Thankful

Since it is Thanksgiving, I wanted to list the things I am thankful for.  🙂  This past week’s message was on being thankful and Pastor Patrick reminded me of so many things I should be thankful for.

1. my salvation– God’s free gift to us that can never be taken away.

2. the Bible– God refreshes my soul through His word of truth.

3. alex– the love of my life and my best friend who never seems to fail at making me laugh.  He also reminds me of eternal life ahead of us and helps me to tackle our present challenges with a good attitude.

4. nathaniel– for his cute face and ability to entertain himself.  He brings such a big joy in our lives despite of his bad temper tantrums.

5. eliana– for sustaining her life through multiple surgeries and hospital admission.  I’m also thankful that He has spared her happy personality through the tough days.  She is a very smiley baby.  She is a perfect baby for our family.  God truly knows what is best for us.   🙂

6. alex’s schedule– he gets every other week off, which then allows all of us to make family trips to the doctor’s office multiple times a week for ana.

7. friends who are free during the day– when alex has work every other week, friends are there to either babysit nathaniel or come with me to the doctor’s appointments!

8. our parents– we truly have great parents who fear God and love Him.  They have been very supportive and encouraging throughout this past year and always keep us in their prayers!  🙂

9. the church family– we love our church (Lighthouse Bible Church).  This year would have been tremendously more difficult without this loving body of family.  May God be continually preached and magnified through us all!

10. small groups– both singles accountability group and the married group have been a huge blessing this year.  Praise God that we have sisters who can pray for our weaknesses and keep us accountable.

11. our health insurance– ana gets good insurance through alex.  I call her “a million dollar baby” because just her health care cost at the NICU for the first 7 weeks of her life came out to be more than $500,000.  The insurance covered it in full.  Ana is worth a good looking house and much more.  🙂

12. for the flexibility to be a housewife– I love being a housewife (not all the time but for most of the time).  I am thankful that I can stay at home and take care of our beautiful two children.

13. our health– ana seems little unhealthy but other than that, others seem to be doing ok.  🙂

14. our possessions– God has entrusted so much to us to be good stewards over them.  May we always seek for His wisdom to make the best use out of them.

Other than all these, I still have so much to be thankful for and I am humbled by the presence of God’s grace in every aspect of my life.  Another Thanksgiving Day has come and passed by, but may our thankful attitude never be a seasonal event.  Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!  I hope you had a great Thanksgiving with your loved ones!  🙂

 

My nomination for very inspiring blogger award :)

Recently this blog has been nominated for the very inspiring blogger award.  I am thankful that people find this journey inspirational.  I hope and pray that this blog may make God look bigger and greater to all people who come across it.  I have to follow this instruction for the nomination now.  I was nominated by hgmama who is currently going through a difficult pregnancy due to a condition called hyperemesis gravidarum (HG).  Please visit the blog for more information on the condition and also to pray for our fellow sister in Christ.  🙂

Here are the rules for the Very Inspiring Blog Award.  Please follow carefully:

1. Display the award logo on your blog.
2. Link back to the person who nominated you.
3. State 7 things about yourself.
4. Nominate 15 other bloggers for this award and link to them.
5. Notify those bloggers of the nomination and the award’s requirements

7 things about myself:

1. I think I mentioned this before– but it is worth mentioning it again since I like it so much.  I like eating.  A lot.  Praise God for delicious food.

2. I have a hot temper like little spicy pepper.  It is something I have been trying to work on for a long long time.  God has been slowly changing me over time, but I still have a long way to go.

3.  I have a pharmacy degree that I used for 4 months before Nathaniel came.  Now, I hardly refer myself as a pharmacist.  I have forgotten everything except some over-the-counter medications that every mom knows.  Please don’t ask me any questions.

4. I like the idea of reading books sitting by the window on a rainy day with a cup of tea but I never do it.

5. I really don’t like being alone by myself.  When Alex is at home (every other week) I make sure we do EVERYTHING together.  🙂

6. I can’t think of anything else to share about myself.  I am a very ordinary housewife.  🙂

Here are my nominations for inspirational blogs.  I don’t follow that many blogs but each has blessed me in different ways and I would highly recommend you to go read and be encouraged too!

1. Wrestling with an angel 

2. Pray for Ian

3. Yu family

4. mimikim

5. Cathie hong

6. Baby Glende

7. Mrs Sue Lee

Yikes..  As you can see, I have NOT followed the instruction very carefully..  But I hope this list of blogs would be beneficial for you as they have been for me!  🙂  Now, off to bed!  🙂

Ta-Da!

