Spring

Well I finally feel like spring is here for good and we have been having so much fun planting gardens and getting the yard all cleaned up. I got lots of rose bushes for mother's day and I can't wait until they are all blooming this summer! Bella graduates from preschool next week and although we are excited to end that chapter of Bella's life, we are already terribly sad to say good-bye to her teachers. What a God-send they were this year! Mrs. Sue and Mrs. Ann were the best teachers I have ever come to know and we all feel blessed to have had them be a part of Bella's life! I wanted to also take this time to wish all of our mothers and grandmothers happy mother's day! We are so thankful that we have each and every one of you to love. God is so good! What would we do without you? Thank you mom for all of your love and support this spring - I am blessed and I know it! Our dear friend Jess is scheduled for her c-section Friday the 15Th and I if you could pray for baby number five that he/she is healthy and that Jess recovers quickly, that would be great. Also if you want pray that it is a boy,that would be great too! Not that a fifth girl wouldn't be as exciting, but I'm sure they would love to experience the gifts that a little boy can bring into their lives and so would all of us friends! I pray that each and every one of you who reads this is doing well and that spring brings you lots of hope and joy! God bless!

My Birthday and Easter

Happy Easter to all of our friends and family! This has been a busy week with Bella having spring break, Aaron being gone, celebrating my birthday and Easter today. Thankfully the weather was nice all week and we were able to spend a lot of time outside. I just wanted to thank everyone for their thoughts and prayers in the last couple of weeks. We couldn't have gotten through this time without them. The Easter bunny paid us a visit this morning and Bella was very excited. Natalie Jane wasn't that into finding the eggs this year, but Bella made up for her. They are playing with their Easter goodies right now and hopefully we will spend some time with family today. We had a very nice service at church this morning and now we can relax after getting ready for this crazy weekend. Take care everyone!

Sad Hearts

Most of you know that we had another IVF procedure and got pregnant. Our blood worked looked great and right away we had large numbers. We were suppose to have our first ultra-sound on Thursday, but the doctor couldn't find the heart beat. The sack was too small for six weeks, so I had more blood work that night, but by Friday my HCG showed that my levels were dropping and that my body was going to lose this pregnancy. We were not prepared for this news at all. Everything seemed to be going according to plan and with doing an IVF, they pump you so full of hormones, you feel more confident about not miscarrying, at least we did. It's rare, but it happened, and now we have to put all of our hopes, expectations and excitement away and continue the grieving process. Bella has been asking for another little brother or sister for a while now, and so we did tell her when we felt like it was safe to. She was praying every night that the baby would be safe and strong and that it would teach Natalie how to love and how not to be naughty. She was sad at first, but now she's just praying for another little brother or sister to come along. I wish life was that simple for Aaron and I. I wish that I didn't desire a big family or to be pregnant again, but I do (we do), so we put our faith in God and understand that our days are numbered and that this baby may have only lived for six weeks, but it was loved so much and in the end, isn't that what life is suppose to be all about?

Bella Accepted Christ Today

The last couple of weeks around the Combs's household have been difficult and I woke up today feeling a little bit weary, but then something amazing happened. We were listening to Steven Curtis Chapman's "Cinderella" song on the radio and those of you who don't know the song, it is about how his little girl wants to play Cinderella all the time and dance with her daddy and then it flashes to prom when she's older and she asks him to help her practice dancing and then flashes forward again to her wedding day and it's a tear jirking song, but the really sad part of the song is that the artist that sings that song lost his four-year old daughter (whom he wrote the song about) last year when his older son hit her in the driveway with the car accidentally. Bella remembered the story I had told her. We told her about the story so we could explain the danger of running in front of cars. I hadn't said anything yet, but she was really quiet and I said "what are you thinking about?" She said "I was thinking of the little girl who died". We talked about that story and she said she was very sad for her, but I explained to her that she didn't need to be sad for the little girl, because she was in heaven with Jesus now and although we are sad for her family and the ones who miss her, we are excited that she is with him. We have been talking to her about how you get to heaven and praying to Jesus when she was ready to have hime come into her heart, but I always tell her that it doesn't need to be done today, but when she's really ready and understands what that means. Well, today she said "I want Jesus to come into my heart today Mom, so I can go to heaven when I die". A lot of you have been going through this very same moment with your children lately and I was so excited for each and every one of you, but when it's your child, there are no words to express the happiness you feel. I don't know if at four and half she really undnerstands completely, but there is nothing like the pure faith of a child! It's funny to see someone so young, also be so compassionate at the same time. Every time we pray, she always prays for the homeless people downtown who live in boxes under the bridge who have no home or food and she's still asking questions about our friend Ryand who passed away last June. She worries about people who are sad or who have lost someone. I have always been proud of her for her soft heart, but lately she has been having issues and has been in kind of a funk. She's definetely been batteling something and when this morning she prayed her prayer with me, it renewed my spirit and made me understand that Aaron and I are doing something right at least. That Bella loves Christ and the hurting - I couldn't feel more OK, no matter what happens from here!

