My nephew Ace with baby Callilyn. He keeps asking his mom, "when is baby Callilyn coming?!?!" He already loves her!!
My baby bump at 20 weeks! Her first picture with her mommy on the golf course! We have chosen a name: Callaway Lyn Griffiths. I guess it's only fitting with a name Callaway that her first pictures be taken on a golf course. Lyn is named after my mom Linda. However, we'll just call her Callilyn for short! Hehe. We LOVE her!!!
We have truly been overwhelmed by tender mercies. Since moving to St. George so much has happened and we could not be more appreciative to our Father in Heaven. Since our last post, our baby girl is growing and growing! I'm already so in love!! Happy news, she is kicking now! It's crazy. At my last doctor's appointment, he said it was usually around week 20ish. I would get so excited and realize...it was just...gas. Embarrassing but I didn't know the difference! Now she is a pro soccer player in the making! Mamma is so proud! Michael felt her for the first time on Thursday and it was such a magical experience.
As far as medical insurance goes, we fought our way through and we were accepted. We were guided and met a case worker that works with families that have "recently entered America" and he was so surprised by our case he wanted to get involved. All our hard work paid off and we are COMPLETELY covered! Again, HUGE tender mercy. As we were leaving his office he said, "You're the palest illegal I've ever worked with!" It was hilarious cause our doctor said the same thing a week later. I also have to give a shout out to our amazing doctor. He is a OB and family practitioner and BEFORE we were accepted with our health insurance, he was also so stunned by our case that he was willing to see us, even if we could not pay! Now, that's a good doctor!
Michael is now working full time at Home Depot. Not his ideal place but with the economy how it is, another true tender mercy he has a full time job! His boss and manager love him! They aren't used to the work ethic of an Idaho farm boy. He's already received
two awards since working there for his outstanding work ethic and work attitude. Michael says it's not a big deal but it is to me!! I'm so proud of my hard workin' man!
As for me, I completed my externship at Dixie Regional Hospital. I am so grateful for that experience and the amazing people I worked with, was able to serve, and that I met. There are two patients that really stick out in my mind. The one is the previous story I told about the man who could only say 'one.' The second was an amazing woman that was admitted to the rehab floor with a severe left CVA. When I began to see her, she was completely non verbal however this woman had such an incredible spirit--it's hard to describe but you could
feel that this woman is an incredible person. She had the most tender smile and come to find out...this woman WAS an incredible person. She accomplished some outstanding things in her life and her husband was a mighty person as well. They traveled all over the world teaching, her husband wrote a book, and she even taught for a while at Utah State. :D This lady truly changed my life. Since she was non verbal, I was working with a speech pathologist from the new River Road hospital and she taught me how to encourage and teach verbalization. My supervisor was gone for the week so I told this patient that by the end of the week, I wanted her to help me impress my supervisor and our goal was to have her verbalizing by the end of the week. We worked hard but she did it! I was so proud. Hearing her voice brought tears to my eyes! My last day of my externship, I was working with this patient. I told her that it was my last day at the hospital and tears came to her eyes. (first emotion I've seen from her since I had started seeing her) I told her that since it was my last day and her son's birthday, we would work on her being able to sing happy birthday to her son. As we were practicing, a strong impression came to me to elicit "I love you" from this patient so she could tell her family. We worked and worked and she did it! It was magical. This patient's daughter came in and I said to the patient to tell her daughter what we had been practicing. The patient looked at her daughter and said "I.....love.....you"! The daughter just cheered and cheered! Tears were on the surface and it took everything inside me to hold back. Well, that didn't last long. The patient reached out to give me a hug since it was my last day, I hugged her, and her daughter also had tears in her eyes as we all said goodbye. Since it was my last day, I went with my amazing supervisor and got lunch at the hospital and had a team meeting in the conference room. We hurried and during the meeting a nurse came into the room panicked and said they needed a doctor NOW! The doctor, the nurses, and a couple therapists jumped up and ran out of the room. Soon, over the intercom we heard a 'code blue' which is unresponsive patient. Everyone in that room's heart stopped as we had to witness and wait. Soon, the doctor came in with tears in his eyes and said it was my patient that I had just finished seeing. She had passed away less than 5 minutes after I said goodbye. Being pregnant, and just being me, I sobbed and sobbed. Hard way to end my externship. My heart was so broken. It was my tender mercy to have been given the opportunity to work with this incredible woman and truly my privilege. Sadly, this patient did not have the opportunity to sing happy birthday to her son (she did a few days earlier but we had really perfected it but I know he knew).
Since that time, I've enjoyed this no-school thing. Totally not like me to not be rushing rushing but it's been enjoyable. I graduate with my master’s degree on May 7th....HUGE TENDER MERCY!!!!! If you would have told me a year ago that I would survive to this point, I would have laughed in your face. My Savior Jesus Christ has truly carried me through these last two years. It was through the literal grace of my Savior that I made it to this point. Every day was hard. Every day. However, I would do it again. I had such an amazing support system outside of the department and within my grad school family. Our group of 14 graduate students truly were a
family. I couldn't have done it without that support and it's going to be so hard not seeing them every day. So, only a few more days and I GRADUATE!!!! Hallelujah!
I also decided that it was a travesty that I was graduating with my masters degree and CANNOT SEW!!! I changed that quickly! I went home to help take care of my Mamma and spend some time with family and while there I made
6 BLANKETS! I made 2 levi quilts. One was 7.5 ft long by 5.5 ft wide! HUGE. I used all my old high school jeans! And the second was for my brother’s wedding. It was his high school jeans and it was his wedding colors. His fiancé Ashley told me their colors were black, white, and bright pink...so that's what I did. The back was black and white polka-dot and I tied with bright pink string! It turned out so cute! I also made 2 fleece baby blankets, one rag quilt (for my sweet baby girl--it has cowgirls on it! :D), and finished a levi quilt that my mom started! AND...I learned how to crochet! I'm so proud...the righteous kind of proud!
Truly, Michael and I have had infinite tender mercies bestowed upon us from our Father in Heaven! I am forever grateful...and we have so much to look forward to!!!!
Graduation, a wedding, and a baby coming!!! Wow, our cup runneth over!
