Happy Birthday Sweet girl! (October 21)

I'm going to admit, this isn't the birthday I've looked forward to.  Our sweet girl is 18!  What, an adult?! Do you ever think of your kids as adults?  I'm starting to think not.  Leah was the sweet baby that taught us how to be parents.  Leah was the baby I brought home and cried and prayed I wouldn't mess her up.  Who told me I was fit to be a parent?  What did I know about parenting? 
Leah was the toddler that told us and showed us she was going to pave her own way.  We had our battles, and our goal was to train her without breaking her spunky spirit.  We learned some amazing parenting tactics with help of great friends and family. 

Leah got to 8-10 years old and we could start to reason with her.  We could explain if you do something, this is the consequence.  Sometimes she'd choose the consequence with a smile on her face.  Gotta love her for it. 
Teenage years were better than we imagined. She's been a delight.  I told someone recently, "I would freeze time right now, if I could."  But I can't.  I don't want her to grow up.  I selfishly want her to stay home, by us, forever.  To enjoy life and not have to grow up. 

But reguardless our sweet sweet girl is 18!!!  She's finishing up her Senior year and heading to college.  She's aware I will be a hot mess (actually the hot mess started when she started school this year.)  I just love her SOOOOOO much!!!  With that, she will tell me to stop typing and get a grip!

So  HAPPY 18TH BIRTHDAY SWEET SWEET LEAH!!   Thank you for everything you have taught us!  We look so forward to many years of memories and teachings!

This man!!!

What do I say about this man????   I think he was pretty great!  He is my grandpa. 

 

 It's hard to describe him.  I am obviously biased.  To the untrained eye, they might describe him as "gruff."  To me, I can say he Loved and he was Loved!

When I was 18 years old I was standing in his kitchen, by the sink.  He came up and said, "how's grandpa's favorite grand daughter?"   I smiled as always and said, "great!"  And gave him a big hug.  I then looked at him and said, "Oh my!!!  I'm you're only grand daughter!"  He laughed and laughed and laughed.  Obviously I should've caught on to that before I was 18, but he made me feel so special, that it never occurred to me.  In grandpa's eye's his grandkids were something very special. 

 

 When my cousin Dustin was born, (a long time ago) for some reason my grandpa always called in Gustin.  We would laugh, but no one dare correct him.  He was grandpa, we just let it go.

When Brooke got sick, my grandpa (a man of few words) said to me, with tears in his eyes "I will not out live my great grand daughter."  And he cried.  That was it.  He would not elaborate.  He had nothing else to say.  He just hugged me. 

My grandpa and I had something.  I can't tell you what it was, but I felt like I got him.  I felt like he got me.  Maybe it's because I was his only grand daughter.  A couple weeks ago I was at the assisted living grandpa was at.  The aide came in to help him and he said to her, "you can leave, Shelly will help me.  She's here now."  It made me happy.  I would/will do anything for my grandparents.  But sometimes you feel helpless. 

My grandparents were married 69 years!!  CRAZY, right???  You don't hear of that.  My grandma said yesterday, "we had our arguments.  If married people say they don't fight, it's a lie, and it's not healthy."   So true. A healthy relationship is learning to compromise.  And sometimes doing what you really don't want to for someone else.  But in the end being there for each other for the long haul. 

My grandparents were also always young.  I know that sounds dumb, but you get older people that sit in their chair and hang out, and then there was my grandpa, always in his barn, riding quads, chopping wood, gardening, going to auctions, mowing, dumpster diving.  He was busy and active. 

All in all, I shared memories of a great man.   This man LOVED his family.  And this family of girls LOVED their grandpa.  He will be terribly missed, but I am SOOOOOO happy that my girls got to meet him.  Even the toughest of men has a soft heart for grand kids. 

We love you grandpa!!  Until we meet again!!!

What's your style?

What's you're style?   This question has been asked to me many times.  With clothing, houses etc.  I've never known how to answer.  Until recently..........

You see this is happening. 