Hello everyone!  🙂

Ana’s stitches came out and it’s time to post her post surgery pictures!  🙂  I’m very thankful and excited for this occasion.  🙂  Here is ana’s new smile!  She has her helmet on too now.  It is bright yellow.  🙂 We are grateful that God used the surgeon to fix ana’s cleft lip.  People are already making comment that she looks so different and how well her scar is healing.  Thank you for all your prayers!!  🙂  More pictures to follow!

bye bye triangle mouth

One time at church eden walked up to the stroller, looked at ana’s face for awhile, walked to christine and asked, “Mommy, why does she have a triangle mouth?”  I thought that was so funny and cute that I think about it from time to time and chuckle.  It did look like a triangle.  Kids have the most creative minds.  🙂

But now the triangle mouth is gone.  The face that brought me so much joy and pain at the same time is now replaced with another face.  In fact, her new face was so different that I couldn’t recognize her at first.  Straight out from the surgery, everything about her was different.  Her face was unrecognizable and even her smell was foreign.  The only thing that assured me that I was holding my dear daughter in my arms was her wrist band that identified her before she went into the surgery.  It said ELIANA KO 6/20/2012.

The next day I went to visit ana early at the hospital.  When she saw me walk in, she tried to smile twice with her stitched up mouth.  It broke my heart to see her trying to smile through her apparent pain and discomfort.  I also was ashamed for having a bad attitude with things that are so much more trivial than what she was going through.  But even for her, the next two days were so miserable that her smile was no where to be found.  Praise God that she found her smile back again two days later after she was finally able to sleep somewhat throughout the night.  🙂

For a few days after the surgery, I missed her cute cleft lip.  But now, I am in love all over again with her new little mouth.  We made good and precious memories with her cleft lip and they will remain in our hearts and computer screens.  Now it is time to make more memories with her little mouth!  🙂

Tomorrow she will get her stitches removed.  And in two more weeks the tubes stuck up her nose will be gone too.  Oh, how I wait for that day!  Those tubes brought ana such troubles after she got discharged it was not even funny.  It may be that I have a very short term memory, but this discharge was the most difficult transition home by far.  I stood up all night watching ana trying to breathe through the nose tubes and cried so many times with her as she tried to breathe through her nose, but to no avail.  Praise the Lord, that she somewhat learned to breathe through her tiny nose holes!  Hopefully removing the tubes altogether will make it much better.  🙂

Ana also got her helmet a few days ago.  She looks like a racing driver–especially when she is sitting in her bumbo.  She is trying to get used to that too.  Poor thing..  She has so many things to get used to over so little time.  But it’s amazing that she still smiles up a storm whenever I see her.  I love her so dearly.  She is a perfect daughter that I have always wanted.  I am so thankful and feel privileged to be her mom.  🙂

Ana gets discharged for the third time!

Hello all,  🙂

Ana was dc’ed yesterday as planned.  Praise the Lord!  Ana had a very bad night yesterday because she had a hard time breathing through little tube they stuck in her nose.  It’s supposed to help her nose heal better in shape after the surgery but also makes it super difficult for her to breathe.  It’s difficult watching her struggle so much just to survive.  Life is quite miserable for her right now..  😦  We just bought a humidifier hoping that it will help her dry nose and have her breathe better.  Please pray that she’ll be able to breathe and get some rest!

thank you!  🙂  you’ll see her this sunday!!!  🙂

excited,

maria

The surgery was successful! :) a short update

hello everyone!

Thank you for praying for the surgery and our family.  Ana had her surgery today around 12:30 and it took about one and a half hours as expected.  She is currently recovering and still groggy from the anesthesia.  It was hard to recognize her at first because she looked so different!  But when the swelling subsides I hope she will look like her normal self again.  🙂  Again, thank you for keeping us in your prayer!  We will post pictures soon!  🙂

love,

maria

lip surgery date is set!

Hello again!  🙂

Ana’s lip surgery coordinator called this morningand asked if it would be OK to schedule her lip surgery this thursday.  It’s a very short notice but we are going to go for it!  🙂  We will post the before and after pictures– but the after pictures will be posted after her surgery is fully healed.  Please pray for another successful surgery!

here are some of the details:

date: 11/8

time: 12:30pm

length of surgery: ~ 1 1/2 hours

length ofhospitalization: ~ 1-2 nights

This will be ana’s 4th surgery.  The surgeon is very concerned about ana’s heart condition but the cardiologists said it would be OK.  Please pray that there will be no complications from the surgery!

Also, it has been recommended that ana get a helmet to fix herflat head.  She’ll be getting her helmet this coming week.  Please pray that she will adjust well to many changes this coming week with the lip surgery and the helmet.

Thank you for keeping us in your prayers!  🙂

love,

maria

here are some pictures of us.  🙂