From Great Sorrow Comes Great Joy

As you all know Jacob and I recently lost our beautiful Catherine. It has been an extremely difficult journey to recovery. Our hope lies in the Lord and we know that we will one day get to embrace our beautiful little girl. This past Wednesday we attended a beautiful mass at St. Laurence in honor of all the families that have been through this difficult experience. The women that coordinated everything had all been through miscarriages themselves and really made it a night to remember. The mass was truly spectacular. Each and every mass is heaven on earth and to share that with so many other families who were grieving alongside of us was really special. The readings were hand chosen to relay hope and challenging us to see our loss as a gain for the kingdom of God. We were all part of God's special plan to create a new soul which in his infinite wisdom he believed was more needed in Heaven than on earth. All of our precious babies are serving full time on Christ's army. What consolation it is to know that our beautiful Catherine is interceding for us at the foot of Christ. After the homily all the parents who have lost a child to miscarriage were called to the front for a special blessing. I can barely explain what it feels like to be a part of this sorrowful yet faithful group. Everyone embraced as we returned to our seats, its a special feeling to know that the person you are hugging really does understand your heartache. It was a beautiful and emotional evening and was a nice way to give ourselves some much needed closure.

Through much prayer and discernment Jacob and I decided we were ready to try again in early July and God has blessed us again. We saw our precious baby a few weeks ago and there is definitely a strong heartbeat! As you can imagine we are thrilled beyond belief and are ready to welcome our little one come March. So far this pregnancy God has been sending me daily updates that we have a healthy baby, in the form of all day sickness! I am too overjoyed to be pregnant to complain! Oh and it has definitely helped with loosing a few extra pounds before I begin to show! Thank you to all of you who have kept us in your prayers. God is good all the time!

Mr. & Mrs. King

Saturday night we were invited to a wedding of one of my very best friends from High School, Ashley. We had the pleasure of teaching them NFP so we were able to get to know her Fiance Jeff a little bit before the wedding. It was an absolutely gorgeous wedding and Ashley was positively stunning. The priest that presided had a long history with Ashley's family and had baptised her 25 years ago this August.

Curtis was a total hit at the reception and literally had three girls fighting to dance with him. He was the life of the

party as he ran around the dance floor cutting a rug. At one point the lead singer after seeing Curtis stare at his guitar through an entire song bent down and let Curtis take the lead. I really think we will have a little musician on our hands. He was FASCINATED with the band and their instruments! It was a great evening that ended around 11 when Curtis literally fell asleep in my lap. He was knocked out from all that dancing! Here are a few pictures of him with his entourage.

Growing Pains

How is it possible that my little man is 19 months old??? Someone asked me how old he was today and I nearly choked when I said 18, no wait, 19 months! He has been the single greatest and most defining part of our lives up to this point. Seeing his little smile every morning makes us realize just how awesome God has showered us with blessings! I just can't get over how big he has gotten recently and how independent he seams most days. He likes to serenade us as we drive anywhere lately we just love to hear his little voice from the back seat. I really should head to bed, who knows what time he will be up in the morning! Here is a picture of my big boy from last weekend...

Baton Rouge

This past weekend we packed up the car and headed off to Baton Rouge to go visit the Harrison family. Kelly, Jacob, Drew, and Luke are such a blessing to our lives and most especially to Curtis's life as Kelly and Jacob are his Godparents. We were thrilled to be able to spend some real quality time catching up with them. The boys are absolutly awesome and were very excited to have a play buddy all weekend. Friday we got in the car around one and expected the trip to take awhile and to be full of stops. Much to our disbelief we didn't have to stop once. Curtis was AMAZING, we read books, colored, sang songs, ate snacks, and before we knew it we were there!!! He was such a trooper! We apologized to him several times for doubting that he could be such a big boy in the car for four hours! We had been postponing this trip for a few months thinking the drive would be horrible, boy were we wrong! When we got there the boys were ecstatic to see each other and played the night away. Saturday we went to the mall, went swimming, and then went out to eat at Boutins. There was live music and dancing starting at seven and the boys really cut a rug. There is a swamp behind the restaurant full of turtles, fish, and snakes. The boys loved it! When we left we told Curtis that the turtles needed to go to sleep so the whole ride home he was saying "Oh no, tuttul seepin" too cute! It was a wonderful trip and we are so amazingly blessed to have them in our lives. By the way Kelly and Jacob look absolutely AMAZING!!! They have been doing weight watchers for a few months now and both of them are back to their high school weights!!!!!

A lesson in early influences...

Curtis is learning to dress himself this week. For some reason he perfers to wear more than pair of shorts. It seams like maybe we have been spending too much time at the West Pearland Wal-Mart! His fashion sense is off to a thugish beginning!

Three years later

The past three years of my life have been by far the most amazing!! Three years ago tonight Jacob and I were nervous, giddy, and incredibly excited as we entered into the sacrament of matrimony. As we watched out wedding video tonight it helped us remember just how awesomely blessed we have been these past three years. Looking back its easy to laugh at our young looking faces getting ready to jump into the unknown together. We bought an amazing house just before we got married and laughed that we would soon actually live in the master bedroom of our house...together! We dreamed of having our first child and spent countless hours imagining what he or she would be like, look like, act like. We imagined all the places we would go and the friendships we would make along the way. What an awesome blessing to have seen these dreams come true! We have had millions of amazing memories these past few years. We have also had our share of heartaches, most especially our precious Catherine. Through it all we have grown together as a family. I have more love for Jacob this day then I could have ever imagined as I stood on the alter three years ago. I could never have imagined what joy I would fee to see our love be manifested into such a beautiful little face. How awesome is God and all of his graces!!!! Thank you Jacob for making all of our dreams come true. You are truly a spectacular man of God! Where you lead I will follow. Fully, Fruitfully, Faithfully, Forever.

Introducing Kaylee Renee Schwartz

Kristy and Dan blessed us today with another beautiful niece to adore! Kaylee was born this morning around seven after a rather scary high heart rate and emergency c-section. As soon as the doctors pulled her out her heart rate returned to normal and all else was great! Kristy and Dan are absolutely thrilled (as are all of us!). I am loving seeing Danny jump into the role of Dad, he is already looking like a pro! He has even changed his first tar diaper! We are already madly in love with her and are dying to go see her again tomorrow afternoon. Enjoy the pics!