The porch is coming down and being redone.  After talking about it so much EVERYONE wants to puke, it's happening.  Luckily, we have relation that's a builder, otherwise we would be fired as clients.  When asked, what do you want done, we say, "the porch needs to be redone."  He is aware of that.  It's OBVIOUS!!!  But there's decking to pick out, walls to be redone, the ceiling.  Our answer, "surprise us."  We have friends that this conversation would make them cringe.  And I get it, and I'm so sorry.  This has been a revelation to me. 
I was again recently asked, "what's the style in your house? That will help you."  As I walked around today I realized, our "style" is family.  Our walls are covered with drawings the kids have made, a framed picture of a combine at sunset, an old hat Steve use to wear, pictures of the family and I found a lot of dirty fingerprints.  ALL OUR FAVORITES!!! (maybe minus the finger prints :) 
I got to go shopping with friends this weekend.  Had a GREAT time.  But I again thought about my style and laughed.  I bought 2 t shirts and I am convinced they can be worn to work, out to dinner and church.  That's a lot of pressure for a 6 dollar t shirt. But that's my style :) 

It took me a long time to come to grips with who I am, or who I'm not.  It seems to be a struggle for so many.  Trying to form into a mold, or style.  Everyone has their own, but in the end, as Christians we all strive for the same thing.  To raise awesome kids who love the Lord, and an eternity with our Heavenly Father. 

As for the porch.  You better stay tuned.  I know it'll look good.  I have the MOST confidence in my builder. 

Grateful!

That's what we are today!  Grateful for another day.  For 7 years post transplant!  For 5 pretty healthy girls! For family and friends. 
Tonight I looked back at pictures of the twins.  When they were born, their first year. And I thought, "why?" and "how did we make it?"  and "where did the time go?" 
As days go on, I sometimes forget the many lessons learned. I get irritated.  Frustrated with the non listening kids.  My patience grows thin.  And then I sit and reminisce.  Not everyone is given this chance.  We did nothing different than any other family with a sick child, the results were just different.  Which means, I have to be different.  God called as a Christians to not conform to this world.  We were so fortunate to live this miracle!!!  Thank you Jesus!!  Thank you for changing lives!! 


Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; For this is God's will for you in Jesus Christ.
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18   (A great friend sent me this verse today.  THANK YOU!)

 

 

 

Time goes on...........

This week I did something special. I had the day off work and my friend was babysitting her grandson. Yes I said grandson!  What a prefect day to go hold a sweet baby. Also a time to reminisce. I have a few friends that we have stuck together through it all. You see we were friends before we had babies, or right when we had them.  We endured the pregnancies, maternity leaves, baby illness', going back to work, daycare, minimal cash flow and on and on.  And the question remains,  how did we get here?   I sat in her living room.  And all I could think was, we made it.  Our sweet babies are growing.  They sleep all night.  We can talk with them, reason with them, joke around with them.  We are raising them to be independent young people.  I LOVED having babies in the house.  I would actually do it again if I was younger with more energy, but this is great a well.   I hate seeing my babies grow, but I am so blessed to have wonderful friends to grow with (not old, just grow :)

My message to mom's of any little's,  hang in there mama!  You are making a difference.  Those little's love you, you are their everything.  And, it gets easier.  I promise!!  God has great plans and I love to see His plans roll out.  Look for Him every day.  You'll see Him!! 


                                                Our "little" family, "God grant us rest."

                                                               To "thank you Jesus!"

LONG TIME!!!

So, it's been a long time since this was updated.  To be honest I wrote an exit post last month but never posted it.   With all the social media the blog is just something else to read.  But to be completely honest we have a 7 year old that can read.  And she hasn't been that excited about her past.  She has seen her baby book many times.  But recently she read it.  I came home and Steve said, "watch out, she's mad."  I was like, "whatever."  Well, she brought me her book and flips through the pages asking me why I wrote the things I did.  Like, "the doctors said she might not make it."  "she was very sick"   "she cried all night."  I explained to her, these are true events that happened.  She was not having it.  And the true feelings came out, from the mouths of babe.  "Mom!  If you write all this EVERYONE will know I was sick!"  

Everyone does know...........this is no secret.   To our 40 year old minds, we lived this.  Our family, friends and friend of friends lived this.  To a 7 year old.........this never happened and she's normal.  Any my thoughts wandered to the blog, "oh boy, she's gonna kill me." 

Now I am aware, she's 7, she's not in control.  But like a good friend said, we've dealt with her physical well being for a long time.  Now we have more.  Mental and emotional well being. The strong feelings to fit in. 

