"You're so strong!"

I think a lot of us have heard those words. And we think, "I'm not strong, I don't have a choice!" They're definitely not comforting words, although I know people mean well. The other one that I hear ALL THE TIME is that Heavenly Father doesn't give you anything you can't handle. Which since I've had Emily and especially since I lost her, I've felt is just not a true statement. I'm sorry, but that's what I think. And I know people who have gone through a lot more than me. And I could never figure out how to explain it to people without feeling like I was doubting God. But last week I went to Time Out for Women and heard Kris Belcher talk, who has had cancer in her eyes and had her eyes removed, and is of course blind. With 2 little kids. She said she would hear those two comments, "You're so strong," and "God wouldn't give you anything you couldn't handle," all the time and just think, "That's not true." And then she said something I loved. She said that we are given things that we can't handle. Why else would we need a Savior? Isn't that why Christ went through what he did for us? And I just LOVED that thought. Because it's true. The only way I've been able to deal with everything with Emily, both while she was here, and especially during the time she was dying and after she passed away, is through the atonement, and praying and asking Heavenly Father to let me give my burdens to my Savior and let him carry it for me, because I just couldn't do it myself. And the miracle is, he has! He has made it so that I can have peace and be happy, which for me is just amazing and I am so grateful for. And it is only through him. I couldn't "handle it" by myself. I've tried. It doesn't work.

Easter

In San Antonio for Fiesta and Easter they sell Cascarones, eggs dyed and filled with confetti, and you crack them on each other's heads. Lily loves it, but Lance has cried and cried each time Robby does it to Lily or she does it to one of us.

Cracking the egg on Lily's head.

We had a fun Easter morning. The kids really liked Lance's birthday present and had fun playing with it.
You can see Lance's face a bit behind Lily's arm. He is not happy. I hid the cascarones as part of our Easter Egg hunt.

Easter outfits.

Our attempt at a family picture. Not successful.

Lance turns One!

Lance with is birthday cupcake. He liked it, but not quite like his sister Lily did! Both on her first birthday and on his!We forgot to put his hat on. He's laughing at Lily.
My sad attempt at a soccer ball cake. The one thing Lance loves is balls, so that was the theme for his party. Look at all the little ladies with him!
His $1 ball that he loved.
I also made cupcakes, they turned out much better than the cake did. My favorite were the baseball ones.

Consider the Lilies

Lately it seems like I have so many friends going through tough times with their children. Surgeries going wrong, or things coming up that they weren't expecting to deal with, or even death. And it just breaks my heart. One of my favorite songs has always been, since I first heard it before Emily was born, Consider the Lilies, by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. After Emily was born I heard them sing it at a Relief Society conference and cried and cried. I think the song is one of the reasons I love the name Lily. If you'd like to listen to it, it's the first link on the right. (I couldn't figure out how to put it in my post-help?)

My favorite line is "Consider the sweet, tender children, who must suffer on this Earth. The pains of all them he carried, from the day of his birth.

He clothes the lilies of the field. He feeds the lambs in His fold, And he will heal those who trust him, And make their hearts as gold. "

My thoughts this Easter turn toward Emily, as they have every Easter since she's been gone. And of course they turn toward my Savior. I'm so grateful for his Atoning sacrifice and the Ressurection, that I can be with Emily and my family again. This song was the song that was playing when Emily passed away, and so it's taken me awhile to be able to listen to it again. But I love the message and the peace and hope it brings.

Moments

I feel like in my 9 years of being married, I have lived two completely different lives. And I have. For 4 1/2 years we had Emily, and I was the Mom of a Child with Special Needs. And this really defined who I was. And who I am still, I think. Everything that I did or thought revolved around Emily and what she needed. My life was full of therapy, doctors appointments, school, etc. Even during play time it was she and I doing therapy. But we sang lots of songs and read lots of books and went lots of places, which I am so grateful for. Lily was only 5 months old when Emily passed away, so I hadn't even really had a chance to get used to life with 2! Lily wasn't rolling around much yet or anything, and so life was mostly still taking care of Emily, with playing and feeding Lily when we could! Lily was such an easy going baby. It still hurts when I think that Em and Lily only had 5 months together. But, Lily knows her little sister now. She talks about Emily going to school in her wheelchair, and how she loved to roll, and how she loved to eat bananas and how she had owies on her stomach (heart surgery).

And now I have my life with Lily and Lance. While it's busy, it's your typical life with two toddler/babies. My schedule is pretty much my own-if I don't make it to the grocery store, I can go later or Robby can go. If I don't want to go to story time, or to the zoo, I don't have to go. It's just amazing to me how "normal" my life is now. And I'm very happy. I love being able to just play with my kids, and my worries are the typical ones now-hold my hand when you cross the street, don't talk to strangers, etc. But it's hard, because inside I'm still that mom of a child with special needs, who a lot of people don't know and never met because they never met Emily. And it's hard because the reason why my life is "normal" is because Emily isn't here. And while I know she's happy and busy, it doesn't make me miss her any less.

Emily has definitely made me appreciate all that Lily and Lance can do. Sometimes it's like a mantra, "I'm grateful Lily's so busy. I'm grateful she can make messes. I'm grateful she talks so much! I'm grateful that Lance can breastfeed and doesn't want to stop and wakes up in the middle of the night to eat." (that might be pushing it.) But really I am grateful. I'm grateful for all the little moments in my life, with all my kids.

Robby's mom and Aunt Diana came last weekend. We had fun going up to Fredricksburg to pick strawberries. I will say, the Fredricksburg peaches are much better than the strawberries.

