Gavin's Baptism

What a wonderful experience.

So much has been leading up to this day.  G has been learning how to distinguish right from wrong...not that he always makes the right choices, but he is learning.

We have been learning about the importance of Baptism in our family.  We've been focusing on following the example of our Savior and learning about His teachings.  We've been learning about the covenant of baptism and the responsibility that accompanies a decision like this.  We've been studying our scriptures and trying to be kind to one another...repenting and saying sorry when we make mistakes.  After all of this, he chose to be baptized.  We are so grateful and proud of all G has done to be ready for this.

When G had decided that he was ready to be baptized, he was able to be interviewed by Bishop Mansius.  It was an interesting feeling as a parent, sitting outside the office wondering if the bishop would feel G was ready like we thought he was.  I couldn't help but smile when I saw the smile of both G's face as well as the bishop's.  He was ready.

Grammy HB found a book that she shared with our family about baptism.  The Big Guy Lowe read through it with the two older boys earlier in the day G was to be baptised.

 

 

Because we were having family in town for Christmas, we were able to schedule the baptism to take place on Sunday, December 19th.  To make it even more special, we were able to share that evening with the Martin Family as Grace was prepared to be baptized too.  Many of Grace's extended family are Breitmayers--who happen to be long time friends of G's extended family; the Hornbergers.  Because The Big Guy Lowe is a worthy priesthood holder, G asked his dad to perform the baptism as well as the confirmation.  He then asked me if I would give the talk on the Gift of the Holy Ghost.  We were both so grateful.

Here are some photos from the beginning of the evening.  G and his dad.

All the Lowe brothers and dad.

Now a few of the entire family.

What a wonderful evening. 

What a wonderful beginning...

Eight years ago today...

I almost can't believe it!!  How can G be EIGHT YEARS OLD???

Didn't we just finish having birthday number "7"?

Wasn't it just a short time ago when he was a new little baby?

The Big Guy Lowe and I were so excited to have our little baby.  This is what I was looking like back then.

We had been told by doctors that we wouldn't be able to have children.  We had gone through the pain and anguish that keenly tore at our hearts.  In the midst of the doctor visits, research, tears and sadness, I was given a blessing.  The Big Guy Lowe, as a worthy Priesthood holder, took the opportunity to give a blessing of comfort to his heart-sick wife.  In that blessing I was told among other things, that we would be able to have children.  While comforted, I needed my dear husband to remind me of this special blessing in the coming months--during my times of weakness and question, while our doctors continued to say things like "premature ovarian failure, test results over time show things aren't right, need to seek specialists, seek to grow your family by other means..."  It was hard to remember the feeling I had in my heart when I received that special blessing; when I received the words my Savior wanted me to know.  Currently, The Big Guy Lowe and I are reading the Biography of President Thomas S. Monson.  Something he has shared that I love is the true principle that Faith and Fear cannot reside at the same time in our hearts.  I learned that principle during our time of great struggle.  Faith does overcome fear...and it did.

We found a new doctor, a fertility endocrinologist up in SLC.  New tests were run, similar results were found, but we pressed forward.  It was actually a scary feeling, wanting to look at the pregnancy test I had just taken, but being so afraid of the devestation that I had felt so many times before.  I put the test in a drawer and then called for The Big Guy Lowe to come into the bathroom.  Oh, I hadn't told him I was going to take another test.  When I explained what I had done and that the test was in the drawer but I didn't have the courage to look at it, he opened the drawer and excitedly asked "What do two lines mean?"  When we took this good news to our doctor, he was surprised, but instead of asking how decided to persue a healthy pregnancy.  Such gratitude filled our hearts.  Even now, many years later I am touched with a peace and gratitude for that time in our lives.

The pregnancy progressed well, until the very end.  Nothing crazy, but my blood pressure started increasing to the point that my doctor sent us over to the hospital a few weeks early to have our baby.  We were nervous and excited.  My mom was planning on being with us to help, but we weren't supposed to have our baby until the 18th, and my sister, Emily, was getting married on the 10th.  While nervous, I felt like Scott and I would be able to handle things well together.  My in-laws offered to come back out (they had been at our house just a week earlier over Thanksgiving), but we let them know we would be okay.

G was born early in the morning on December 5th, 2002.  We were so happy, and SO tired!

Wow, did I mention that I was SO tired.  Not that pretty, but we had just been working pretty hard for the last 19 hours. 

This little sweetie was worth it! 

