A Blessing for Kelson

On April 26^th I got to see my son for the first time after his helicopter ride to Urbana. I was excited to see him and Trever since I’d been away for both of them for about 24 hours, recovering from the C-Section. Shortly after I saw Kelson, Trever and I went back to our room to decompress and talk for the first time face to face, without an audience, since our world had been turned upside down the day before. At this point he told me he wanted to have Kelson baptized.

I was thoroughly against it. I was not giving up on my son. I felt that if we have him baptized we were giving God permission to take him to heaven and I wasn’t about to quit fighting for him. Up until this point everyone had told me it was ok to be scared and tried to make me feel like things were not going to be ok. I was calm and never doubted God’s intentions for Kelson. I knew he would be fine. The only time I really questioned if Kelson would be fine was the instant that Trever mentioned baptism to me. However, that is when I learned the real meaning of being baptized.

I don’t think I’ll ever forget his baptism. I remember sitting there in my wheelchair and watching Pastor Liz get a travel size bottle of baptismal water out of her purse. Not your typical baptism. I remember the NICU staff letting everyone that was there visiting at the time come back to his isolette even though only 4 of us were allowed back there at a time. I remember everyone sobbing, and feeling the real reason we were doing this was because he wasn’t going to survive to have a church baptism. And as Pastor Liz did the baptism, I remember feeling a huge sense of relief wash over me. She prayed for him, but she also prayed with me. At that point, there was not a doubt in my mind that Kelson had God on his side.

Before Claire was baptized, we took a little “class” with Pastor Liz. I remember having several conversations about people having a baby baptized and then never seeing the child in church again. We discussed the importance of not only the family raising the child in a Christian lifestyle but the idea that the congregation was making a commitment to support the child in his/her Christian life. Because Kelson did not have the commitment of his church family on April 26^th we knew we wanted to have a “church baptism”. And last Sunday was the day.

Our church does not believe in being baptized twice so we couldn’t really “Re-baptize” him. We are also in the process of finding a new church home in our new community and felt like asking the congregation at our old church to make a commitment to Kelson was being kind of hypocritical. But Pastor Liz had the right idea. She did a very nice, very simple, blessing for Kelson and for our family as we start the next leg of our journey. She anointed Kelson. She said just the right things. And we were able to share our little miracle with some of the most instrumental people on our team. Both the Piper City United Methodist Church and the Presbyterian Church have supported us spiritually and financially, helped us move, fed our friends, and stalked our blog for almost 6 months now. And for that, we are beyond thankful.

Yesterday was, in a way, just a symbolic gesture. But, it was also a glimpse back at how far we have come in the last few months and a stepping stone in to the next leg of our journey as a family. We are grateful for the church family that we’re leaving behind in Piper City and we are excited to find our perfect fit in our new church family in LeRoy.

5 months plus

 A friend recently sent an e-mail that discussed using the word "busy" when someone asks how things are going and it has continued to pop in my mind over the last few days.  Several people continue to ask "when are you going to update the blog?" or tell us "we're going through Kelson withdrawls".  So, instead of using the word busy as an excuse to why we haven't blogged, I'm going to tell you that blogging is not a priortiy these days.  We are living life.  Finding our normal.  Making our house a home.  Trying to be the best we can be at the careers we have chosen and raise two semi-well behaved, somewhat polite kids while attempting to keep them fed and bathed on a regular basis. 

So, what have we been up to since month 5....

Kelson has been growing like crazy!  He's starting to eat us out of house and home and we're anxiously awaiting the ok from Dr. A to give him some "real" food.  He has speech therapy on Wednesdays and physical therapy every other week.  He enjoys chewing on his hands, smiling all the time, and is quite the wiggle worm.  Kelson was 11 pounds 3 ounces at his 5 month check up. 

What else has been going on around these parts since our last entry?   We've had a couple weeks off from football games but filled them with other outings.  Last weekend we made our maiden voyage to Curtis Orchard with Trever's sister, Kyla and her two kids.  Everyone enjoyed themselves and we came home with pumpkins and apple fritters.  The kids really enjoyed playing together, running and getting muddy.  Kelson was a good sport through most of it. 

 After the orchard we headed to Rantoul to celebrate with one of our favorite 2 year olds.  Hunter had a construction themed party and all of our kids enjoyed playing with his toys. 

 Yesterday we lounged around the house and worked on little projects around the house before heading to Alex & Theo's house for a hog roast.  We enjoyed catching up with some Piper City friends and introducing many of them to Kelson for the first time.  Claire really enjoyed playing with Alex and taking a ride on his 4-wheeler. 

I caught this picture this morning before church.  Claire loves to hold her little brother...for short amounts of time...and Kelson humors her...sometimes.  They were both in great spirits this morning and it shows here. 

I also have a few prayer requests to share with our faithful blog followers.  Before our time in the NICU I probably couldn't have named a single person that I knew well that had been through a NICU or pediatric hospital stay of their own.  Since that time it's like premie and sick babies have been the theme. 

I want to share my friend Lydia's blog over at Corn Fed Kansan.  Her little girl, Lorena, was born around 28 weeks gestation and wasn't due until around December 1st (I think my stats are right).  But, she's a little fighter and doing great according to her mommy's blog.  One of the hardest parts for this family is that they live 2 hours from the hospital and don't get to visit as often as they would like.  Please keep them in your prayers.

Also, prayers would be appreciate for little Carter who had a very rough start with a diagnois of Cystic Fibrosis and had a large portion of his intestines removed shortly after birth.  I believe that his mommy & daddy got to take him home this weekend.

...for Gabrielle who was suppose to be born around Thanksgiving in Arizona but decided to make her appearance while in Illinois visiting. 

...and finally for Laia who at about 10 days old has been fighting a fever for a few days and took an abulance ride to Peoria. 

We know that all of you have prayed for us and we have truly seen the miracles that God can do!  Please pray for our friends that they may see those same miracles in their little ones.