We went to Rudy's BBQ on the way home, and Lance was having fun playing with Grammy and doing his cheesy smile for the camera.
This is the side of the Alamo. Diana's big reason for coming was that she always wanted to see the Alamo, and we tried to go the first day and it was closed! It closes at 5:30. So we went back before she left on Monday. Robby was able to walk from work to see us.
We tried to get a good picture on Emily's bench before Peggy flew out. This was the best one we got. Not too much of a success.

March Madness

So, before the big game tonight, I thought I'd write what March Madness means to our family. I should have known it would always be a part of our life. Our first kiss was after the final NCAA March Madness game, on April 2 2005, when Duke lost to I think Arizona. Robby and I had gone on 2 dates; the 2nd one being an all day ski date to Alta. I had then gone over to his house, "the Casa" two days later and watched General Conference with him and his roommates and their girlfriends. We spent a good portion of the day together just talking, and then he invited me over to watch the basketball game the next day. I could have cared less about the game, but I did like Robby, so I of course said yes. I think I got there for the end of the game, just in time to see his buddy Chad lose it when Duke lost. (sorry Chad).

Robby walked me to my car after the game was over and we held hands for the first time, and then as I was going to get in the car he kissed me! I was totally not expecting it. But I should have known then that basketball would be a big part of our life.

ESPECIALLY when BYU makes it into the tournement. I think most people who read this know that Robby is a slightly obsessive BYU fan-I would say football over basketball, though this year he has Jimmer Fever like everyone else. And Jimmer signed the banner that is hanging up in Lance's room, so even more reason to like him! Every year since we've been married we watch BYU lose in the first round of the tournament. Well, last year they were playing in Oklahoma City, 8 hours away, and Robby decided he HAD to go and support the team. So he drove by himself and stayed and stayed in a Motel 6 and was there when they beat Florida in double overtime to win their first round game in something like 15 years. So now that they're playing in New Orleans, and Robby's not there yet, but if they win tonight (fingers crossed) he'll drive Saturday to New Orleans to watch them play. And then, we would go to Houston if they won that game.

Every year we fill out our brackets and do a "friendly bet." Which I am so far winning this year! And then Emily and I would always watch the games together on Thursday and Friday during the first round of the tournament. So now, March Madness always makes me miss Emily! We do a tounament pick 'em with some of my family and Robby's and some friends. In the last 4 years my dad has been in Turkey and Afganistan, yet he still manages to follow what's going on. He's always overly optomistic when it comes to BYU-he always at least has them going to the sweet 16. But hopefully this year he'll be right-he's got them winning the whole thing! He had them winning the whole thing last year, too.

Our TEXAS Sized Weekend

I ended up with these pictures in reverse order. 2 weeks ago we had a good traditional Texas weekend. It started on Friday morning when I took the kids to the San Antonio rodeo. I was so excited to take them both to the petting zoo, and they both cried and cried. It has goats, sheep, a llama, chickens, a kangaroo, pot belly pigs, deer, etc. I think it was a bit overwhelming! And then a deer bit the back of Lily's shirt, and so if you ask her about the rodeo she tells you a "Deer bit my back!"

On Friday afternoon we left to go up to Fort Worth to go to the BYU-TCU basketball game. We stayed in a Courtyard Marriot about 10 minutes away from TCU. Here's the kids ready to go swimming Saturday night.

Here we are at the game. Lance was NOT HAPPY about the noise. There were more BYU fans there than TCU fans, and it was loud. He cried and cried and was only happy if Mommy was holding him, poor kid. Lily actually did pretty well. We had got salt water taffy earlier at the Fort Worth Stockyards, and as long as she was supplied with candy she was happy. We're great parents like that!

My favorite part of the game was these people who had a life sized cutout of Jimmer. People were standing in line to get their picture taken with it. It made me laugh. And in case you're wondering, we are in mourning at our house with the loss of Bradon Davies from the team.

We met up with my cousin Kathleen and her husband and cute girl, Lucy. These rides were 25 cents at the stockyards, so we let them go on a few. We went out to lunch at Joe T Garcia's afterwards, and waited for over an hour. The fajitas were good, and the company was great, but Chuys is definintly better, in case you're wondering. Mmm. Chuys.
On Friday night on our way up to Fort Worth we went to Salt Lick BBQ. AMAZING! It was so good, and in a beautiful location out in the middle of the Hill Country. I even liked the potato salad and cole slaw. It didn't have mayo like most do. The meat was so good. I think the turkey was my favorite. And then they had the BEST blackberry-peach cobbler. Here's Lance enjoying the beans. If you say Cheese and take his picture he gives you the cheesiest smile!

Like mother like daughter-she loved the cobbler.

Here's Lily at the petting zoo.

And I just thought Lance was too cute in this little outfit.

Things are going well here. Lily is watching an Elmo's World about going to the potty that we just got at the library today, and just had an accident. While she's watching Elmo talk about going to the potty. I don't think she sees the irony of that, but I sure do! Lance started crawling last week, so that's fun. Lily loves that he can follow her around now. I'm missing normal spring weather-it's beautiful here today, but over the weekend is was in the 80's, which I don't appreciate for the end of February. I planted daffodil bulbs in the fall, and I actually now have daffodils! It's amazing. I think it's one of the first bulb things I've planted since being in Texas that's actually grown. I think all of our freezing temps really helped them.

My dad is back in Afghanistan, working in radio this time. It's an American company, and they have a good record as far as no loss of life, so that's good, I guess. He's not sure how long he'll be there. My mom's in Washington. We'll see him at the end of June in Utah.