneak away to South Carolina by ourselves for two days. As always, the time passed too quickly. We are very thankful for my dad and stepmom's generosity, hospitality and help with our boys.

Fort Sumter!

The boys had a blast with Grammie and Gramps. They were able to do some pretty fun things while they were there, like go to an animal ranch where they fed animals from inside the car. The llamas tried to steal Gramps' bucket and Sammy's favorite animal was the cow.

Gramps' freezer is NEVER short on ice cream. :)

And every morning the boys helped Grammie feed the birds.

I spent my entire childhood getting onto airplanes in order to fly away from my dad. I'm still doing it, and I still hate it. I love my dad and stepmom so much! We all do. We have sad hearts today. We miss them.

My dad is having a small surgery next week sometime, so could I ask for your prayers for him? He is going to do AWESOME. Pray for a calm spirit for him, and of course for total success, as well.

We are gearing up for Elijah's ear surgery on Tuesday. I've been doing a good job of keeping it out of my head. I'll worry about that tomorrow. Isn't that a line from Gone With the Wind? :)

THANK YOU to all of you who have sent cards and letters and other fun things for the boys. They have been so thrilled about every single piece of mail they've gotten. I sincerely want to hug each one of you for the amount of comfort this barrage of mail has provided for ALL of us. Thank you thank you thank you! Maggie, your card was particularly moving and thoughtful.

I have to share with you this one special gift we received right before we left for vacation last week. A friend (Hi, Christine!) of a friend (Hi, Alise!) sent us some worry stones that she makes herself. (Check out her website to see more!) Some of the stones have Elijah's name on them. Some have fun drawings. And some have the word I have always used to describe Elijah in medical situations--STEADFAST. Whenever I need to turn off my fear and start focusing on positive thoughts, that is where I start. It holds a lot of meaning for me. Thank you, Christine! The boys have treated the stones like they are precious jewels. In fact, there is a batch of them in a glass jar in my refrigerator right now. I asked Elijah what was going on and he said, "Oh, PLEASE don't touch those! My stone soup is cooking." :)

One more piece of news and I'll sign off. Elijah lost his fourth tooth last night, literally 5 minutes after we had gotten home! The Tooth Fairy was very nice to him, and he looks adorable with his two top front teeth missing. That will be my next picture! Thanks for checking in..