Mountain Musings

The Simple Woman's Daybook ~ September!

For Today: Wednesday, September 14

Outside my window...We're in for another hot day with temps reaching 90 by afternoon--possibly the last hot day of summer with cooler and more pleasant temps arriving soon...I'm looking forward to getting outside and cleaning up the fall garden.

I am thinking...it's been a very long blog break for me--I hope you're still out there reading! Are you? I had originally thought I'd do a blog series titled September Snapshots and post a photo every day the month of September. Thankfully, I talked myself out of that before I started! Because...

I am learning...to be a round-the-clock caregiver for Granny. Unfortunately, last week she broke another bone in her lower back and has been in severe, excruciating pain. Tomorrow she has a bone scan, and surgery is tentatively scheduled for Friday afternoon to repair the compression fracture. Please pray for her!

Here's Granny enjoying a treat; I know she's looking forward to getting well and making baskets again, her favorite hobby: Here's a custom order of 4 baskets she was staining when the fracture happened down in the garden shed. But she finished the job, and they're all completed and ready for pick up:Have you had a good summer? Ours has been filled with gardening, travel, priming and painting more cabinets (yes, still!), and getting together with good friends. Here are two of my long-time friends who met up with me at Panera...Sue and Nancie, friends for 36 years:Another friend and I met recently for lunch at The Purple Foot to celebrate our birthdays. I failed to get a picture of the two of us together, but here's the beautiful painting Jean painted especially for me because she knew I loved watering cans! I didn't know she was an artist! I love it mostly because she painted it! Thank you, Jean!: Special travel...In August Tom and I traveled back to our old stomping grounds in Williamsburg, Jamestown, and Yorktown for our 36th wedding anniversary...fun memories!

I took lots of scenic pictures of our trip (none of us together on our anniversary!)...this one is the most representative of Jamestown. We went on a cruise aboard the Jamestown Discovery Boat Tour, viewing these three ships on Jamestown Island, something we'd never done when we lived there:We loved strolling along the river in Yorktown and enjoyed the little village of shops...newly rebuilt since we moved away 14 years ago:

I am creating...I recently purchased a cross-stitch pattern from the Stony Creek Collection, and I'm looking forward to getting started.

 It's called: Plans for You--a collection of clay pots with geraniums and the verse, 'For I know the plans I have for you' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.' Jeremiah 29:11.

 

I am wearing...charcoal sport knit skirt, teal tank, floral blouse.

I am reading...a magazine I discovered recently...Living the Country Life.

 

 

In my kitchen...we've been enjoying some tomatillo salsa which Hannah made--thanks to a friend who gave her a plant earlier this year:

I am thankful...for all the prayers that have gone up for our little grandson Andrew. He's been home from the hospital for a couple of weeks now and is doing well. Please pray for continued growth and development:I am hoping...to get to visit this little cutie pie in about six weeks. What a miracle baby he is!

 

In my garden...a new red coneflower! Here's Hannah holding my purchase:

One of my favorite things...visiting garden centers like this one. Hannah and I made some sales calls this summer to get her soap into some new shops. This was one garden center we visited in Charlottesville:

Closing Notes...Hopefully, this Daybook post caught you up a bit on the summertime happenings around here. Check out other Simple Woman Daybook posts here.

 

~Deb

A Joyous Homecoming!

This week, after 132 days in the NICU, Eric and I brought our miracle baby HOME! God has been so good to us, blessing us with this little one. It's been a long road with good and bad days along the way, but He has brought us through. Baby Andrew weighed 1 lb, 6.5 oz when he was born in April at 24 weeks, and was the most fragile looking micropreemie. Every day, Eric or I snuggled him close - what the NICU nurses call "kangaroo care." Even when intubated, with tubes and drains and wires coming out in all directions, they encourage parents to hold their babies as much as possible. It was scary at first to hold such a tiny, tiny baby, but our snuggle time was quickly the best part of the day.

The summer has passed by, with surgeries, transfusions, medications, and procedures, but almost every day and week brought some improvement. Even the little milestones mean so much when you're dealing with a preemie - opening his eyes for the first time, getting fed milk through a tube, even when it's just 1 milliliter, being able to hold his temperature when we held him so we didn't have to pile on blankets, and every ten grams of weight gain. You can imagine the excitement for the big milestones such as finally being extubated successfully and being on full NG (nasogastric) feeds! :)

The end of July, my family came down to visit for my baby shower, and we took a four generations picture with Great-Granny and Granny:

Finally, at long last, we could bring him home to stay! YAY! We are loving being our own little family together! :) He is quite the little chunky monkey now, already almost 8 pounds.

We want to thank all the many family and friends, as well as the numerous Christians that we've never met or heard of, who have been faithfully praying for us over the past 4 months. Your prayers, encouraging emails, and practical support have been a great help to us!!

Praise the Lord for what He has done!

~Sarah

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