My Favorite Forklift Driver! :-)

Khalid has been searching for months for a fulltime job and finally found one!  He is working outside of Vienna driving for a forklift for an oil/construction company.  Yea!  After working part time for months, he is  we are so excited for more hours and more money.   :)  Thanks God! 


He is SO cute in his hat and safety glasses!



Easter

Easter -- what a wonderful time of year!  Not only is it springtime, but people all over the world are celebrating the resurrection of our Lord!  He is Risen!  Khalid and I had a great Easter....we went to a Good Friday service at our church which was very moving and humbling.  It also made Easter Sunday that much more joyous because of the forgivness we have due to our Savior's death and resurrections.  YEA!  Praise God!  :-) 

It was also my first day of sugar in 40+ days....wish I could say that it was wonderful, but I seem to have a problem with two words called self-control.  I made muffins for breakfast and that was good.  Then after church we went and got Tichy (aka heavenly ice cream) which was even better.  THEN for dinner I decided to forgo actual food and had Dr. Pepper and Reesee's which was the beginning of a horrible belly ache.  :-)  At least they tasted good when I was eating them even if my stomach had forgotten how to digest sugar.... 

(writing this on Wednesday and had a donut for breakfast - first sugar again since Sunday - stomach seems okay with that although I haven't tried a soda again yet....nervous.  ha!)


With my Tichy Eis



Before our Good Friday service

Blessings

Two years ago on Easter I was still deep in my grief for Nicoda, yet I will never forget what my friend Heidi told me.  She actually left her service to call me and tell how convicted she felt  about Jesus' resucrection and the hope that I can have of seeing Nicoda again.  I never forgot her words or the meaning.  I love the thought that my precious babies are waiting in heaven for Khalid and I to come -- all because Jesus gave up his life in order to make us perfect in God's eyes!  Praise God!  He is Risen! 

Hope Mommies

*** a side note to begin *** 
When I left for my retreat a couple of weeks ago, I literally thought finally I can start relationships without the cloud of grief around me.  I always answer peoples question about it if I have children with yes and tell them briefly about Nicoda, but I wanted this weekend to be about something new.  BUT at the retreat I met woman after woman who had lost kids through miscarriage and stillbirth.  Then when I arrived home, I had an email from a dear friend connecting me to another amazing woman and a website called Hope Mommies. which led me to so many more stories and women.   I say all of that to say God isn't through with Mr. Nicoda's story in my life and others.  God isn't ready for me to forget all that grief because He knows now it is the time to pay it forward.   God is so good! 

Hope Mommies is a website/forum for moms who have lost children to miscarriage, stillbirth, or infant death.  When I first lost Nicoda (and by that I mean the first year!) I would scour the web for these websites and read story after story.  So many of the stories that I read made me more angry that I lost Nicoda because the women saw no sense in the death -- they didn't have Jesus.  Hope Mommies is a place where women who are searching like I was can read others stories like they so want to and see HOPE in them instead of just sorrow and bitterness.  I LOVE IT!  What an amazing blessing and tool this website is going to be!  Praise God for His Mighty Way in working through people to meet needs! 

Grief and Loss -- Looking Back

Last weekend I was BLESSED beyond measure to attend the women's retreat sponsered by my church, International Chapel of Vienna.  And I won't mince words it was the best weekend of my life since losing Nicoda.  I learned so much, met so many wonderful women, was met by God exactly when I needed it, and was ANXIETY FREE! 

At the retreat I met several women who have lost children through miscarriage and one who gave her testimony of losing her son at 31 weeks (just like our boy).  Hearing all of their different stories was so eye opening for me.  The amazing woman who lost her Christoper at 31 weeks knew since week 10 that he was going to die.  He wasn't developing or forming correctly, but they knew that God had given him life and they would going to carry him until God took him.  She talked about verses that gave her hope during that time and how she was grieveing, but that everyday she saw how Christopher was touching lives and allowing them to minister to others.  I sat there weeping for her pain and literally in shock about how she and family viewed his life and death as such a God thing so early on.  Her story was so night and day from how I felt when I lost Nicoda.  I also met another woman who had just recently lost her child at 10 weeks.  They had been doing in vitro for FIVE years and were finally blessed with a child only to lose him/her.   M (the woman) told me that she couldn't believe how hungry for the Word losing her child has made her.  She downloads and listens to 5 or 6 sermons a day and has an unquenchable thirst for soaking up everything spiritual.  I again listened in disbelief in how her grief story is going to be so different from mine.  I feel like it took me a good part of two years before I felt 'good' again.  Two years before my heart and my mind could both understand at the same time that God is still God -- although my life changed He didn't change.  He loves me and is working things out for His glory. 

From those stories of those amazing women, I have been changed.  Since arriving home I have been soaking up the Scriptures like I haven't ever read them before.  I am so motivated to use my life for God's glory and to continue to find a way to use Nicoda's life for His glory as well.

(written last week and somehow forgot to post it!)