Come on...REALLY?

The last couple of days have been really uneventful... Until the last 30 minutes...

When I was in the hospital there were a couple of times I felt maybe I was getting a UTI. But the feeling always passed really quickly and for the most part I have felt great since I got home.

But low and behold, I just got up off the couch for the first time in 3 hours to use the bathroom and I passed 3 kidney stones. CRAZY!!! Thank God, the last 4 I have passed really weren't bad... Just more of a surprise than anything else. Honestly , I came out laughing to Greg and the boys! I truly am really extremely healthy normally. But I have had my share of weird issues as of late.

I am so thankful hat God has made these sort of crazy things work out ok so far. Little Levi seems to be handling everything great. And my heart is falling more and more in love with him with each passing day! Bed rest has given me the chance to just sit and treasure each movement and heartbeat I get to hear.

I am thankful that since we have gotten home, the family has adjusted great to Mom being in bed. Really it has been better than I had anticipated! Last night the other families from our small group came over to help me clean our bedroom... What a relief! It looks great and my room is now the refuge I have always hoped it to be:). I did have to humble myself and accept the help and we had some good laughs in the process of getting it done. It was actually a lot of fun:). I am so thankful to have friends who are so willing to help us out:)

Thanks so much for your continued prayers for baby Levi!

Going home for now:)

So the doctor said my numbers came in just below what I needed it to be at to go home. They haven't discharged me yet, but should be doing that soon:)

The high risk doctor did say she felt like I will be back in here at some point again before Levi comes, but that hopefully we can buy us all some time with mom at home before that happens. That sounds good to me.

It is very hard for me to let messes go, but that will have to change for a while:). And truly I will do anything within my power to get Levi here safely and at the right time. The kids are huge helpers but I also want to not expect too much of them. I know Greg can take care of things very well too, but I also know he has a full time job and helping with the kids will be a lot. We have very sweet friends who are being very persistent on making sure we accept meals. ( thanks Nikki and Shelley) Even though we have meals frozen, those will go pretty quickly if I am not cooking at all. So I am so thankful that church can help us out with that. Thank you God! That will be a huge help.

So I am going home on strict orders to monitor my bp and stay put! So stay put I will:).

Thanks again for all your prayers! We are so grateful to you all:)

It's the mama of the house posting:)

Hi friends, it is me Sara.I think I finally figured out how to post from the boy's IPod. We will see how this goes:). Well let me say for a guy who doesn't really even look at my blog often, my hubby sure posted some kind words:).

I kind of smile thinking of him at home with all the kids,busy as can be, while I sit here literally laying around. I think they are doing well so far.

Onto Levi, I just love him, love sitting here hearing his heart beat. He is doing great,praise God! He got his first dose of steroids last night and will get one more tonight just in case to help mature his lungs. The thought he was measuring about 2 lbs 6 oz yesterday so that is a few days ahead of schedule.

Like G said once we get the 24 urine results back then we will go from there. If my levels are over 300 it looks like I will be staying till we meet Levi. But if we are under 300 then we go home on bedrest. The high risk doctor thinks I will probably be over the 300 with the blood pressure as high as it was yesterday at 180 over 105. So we will see. I am so thankful that I feel fine and even more so that Levi is doing so well.

My prayer is that we can make it as many weeks more as we can. The doctor said that you never know I could possibly make it full term. This is all new territory for me, I have always gone fullterm and never had an issue until Samuel was stillborn due to the Cord accident. I have always had very uneventful pregnancies... But obviously God has us on another little adventure with this special guy:).

So we wait on God's timing... Thanks so much for your prayers . We will keep you all posted:)

Time Will Tell

Hello Again,

So far... so good! Sara's BP was able to be regulated/brought down with the medications they gave her at the hospital. Levi is still doing wonderful and now we have to wait and see what the urine tests will come back with. We are praying that the condition is simply due to Sara's BP and can be somewhat handled easier than the alternative... which is related to pre eclampsia.

