Beyond Blessed

To say that this weekend was amazing just isn't saying enough. I am still completely overwhelmed by this weekend (in such a good way!) and still on a high from all of it. Let's start from the beginning shall we:

Wednesday night - headed home for a weekend of fun!

Thursday - Matt headed to the clinic to begin/finish putting in alllllll of his dissertation data. I am so thankful for his RA who drove 2 hours both ways to be there to help him enter the mounds and mounds of data. He got most of it done. I spent the morning working and had lunch with an old high school friend, which was so great (super great!), and then went to the doc with my mom who has released her to go back to work (although not working from the office full time) and drive! Yay!! Thursday night we hung out at home and had a family dinner for my dad's birthday (which is today) and had a great time with my parents and bro/SIL.

Friday - I took the day off work while Matt headed into school to finish putting his data in. My mom and I met up with some of our old co-workers for breakfast. It was so great to see them and catch up. We had been going to breakfast once a month or so while we still lived in Michigan - it seemed like everyone in the group was going through an insanely rough time around then, so it was nice to be together and talk. And it is so nice to see that we are all slowly healing (as much as you can heal when you lose your husband, beat Stage 4 breast cancer, and lose two babies in a year)... and it was just so refreshing to be around all of them who helped us through the hardest time of our life. And they were so sweet and got us a gift certificate to Babies R Us! After that, we went home for a little while and then I got ready for my shower at my old place of work.... Oh my gosh do I miss all of these people. It was so amazing to see everyone again. They were all such a huge (to put it mildly) support when we lost our Peanut. We were so surprised by the sheer number of people who came to see us and to shower us with gifts! We left with a car load of amazing baby stuff, and with our hearts happy from seeing all these people. It made me miss them even more! Friday night we had pizza, which I had been craving and this particular pizza place doesn't exist in our new city. And then we got to see some of our best friends and hear all about their wedding (from their perspective, we were there!)/honeymoon. Love them!

Saturday was the day of my mom/SIL's shower for us. It was beautiful! The food was amazing, and the decorations were so cute! There was family, friends, neighbors, and all sorts of love to go around. Matt wanted to come to all the showers with me, which I loved, and so did everyone else. We were overwhelmed with how generous everyone was. We got some truly amazing gifts, and even better, some quality time with all these people we haven't seen in a while. As far as gifts go, we got a bunch of the cutest baby clothes, our car seat, swing, umbrella stroller, gym thing, 4 home made and insanely gorgeous quilts and a couple home made blankets, stuffed animals, books, etc. etc. One of my very best friends had a beautiful diaper cake made and shipped for the shower! It was all so great! And there was no possible way we could fit everything, so we had to leave all the big items behind and my parents will bring them down when they come on Thanksgiving. Then we packed up and headed to Matt's family's house.

Sunday we got ready for our last shower thrown by Matt's mom and Sister. It was so much fun as well!! I think my favorite part was watching our neice fall completely in love with her little cousin and love her new role as the Big Cousin. The food was awesome as well, and the cake was so darn cute (shaped like a baby buggy). We got spoiled all over again with gifts, from some adorable clothes, to our stroller, a homemade blanket, and lots of other items and Mommy advice.

We were on a high the whole way home, just talking about how amazing this whole weekend was. How we never thought we would get to the point that we would have a baby shower, let alone 3 absolutely amazing ones. (OK, well I thought that - my husband is always an optimist!) And we were completely overwhelmed by how generous everyone was! (And of course felt quilty too for how spoiled we were!).

There were of course moments of tears this weekend that really only Matt saw. The first came when one of our friends and his old co-worker gave him a gift early. She had her mother draw two little pictures of a Peanut and Pickle with angel wings. He showed it to me right before one of the showers and I just burst into tears. One of my co-workers also gave me a gift after our shower of a Peanut angel ornament. And Matt's best friends mom told us during our shower that she had had our gift for a long time, knowing that she would one day get to give it to us.

I think that is one of the greatest moments this weekend. I truly felt like people wanted to be there to celebrate with us. They had all seen us through the hardest time of our lives (and continue to see us through) and now they got to celebrate with us as we have a new little one on the way. It makes me cry right now just thinking about it.

There are so many things I am thankful for, and to write them all down would be impossible, but here are a few (and in no particular order):
- For the little girl who kicked in my tummy this whole weekend!
- For the husband who sat beside me all weekend, and every day, as we slowly watch our dreams come true.
- For the family and friends who were so generous to throw us such a amazing showers and give us such amazing gifts.
- For the doggy who sat patiently outside during the showers and put up with baby items falling on her in her cramped little space in the car on the way home.
- For the chance to finally see a nursery come together
- For all the love we felt from everyone who was there, and for those that couldn't be there, but wanted to.
- For a moment in the car, that was sent to me by my angels to tell me things would be OK. (I was talking to Matt about someone who had experienced a still birth, and how that is definitely top on my list of worries, and then from out of nowhere, we hear this one tiny little elmo toy (who, weirdly enough, came from the person I was talking about) make his little elmo laugh. Now, you may not think that is weird, but it was because we didn't go over a bump, it didn't shift or fall, and it didn't make a peep the rest of the weekend.... those are my angels!)
- For the chance to finally get to write a pile of thank you notes for things other than gifts to get me through my grief.
- For a cozy house and a warm little room that will soon be filled with the smell of baby.
- For a neice who wants to practice being a Big Cousin over Christmas break and who tells her momy how much she already loves Natalie. She was just beaming all day and it was so fun to watch!

Ahh - we are so lucky and so blessed, and we don't take it for granted. We love all of the people who were able to be there and who wanted to be but couldn't. And could never thank all of you enough for making us feel so loved and for spoiling our little girl rotten! I truly hope that all of you out there praying for your baby get to have moments like these (and soon!). We know how blessed we are, and we are thankful for every minute of it.