The Third Week of January

The third week of January has been very, very good to our family! In 2002 a tiny baby boy joined our family on January 15th. He weighed only 5 pounds 5 ounces and was in the NICU for 9 days before coming home. Long gone are the tiny days! Freeland just turned 15 and is really loving being in high school this year. He is also pretty excited that he is now old enough to go to youth group activities and keeps reminding me that next year he can get his driving permit.

Three years and three days later, on January 18, 2005 Casper arrived. If we thought Freeland was tiny, Casper was only a little over half his size! Weighing only 2 pounds 11 ounces and arriving almost exactly 3 months early, we weren't sure what was store for our sweet, tiny boy! I wish I could have seen then how at 12 years old he would be a grade ahead in school and excelling. He is also bigger at age 12 than either of his older brothers were. He spent the first 11 weeks of his life (except for 1 1/2 days) in the hospital, but he never looked back once he was home to stay!

In 2012, Keith and I left for China on January 14th, we arrived late at night on the 15th, and met Eliana at 9:00 AM on the 16th. She was a tiny, fragile little thing. She weighed only 21 pounds at 3 1/2 years old and still walked like a toddler. She could chew anything that wasn't very soft. Playing ball in the hotel room totally exhausted her. She immediately started growing and learning new things. She is now 8 1/2 and is still a fragile little thing in some ways. She needs lots of love and attention showered on her all the time. Which is no problem! I love that she still loves to cuddle! But she is a confident, capable little student who is reading and making excellent grades in school.

So the third week of January is always full of a lot of joy, celebration, and reflection at our house. God has certainly blessed us with these three!