Our Christmas

We had a very blessed Christmas this year. Madison's Christmas started the weekend before going to Lubbock to spend time with her dad and his mom's side of the family. On Christmas Eve morning Madison and Gage went with Madison's grandma Roxane to celebrate Christmas with her husband's family. I love how they have always accepted Gage as part as their family just as much as James' side of the family has accepted Madison. It just makes it so much easier on the kids when we all still love each other and get along and all the families treat the kids as their own on every side. I hope my kids one day understand how blessed they are to have such loving families all around and never take that for granted. Anyways, back to Christmas get togethers. On Christmas Eve night we got together at my mom's house and this year her entire side of the family was able to make it.

We took a pictures of everyone...here they are: The picture is of my mother and her brothers and sisters with their spouses, their children, and their grandchildren. We have grown so much! I hope all of our children will continue on the tradition of family get togethers as they get older as well. There is nothing like the support of a large family.

We did not get home until about 11:30pm that evening and by the time everyone got settled and in bed it was about 1am. 7am came very early on Christmas morning. It was just us girls who woke up first so I made us a big breakfast and then when Gage woke up it was time to get daddy up and open presents. I was so excited to have our first Christmas home together as a family of 5 but when you have a special needs child there are some things you have to get done first before being able to dig into Christmas. We got Autumn and her equipment moved into the livingroom and right after she opened her first present she started vomiting. This is what happens when you have a child with reflux and you feed her and then try to sit her up and move her around before her meds kick in. So, after every gift she opened we would have to stop and clean her up and suction her. We finally gave up on her opening presents until she felt better but the other kids were really good about being patient while we took care of Autumn in between them opening gifts. It was not the first Christmas I imagined but it still turned out good. After presents we got ready to go to my grandparents house on my dad's side. James had to work Christmas Day so I was left alone to load up all the kids and gifts and head to Odessa. We had a wonderful time at my grandparents. I had to go to a family visitation since my best friends grandmother died earlier in the week and since I had no nurse my mother and sister-in-law went with me so they could sit in the car with Autumn while I went to the viewing. No one besides James and I and our 3 nurses are trained on Autumn so when we don't have a nurse we can not be more than a run away from Autumn in case of an emergency. She did go into the 50's while I was away but they put her oxygen up and she came back up so I was glad they handled it well. Once we move to Dallas my sister-in-law will get trained on taking care of Autumn and that makes me feel so much more prepared in case something did ever happen to both James and I and there would be a family member who could care for her.

Christmas night Autumn woke up for 2 hours in the middle of the night so I was EXHAUSTED the day after Christmas. Me, mom, and my sister-in-law went early morning shopping while I had a nurse for a few hours. That afternoon we did Christmas with my parents and brother's family. We just let the kids play all day and relaxed some. I could hardly keep my eyes open so I was so happy to see my night nurse walk through the door that evening. ;) I forget how much work Autumn is when we go without nurses for a couple of days. I don't plan to have a day nurse once we move to Dallas except for my sister-in-law helping out for about 5 hours a day during the week so that is going to be a hard adjustment. I've done it before but I've gotten spoiled over the last several months having so much help. Even though this past week was very tiring I love being around family and just soaking up the memories. Sometimes I sit in silence when all my kids are in bed and wonder why God has blessed me so much. I don't have a perfect life but I would not trade my life with anyone else I know....I hope you feel the same way about your life and family.

Autumn update: Just wanted to brag about the new things Autumn has learned lately. She can point to her ear, hair, and hiney. ;) She can push herself to a sitting position while laying in her bed. Today during PT (which I missed) she army crawled a little to get a toy. Yea Autumn!!!