Our next week was a bit of a roller-coaster as I'm sure it is with most first-time parents.  Our little G was jaundice, like many newborns, but his bilirubin levels were in the low 20s, which was getting dangerous.  We haven't met anyone else that has had this experience as new parents, but our pediatrician ordered the "bed of lights" to be set up at our home instead of having G brought back to the hospital.

We called some friends from the congregation we belonged to in Holladay, and Scott and another priesthood holder gave G his first blessing.  Later that evening, when the little light-bed arrived we needed the strength we knew our faith could provide.  Oh that bed!  This bed is just bigger than our little baby.  For the first night home we were required to keep him in the bed with only a diaper--no swaddling and only two eye pads with some netting to keep the eye pads in place (at the risk of causing eye damage if we didn't keep them covered!).  The Big Guy Lowe and I cried and cried as we laid him down the first time.  We weren't allowed to hold him other than 30 minutes for every three hours.  In the 30 minutes out of the bed we needed to feed him, change his diaper and cuddle as much as possible, but then he had to be placed back for another 3 hours.  I was truly exhausted, and so was The Big Guy Lowe.  We slept in shifts both being awake for our precious 30 minutes.  I'm so grateful for the love and support that The Big Guy Lowe and I provide for each other...then and now.  I don't know how we would have made it through that seemingly never-ending night, but it was one of those amazing experiences that helped knit our little family together.  Oh, did I mention that The Big Guy Lowe had a final the next morning?  Yep, he did, and it went very well.

Wow.  Amazing what we go through and how the memories of those experiences can bring such strong emotions back so intensely.  We made it through that first rough week.  My wonderful mother came out as soon as she was able and we were so grateful for her love and caring support...for all of us. 

Christmas that year was bitter-sweet.  We brought my mom to the airport so she could go back home.  It hit me so hard how dearly I wanted to raise our son near family.  As any new mother would feel, watching my mom walk into the airport brought huge tears to my eyes that lasted for the majority of that day.  I already missed her love, support and gentle reassurement that every new mother needs.  I will be forever grateful for her love, help and example throughout my life.

The Big Guy Lowe and I actually seemed to get the hang of being parents. 

We went on many long walks through the neighborhoods as that seemed to soothe our colicky baby.  We blessed our little son when he was two months old and had many family members there for the special day.

My wonderful mother was able to come back out to help us for almost a month as I had to go back to work to finish some projects I was working on.  That was another hard move, but it only lasted three months.  Next, The Big Guy Lowe graduated.

And we left Utah to persue his career and for me to persue mine.  The Big Guy Lowe works out of the home and I have been blessed to work within mine.

Wonderful to look back on blessings...eight years ago...

A different kind of Zoo day

What a great day to play at the zoo!  The morning was just a little cloudy and cool, but it was forcasted to burn off leaving a beautiful day!  Perfect!!  We were so happy when the Simpers called and invited us to go to the zoo with them!  YAHOO!!  Our group nicely posed for a picture together!

Amazing creatures were performing for us everywhere!

This bear kept the boys pretty entranced as it would take a few steps forward and then just as many steps backwards.  Hmmm, sometimes I feel like that bear! :)

We were curious to see where we measured up to the bears we were visiting, so we thought we'd find out.

Not too shabby!

Notice the dinosaur?  The Zoo is currently having a dinosaur exibit that sounds pretty neat.  We opted out of going there today, but in honor of it there are dinosaurs all throughout the park.  I'll touch on the dinosaurs a bit later in the post.

After visiting many animals, we were off to ride the long train!!

I was experimenting with some of the different settings on my camera and couldn't help but take a few more pictures of these cute boys!!

I just love it when they are loving to each other.  It makes my heart happy!!

After the train ride we were ready to head home.  We took a quick look into the penguins...

and then stopped one last time to see the Sea Lions as they were being fed.

This is where our day turned.

I realized I couldn't see D.  I couldn't see him anywhere.  My friend, Sue couldn't see her two boys that are a bit older than D either.  She was pretty sure that they had run ahead because they knew we were getting ready to leave.  She headed up to try and catch up with them.  Both of us thought it was odd that the boys would leave without us--especially as just a few minutes earlier, D hadn't been able to see me for a minute and when he did see where I was he came to me with tears in his eyes saying he couldn't find me.  After looking over the area one last time, I headed up towards the entrance/exit.  Truly, at this moment I was feeling a great deal of fear.  I was trying to stay calm, because G is extremely sensitive to situational emotions and I didn't want to cause him any more fear than he was already experiencing when he realized that we didn't have D with us.  As we were quickly heading towards the exit I just kept praying in my mind, asking Heavenly Father to please protect the boys.