Please know also that my sweet love, Sara, is doing well also. When I spoke with her this morning by phone, she sounded great. She is definitely the best Mom out there and I am so thankful for her love and care for me and the children. It is very easy to see, when a situation like this comes along, how much she does for our family (I'm at home with the kids... working, trying to homeschool, breakfast, morning chores, etc.) The good news is that we haven't burned the house down and no one is crying at the moment! Praise the Lord!

Seriously though, Sara is completely awesome. I know I don't say it enough... and I am sorry for that... but it is nice to be able to write on her blog and share how fantastic it has been with her on this journey called life. God always knows what He is doing and He gave me a wonderful bride.

I can't thank you enough for your prayers (and continued ones at that!). We are constantly reminded that God is in control and He is with us always... He promised in His Word. :)

I'll do my best to update and hopefully soon the Rightful Blog Owner will assume her position at the keyboard.

Love y'all and God Bless,
Greg :)

Please Pray

Hello Everyone,

This is Greg. Please keep Sara in your prayers as the doctor had to admit her to the hospital for high blood pressure. We will keep you up to date. The doctor said that Levi is looking great, but Sara had to bring the BP down... minimum 2 to 3 days in the hospital.

We love you so much and thank you for praying for us. Our God reigns and we pray for His will to be done! Thank you.

AND THIS LITTLE BOY WILL BE CALLED....

AND THIS LITTLE BOY...
WILL BE CALLED....


LEVI RYAN...:)

I wanted to share this sweet precious little guy's name with you all so you can pray for him by name these next weeks as we get closer and closer to meeting him face to face.

As much as it has been different, and at times strange, to know the sex of this little guy wiggling around inside of me... it has been pure bliss...

I have loved knowing there is a little boy in there...

And now, I have loved calling him by name when I feel him moving around and when I pray for him...My sweet little Levi:) It brings my heart so much joy.

Greg and I have always like the name Levi... so when we started talking names Levi came up pretty quickly...

Levi means...UNITED, JOINED IN HARMONY

Greg right away thought that was such a cool meaning especially in light of this baby growing as a result of our embryo adoption. We love the meaning and find it so appropriate in our situation. We are amazed at how the Lord united us to our embryo donor... she has given us such a HUGE blessing and we couldn't be more thankful. We share so many of the same hopes and dreams for Levi because we share the same faith. In an email that our donor sent to us on Samuel's birthday she mentioned that while, of course we don't know what Heaven is fully like or what all happens there, she wondered if the Lord had brought together her late husband and Samuel in Heaven just like he has brought us together here on earth. Even though we know Heaven is perfect and there are no needs there for Samuel or her husband it brought my heart such a sweet feeling to think of God possibly allowing that to happen.

We also love the meaning because we long for the day when we will be united with our Savior in Heaven and when we will be reunited with our sweet Samuel again as well... So there you have the meaning behind naming him LEVI.

We wanted to honor our donors as well. Our sweet donor mom was widowed at 27 years old when her husband RYAN passed away. That is really the main reason the embryos were even available. From all we have heard about her husband, he sounds like such a neat Christian young man. So Levi will have his donor dads name as his middle name:) and we love that.

It is funny that we have had a couple of people mention to us in the last 6 months that there really wasn't a reason that we would ever need to tell Levi that he wasn't biologically ours. While I understood where they were coming from... that just has never been our heart from the get go with this. To us this is all part of this precious boys life... God's story for his life. To us, sharing Levi's story shows the awesome power of our God and the miracles that He is capable of even today! And really we are thrilled that he was adopted as an embryo, as this makes Hope not the only adopted child in our family. So we celebrate Levi Ryan and his life... from conception and well beyond...

He is a very special creation made and grown by our father:)

SORRY TO DROP OFF THE FACE OF THE EARTH.... AND HAPPY NEW YEAR

WE HAD A VERY QUICK DAY AND A HALF WITH GREG'S PARENTS WHO DROVE UP THE DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS. IT WAS A REALLY NICE VISIT, BUT WAY TOO FAST FOR ALL OF US. IT WAS LIKE THEY WERE HERE AND THEN GONE... WE WOULD HAVE LIKED A LITTLE MORE TIME WITH THEM.