So with that, I haven't had many updates.  She's been doing "fine" if you ask her.   She struggles with lung issues and "funny breathing."  She has "junky" lungs.  You can hear the wheezing and rhonchi (noise) when you listen.   After seeing a pulmonologist and trying a few things she is scheduled for a CT and a bronchoscopy next week.  Hopefully they can identify what causing this and treat it.  Our "educated guess" is that she has some sort of bug (virus/bacterial) that needs longer than a 7 day course of antibiotics.  That would be an easy fix.  She's a little nervous for the testing because now she's old enough to know what she's in for, but she takes it in stride.   (If you tell her you read about any of this on the blog I will deny it :)

Other than that the Koeman's are just like everyone else.  Trying to enjoy every minute, trying to slow down, and trying to remember someday, our crazy lives won't be crazy and we'll wonder where the time went. 

Praying everyone has a terrific Christmas celebrating the gift of Jesus!   I will admit I had a hard time getting into the Christmas spirit.  No snow, it's so warm.  I just wasn't feeling it.  Then my sweet girl made us a manger, instead of a tree.  That hit me!  And then tonight, watching all their sweet smiles and faces when opening presents.  I wish every night was just like this!

                          I got to dress them up as twins and they liked it!!!  Best present EVER!!!

The Greatest Gift!!

Parenting Woe's!

We tend to put our children in 2 personality categories.  The Tiggers and the Eeyores.  We have 2 Eeyores.  They are pretty laid back (unless you really tick them off), they are slow to speak, they are typically the last one in the van, they bicker and fight with the best of them, but will back down easier. If you ask them to do something, they will mosey on over  and get it done, eventually.
We have 3 Tiggers.  They are QUICK with everything, quick to speak, quick with comebacks, homework done fast, dressed and ready to go, first in the van (claiming their seat).
You get the picture!  Hence they are "Golden girls."  Different personalities bickering it out. (I'm starting to feel I have a problem with TV and my analogies)
So today, I was excited to have taken the day off.  The kids had off school and I figured we'd hang out.  Brooke had a MD appt, so no big plans.  I was instead confronted early in the morning with Tiggers.   BOING BOING BOING!   Let's tell mom off!!!  WOW, are you kidding me!!!!  I must say, our oldest is a tigger as well, but she's grown into her personality and deals very well.  She actually helps me with the others.  Because she gets them she can talk them down, and reason with them.  She was at work, so it was me and NOTHING I could do made it better.  I was actually making it worse.  Discipline escalated the situation, reasoning was not an option, being nice was insulting (go figure).  I left her in her room (which was also the wrong thing to do, according to her) and she left to her grandma's after awhile.  Once she came home, life was great, for her.  In the meantime the other Tigger had joined in on the anger. 
My woe's come in when they all calmed down.  I was like, "ok ladies, we need to figure this out.  Or mama's gonna lose it."  Their response, "you don't love us!"  WHAT!!!!  HEARTBREAKING!!  But yet I get it.  I parent each child different.  If you look cross eyed at the Eeyore's they are heartbroken.  If you looked cross eyed at the Tiggers, they will laugh at you and dance around you.  So to them it looks like I don't love them.  I had to think fast. I told them, because I love them, they are allowed to still live here after they treat me like dirt :)  If they treated a boss like this, they'd be fired.  Never let back into the building.  If they treated a boyfriend like that, they'd be dumped.  But, lucky for them, they treat family like that, and we give Grace, that God gives us.  So we LOVE them unconditionally!!
All in all, a rough morning.  I was happy for a great mother in law to give more love, when kids feel unloved and bring homemade cinnamon rolls at night!!!  (Yum, yes to all you Koeman siblings, we got the cinnamon rolls!!!)
At the end of the day, I can honestly say, we ended up ok.  A good lesson was learned, we did get some fun activities in and we'll try again tomorrow.  God's grace will see us through.

                    This girl got braces!!!

We spend a lot of time out here!  It's harvest time friends!

                             AND it was this girls BIRTHDAY!!!!!   Happy 17th birthday sweet girl!!!  Where did 17 years go!!!!!!!!!

                                                 Homecoming!!!  These girls are gorgeous!!!