I reached the entrance, found Sue and saw that she didn't have the boys.  I asked G to stay up with her and I headed back to look for D.  I was running as I pushed J's stroller down the hill back to the area we had just been.  I looked and looked, but the boys were nowhere to be found.  I went farther into the Zoo, to places we had been earlier and couldn't find them.  My mother's heart was hurting as one of my greatest fears was taking place.  After searching as much as I thought was possible in those areas I headed back to the entrance, hoping Sue had found the boys in the mean time.  Again, I was running up the hill, continuing to pray--pleading with my Heavenly Father to please protect the boys and to help us find them safely.  When I reached the entrance Sue had reported the boys as missing to the reception desk.  They hadn't been found yet.  At this point, G was all but sobbing as he kept asking me "what are we going to do?" and "where is D?"  I was on the verge of tears once again, but as soon as G saw that, I could see his fear increasing.  I put my arm around G and said that we needed to find a place where we could say a prayer.  We walked around the corner and we hugged each other as I said a prayer asking Heavenly Father to please protect D, to calm him and to help him be found so we could all be together again.  I thanked Heavenly Father for prayer and then closed our prayer.  I tried calming G once we had finished praying, letting him know that we were doing all we could, we had asked for Heavenly Father's help, we had the help of the zoo employees and we would find him.  At this point it had been about twenty minutes since we realized we couldn't find D.  Shortly after, we received word from the zoo employees that the boys had been found at the entrance to Dino World--the exibit that we hadn't gone to, and that they would be brought up to the entrance by zoo employees.  My relief was huge!  For a split second I also got pretty angry.  How had D run off and gone so far?  What was he thinking?  That anger soon fell away again to such huge relief that he was okay. 

After waiting about 40 minutes we saw the golf cart that was bringing the boys.  I was so grateful to the employees for taking care of our boys.  As Drew got off the cart and came over to me he hugged me and said that he couldn't find me.  I held him tightly and cried as I said that I had been so scared when I couldn't find him, that we had been looking and looking and that G and I had said a prayer asking Heavenly Father to please keep him safe.  He just about crumpled in my arms then and started sobbing.  G came up to us and hugged both of us.  With J in his stroller, we were all together again.

I've really taken a lot of time to think over the day.  We had a special Family Home Evening about what we do when we get lost or what we do if someone comes up to us and tries to hurt or take us.  I also had to get over my feelings of being responsible for allowing a situation to arise where I didn't know where one of my children were.  It was an extremely emotional and stressful day.

I'm so grateful for how things turned out.  I know that there are many families in the world that have experiences just like ours, but they don't turn out the same.  For about a half hour I felt a fear that I hope I never feel again.  I love my boys dearly.  I am grateful I get to be their mother.  I know Heavenly Father loves each of us too and that He hears our prayers.  I will try to do a better job at keeping my boys safe.  Now to move on.  Sigh....

Good bye

Am I really becoming one of "Those" moms? I just did something that puts me in a new category of moms, and I'm finding a mix of feelings about this.

Not that I have that long to ponder this as my boys are almost arguing with eachother, and thoughts of making dinner are entering my mind (have I mentioned that I really dislike deciding what to make for dinner??), laundry is being washed while other clothes need to be folded, final preparations are being formulated so that our "Saturday is a special day, it's the day we get ready for Sunday" activities will be completed so we can have an enjoyable Sabbath, etc...

I'd better get to the point. I have just given away all our baby clothes that are 12 mos and smaller. No more onsies that look doll-size. No more adorable one-piece outfits that fit little bodies so well and are easy to use. No more hats to keep a newborn's head warm.

I really am okay with all of this, mostly.

What would I have thought if I could have seen a picture of this day seven years ago, as doctors were convinced we would never be able to conceive a child? I am now the mother of three boys! We never do know what is in store for us in this life, we can only have the faith to keep pressing forward (verse 20), knowing that the Lord is aware of us and has things under control--even if those results may not be what we would choose at that time. Our Heavenly Father knows the experiences, good and hard, that will help us be the best children of His that we can be. I know that's true.

I know that's true.

So as I say good-bye to my life as a mom of an infant, I look forward to my life as a mom of little boys and then onward from there.

The couple that received the clothes are expecting their first child--a boy. How excited I am for them as they become parents of an infant...