These Sweet Moments

Well, things are finally slowling down after the holidays and with that I am taking more time to appreciate the girls and all the sweet and funny things they say and do. Like the song says "time falls away", and I wish that I had a photographic memory so I can remember it all before I forget it. Will I remember how small their piggies are right now or how high their sweet voices are or what it feels like to be wrapped in such small little arms? I try to to write it all down, but time slips away and that moment is forgotten. Today was a challenge with Natty - she was her usual naughty self - some call it busy, but it's just a nice way of saying the same thing. I feel bad giving her that label, but she is truely the most challenging child I've ever delt with. Her favorite thing to do is sit in my lap and suck her thumb, but life is busy and so she does the other favorite thing she does best - hang on the fridge or cabinets crying that she needs "cheese" or "canny". When she inevitablly doesn't get what she wants, she throws her temper tantrums, which come by the dozens these days. She learned to say "no" and "mine" this past week and they are my least favorite words coming from a toddler's mouth, BUT in the taking of my time appreciating her tonight I got to watch her swim in the tub and climb into her bed all by herself and sing along with me for the first time as I sang Adel Vise to her. It was one of the sweetest moments I've had with her and it melted my angry heart. When we were done she clapped and folded her hands to say her prayers and giggled when I prayed for her to not be naughty tomorrow - not a coinsidence:) She said Amen all by herself and I thought what a cool little person she's becoming. Aaron is gone tonight, so Bella and I are going to have movie night. She is waiting for me so patiently. Her teacher's brother is in the hospital tonight with spinal meningitus and is unconscious. They have decided to let him go and tomorrow will be his first day with Jesus. All their kids and family will be coming in from out of town. If you could pray for that family. I can't imagine what they must be going through right now and I know that they could use all the prayers they can get. God bless!

Our Trip

We are finally home from our trip and I have been trying hard to figure out how to describe a trip of a lifetime. I just don't even know where to start. I feel blessed that the army gave back to us, after I feel like it's taken so much time from our family. I thank God for that bonus and my wonderful friend Shannon for mothering my children for me while I was gone. No one could have done a better job. Bella is still talking about all the wonderful things they did together. It warms my heart to know that they were so happy. Our favorite place in Australia was Cairns - that's the city that the Great Barrier Reef is off of. It's really the whole area around it that was amazing. There were rain forests and parks and waterfalls galore. We just couldn't get enough. My favorite day of the whole trip was snorkeling in the reef. I felt a little bad that Aaron couldn't go scuba diving, since he is licensed and it would have been the best place in the world for it, but he stuck with me and did not have a pleasant time. For some reason he got stung by five jelly fish, and bit by not only a parrot fish, but a barracuda as well -it was a small one. He was miserable, but I was in awe! The neon fish and reef were just amazing. I don't even know how to describe it. I wanted to stay there forever. It was like another world. I got to hold Koalas at the zoo in Cairns too, which was my second favorite thing about the trip. They are so sweet and they smell like eucalyptus - go figure:) That was always a dream of mine from as long as I can remember. We thought that the outback was amazing as well, but it was just so different. It was so hot and dry. The red rock formations there were very interesting and the life of the Aboriginal people was fascinating. Sydney was just beautiful. It felt like they took England and plonked it right down in the middle of the Caribbean. The buildings were cool and the foliage was tropical. The weather was perfect there - spring time with flowers blooming every where. We visited the big aquarium and took a tour of the town. We went to the famous markets and had a lot of fish and chips. We didn't enjoy Melbourne as much, but we spent most of our time on the Great Ocean Road tour that showed us all these cool rock formations in the ocean. We stopped at lots of parks along the way and saw the beach where they filmed that surf movie with Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze - Point Break. I got some cool shells from that beach shhhhhh;) It was the most beautiful part of the ocean I've ever seen besides the reef that is. We saw wild Koalas sleeping and trees. Wow! I feel so blessed to have gotten to experience that! Our next stop was New Zealand and that was a trip with-in itself. It was only a three hour flight and a couple more time changes. We started in Christchurch, but we weren't there that long. It was a cute little town with a lot of galleries and artists. It felt a little like Ireland did. We took a boat ride down the river like in Italy. When we got to Queenstown, it had just stopped raining and we were greeted by the most beautiful rainbow I've ever seen - it was enormous! We went on lots of tours there and got to see the places where they filmed much of the Lord of The Rings films. We got to take lots of trips up the mountains by way of the gondola. The view from that, was extraordinary. We could see across the lake to the mountains. Wow again! We ended the trip by paragliding off the top of Bob's peak. Aaron just had to do it and I'm usually up for anything, but the idea of crashing and orphaning my girls didn't sound appealing. OK, so who was the one that crashed on their first attempt off the cliff? Oh yeah - that would be me! APPARENTLY our chute only half-way filled with wind when we went running off the edge of the mountain. HMMMMMMMMMMMMMmmmm.I couldn't understand my Aussi tandem jump coach. Their accents are so thick:0 "Negative, negative". Iyiyiyi I hurt my arm, but it was OK. I saw my life flash before my eyes as I was sliding down and clinging to every last pebble and blade of grass. (Sigh) My legs were shaking when we did our final run off the other side. Can you imagine? All of our 13 flights connected great and we only had one long delay, which ended up allowing us to feed wild wallabies in Alice Springs, so all worked out in the end and I came home feeling so relaxed. Happy healthy kids and we survived jet-lag. Thank you God!

Our 10Th Anniversary Trip

Hey all! We are just about ready for our trip now and I wanted to leave you with our itineraries in case we crash on one of the 12 or 13 flights we will have in store for us. OK we are flying from Chicago to St. Louis to LA to Sydney to Cairns (the great barriar reef) we are there for three days and then to Ayers Rock and Alice Springs for a day each and then back to Sydney for three days to Melbourne for two and then we fly to New Zealand and we will be in Christchurch, Queenstown, some smaller towns and Aukland for a total of five days. We leave Thursday for our trip, but we may be going to Chicago on Wednesday night depending on the weather. In case we don't see any of you before the trip - have a happy Thanksgiving! We love you all!