THIS IS HOPE'S TYPICAL SMILE NOW... SHE IS REALLY HAMMING THINGS UP THESE DAYS. AND JOJO WAS THRILLED WITH HIS NEW TEDDY BEAR, CARAMEL, THAT HE GOT FROM GRANDMA AND GRANDPA HINTZ WHILE THEY WERE HERE.

THE HAYTER FAMILY, OUR UP STAIRS NEIGHBORS FROM THE SEMINARY, CAME DOWN FOR A FEW DAYS. WHAT A SPECIAL TREAT THAT WAS FOR US. THE KIDS HAD A BALL TOGETHER. IT TOOK ABOUT 2 HOURS AFTER THEY WOKE UP THE FIRST DAY TO HEAD INTO THE WOODS TO FIND THE INDIAN GRAVEYARD AND START BUILDING SOME FORTS... THE PARENTS ALL LAUGHED... FORT BUILDING WAS ALWAYS GOING ON AROUND THE SEMINARY CAMPUS. THEY WERE BACK TO THEIR OLD PLAYING WAYS. THE KIDS ALSO KILLED TONS OF TIME PLAYING BOARD AND CARD GAMES.

GREG AND I ENJOYED HAVING TIME TO CHAT AND VISIT ABOUT ALL ASPECTS OF LIFE WITH OUR FRIENDS. SO VERY MUCH HAS CHANGED SINCE THE DAYS THAT MARYANN WOULD COME DOWN AND HAVE TEA/COFFEE WITH ME IN BUILDING 4A... I REMEMBER SOMETIMES RETREATING TO OUR BEDROOM TO CHAT AT THAT TIME JUST BECAUSE THE APARTMENTS WERE SMALL AND OUTSIDE THERE WERE ALWAYS SOOOOOO MANY OTHER PEOPLE AROUND. THOSE WERE SUCH GREAT TIMES... I STILL MISS IT AND ALL OF OUR SWEET FRIENDS FROM THOSE DAYS.

WE HAD SUCH A NICE, RELAXING TIME THIS PAST WEEK. OF COURSE WE MISSED ALL THE FUN OF MY BIG FAMILY UP NORTH AT THE CABIN ENJOYING THE SNOW, FROZEN LAKE, ICE SKATING, GAME PLAYING... BUT I THINK GOD KNEW JUST WHAT MY BODY AND BLOOD PRESSURE NEEDED THIS YEAR....LOTS OF LAYING AROUND:)

MY IN LAWS WERE REALLY SWEET TO GET ME AN AT HOME BLOOD PRESSURE MONITOR AND THAT REALLY HELPS, IT GIVES ME PEACE OF MIND JUST TO BE ABLE TO KEEP A GOOD CLOSE CHECK ON THINGS. IT IS CLEARLY OBVIOUS WHEN I AM DOING TOO MUCH.

OUR TREE IS ALIVE AND WELL... WE PICKED THE PERFECT ONE THIS YEAR... SO IT WILL STAY UP FOR ANOTHER WEEK:) I CAN'T TELL YOU HOW MUCH I LOVE TO SIT AT NIGHT WITH A CHAIR PULLED UP BY THE FIRE, THE CHRISTMAS TREE LIGHTS ON, AND HAVING A CHANCE TO READ A BOOK. RIGHT NOW I AM READING 90 MINUTES IN HEAVEN... IT IS A SUPER EASY READ AND REALLY PRETTY ASTOUNDING AT TIMES... YEAH, I AM PRETTY SURE I WOULDN'T HAVE WANTED TO COME BACK IF I HAD THE CHANCE TO EXPERIENCE HEAVEN.... LIKE COMPLETELY SURE:)

WELL, I BETTER GET THE KIDDOS SOME LUNCH... I THINK I WILL TRY TO POST ABOUT THAT FAVORITE CHRISTMAS PRESENT THIS YEAR IN THE NEXT COUPLE OF DAYS... LOUIS AND I EDITED SOME PICS TO POST WITH IT:)