What a WHIRLWIND of a couple months it has been! The move went so smoothly, and we are definitely getting settled, slowly but surely. We are all very homesick (especially Hadelyn), but we are also loving it here! I have so much to share, including an unbelievable fiasco with our first farming experience, so I plan on breaking it up into a few different posts.

First of all, thank you to every single contribution to Hadelyn’s lemonade stand! She ended up raising $639 for Texas Children’s Heart Center. I’ll make a post sometime about the specific ways it will be used, but in a nutshell, it will directly benefit Sunley and all of her half-hearted buddies. It means so much to me that so many people donated for Sunley, but even moreso that y’all supported Hadelyn and made her feel special by participating! This was such a positive service experience for her. For now, we’ve closed the lemonade stand, but we will definitely do more fundraising in the future, and I’ll be sure to share when we do. (Side note: Below is a photo of Midland’s current hero, Zack Owens, at the lemonade stand. He has a GoFundMe if you’re interested: Click Here)

Oklahoma has been good to us, but the first couple weeks did have its fair share of hiccups. We have only been here since July 14th, and have already endured an ER visit with 3 days of inpatient, an on-again/off-again stomach bug with the older two, several broken home items (A/C, water issues, etc), and many days with Derek out of town—during which we had the peak of the stomach bug, and also what we’ll refer to as “The Grand Milk and Poop Incident of 2019.” Despite the hiccups, we have also had lots of highlights.

Not surprisingly, we had TONS of help packing and unpacking from church family, both old (Midland) and new (Edmond). We also had so many people offering to bring us groceries or whatever we needed while the kids were sick. We’ve been given gift cards, free meals, and lots and lots of prayers, and we couldn’t be more thankful. I have some crazy-weird NOT coincidences to share, of course.

Years ago, my best friend, Candace Bohince, nannied for a sweet family in Norman. I’ve only met the mom once (at Candace’s wedding years ago), and didn’t know much about her. Of course it turns out that she works at OU Children’s because God. She gave Derek and I a very thorough tour of the hospital as soon as we got here (on our anniversary — exciting hospital-tour date!), as well as got us hooked up with a great pediatrician and cardiologist. We are not transferring care, so we will still do appointments and surgery with our team in Houston, but we had decided it would be smart to have a team at home that is familiar with her and will follow Sunley’s progress—ya know, just in case we ever needed to utilize their services at OU Children’s. Well, guess what? Just a couple weeks after the hospital tour, Sunley got herself a minor cold and had to be admitted for 3 days. It all went very smoothly, all because we were already hooked up and had our contacts at the hospital. Coincidence? I THINK NOT.

Ready for another crazy God-thing? We met our sweet, retired neighbors across the street from our 5 acre lot (where we will soon build a house). The wife is a retired NICU nurse, and the husband is a retired pediatric cardiology PA, both from OU Children’s. And just 4 houses or so down is a current OU NICU nurse. So ya know…God sees us.

I have lost count of these crazy God filled moments of coincidence, because they seem to happen all the time now. Or maybe they’ve ALWAYS happened, and I’ve only just now learned to look for them and appreciate them. That’s probably more likely.

I think so far, the best thing about being in Oklahoma has been being so close to some of the kids’ cousins. They are gonna have so much fun growing up together! We’ve already done several outings together and it’s just been so great. I wish we could have all of our friends in family in one place, but this is pretty close :)

Sunley is doing well, by the way! The hospital trip was tough emotionally for all of us. I just hate being reminded that she will never be completely well. And while I’m glad my big two are so open about their questions with us, sometimes it is very hard to find the right answers. More prayer, more scripture, and more focus on heaven — that seems to be the only way for us to survive our never-ending journey with CHD.

I will try and do another post sometime on the details of Sunley’s latest echo, which was pretty confusing. But for now, our little family is doing well, and trying to maintain a pretty chill pace.