Faith's Mom's Blog

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Christmas music has been playing now for about a month or so but honestly, I think it could play all year long as far as I'm concerned. I love the beautiful lyrics about the baby born in a manger; some of them written hundreds of years ago. While the traditional ones about Jesus are my favorite, there are a few Christmas songs that I really have fun listening to - and singing along with! When Faith was very little I used to play The Denver Mile High Orchestra's swing version of Jingle Bells and would have her in my arms and we'd go dancing around the living room together. Maybe that's why that song is one of her favorites! Faith actually doesn't do well listening to the slower, more traditional songs as she gets very emotional and even a little weepy. To learn the history of where these Christmas songs originated check out my Article: My Top Ten Favorite Christmas Songs and from Whence They Came It was hard to narrow it down to just ten - but these Christmas

As with most kids in this country who have a physical impairment, our daughter has access to one of the most basic necessities of a handicapped child - a wheelchair. But for those disabled children in third-world or communist countries, many children with cerebral palsy or similar disabilities cannot so easily attain a a much-needed chair that offers the simple gift of mobility. For just a $150 donation, a pediatric wheelchair can be given to a child in a third-world country It is truly heartbreaking that these children who have no means of mobility are left home to lie in bed all day while their parents go to work. These children cannot attend school because they have no way of being transported to school or even the ability to sit up while at school. Some children who may have use of their upper bodies crawl on the ground to get from one place to another. The worst part for these families is that they are looked down upon for having a child with special needs. Sometimes the fa

This season is known as the most wonderful time of the year and probably the busiest time of the year as well. Along with starting Christmas shopping, putting up our tree and thinking about getting our Christmas cards ready, we have taken part in some great Christmas events. Faith checking out some of the ornaments on our Christmas tree! Last Monday we kicked off the week with Faith's program at school called "Old Man Winter's Icicle Follies." Faith's music teacher had given us a CD with all of the music on it so Faith could learn the words better. And I must say, when Rob and I both heard the fast-moving music with all of the tongue-twisting words, we both thought the songs were a little ambitious for third graders. Wow were we surprised when they pulled it off! All of the third-graders did great!  The best part was seeing Faith in the front of the gymnasium alongside the kids in her grade looking relaxed and singing right along with the rest of them. Alth

At least once a year, Faith's school has a fun week where there is a theme each day on how to dress. When Rob was getting Faith ready in the mornings, he really didn't put too much effort into making sure Faith was dressed according to the theme of the day. I used to love having these fun weeks at school and I loved getting Faith ready each day this week. Here is what her fun week looked like: Monday - Faith's favorite day of all - Pajama Day! Tuesday - Backwards Day - even Faith's smile is backwards! Wednesday - Tie Dye Day! Thursday - Faith sportin' her school spirit - Centennial Roughriders Friday - Wacky Day!

November 30 is Newborn Heart Defect Screening Awareness Day . I think it is very important to spread this awareness, especially since congenital heart defects (CHD) are the number one birth defect in babies. CHD affects 8 out of every 1,000 newborns and is responsible for more deaths in the first year of life than any other birth defect. A simple screening, which is done via pulse oximetry done within the first 24 hours of the baby's life, could prevent such deaths from happening. One such death was a five-day old baby named Cora .  I was born with a congenital heart defect and nobody knew until I was about five or six months old. My mom began noticing that the simplest act of eating from my bottle completely wore me out. And when my lips and fingernails began to have a bluish tinge to them, she knew something was very wrong. Unfortunately at that time we lived on an Indian reservation in Wolf Point, Montana so there weren't a lot of specialists in the area. The closest one

Me and my little family of three have a Thanksgiving tradition of going out for thanksgiving dinner on our own. This year, though, we invited another family of three to join as as they had done years ago after we first moved to Mandan. We had met this family at a church in Mandan and have recently reconnected with them as we all now go to New Life Church. So thankful to be reconnected with this wonderful family! So today we headed out to one of the buffets at a local hotel. I was looking so forward to eating a delicious turkey dinner and having pumpkin pie with whip cream for dessert. As we walked into the dining room, however, the first thing I noticed was that the pieces of pumpkin on the dessert tables were not topped with whip cream. I wasn't going to complain though, as I didn't want to appear to be ungrateful on Thanksgiving of all days. As we sat around the table, enjoying our delicious turkey dinner I couldn't help but notice that nobody was taking the bare