Four months of grace

Our sweet Bella turned four months old this week.

I asked my husband if that time has flown by. His response was a resounding, “No.”

 

I’m not going to lie, this past month has been hard.

The background to the tough is the move. Almost all of our belongings are currently stowed in two storage rooms and my father’s garage. We’re currently bunking at my dad’s house, with the hope to move into the new house if all goes well at the end of the month, or at the latest, sometime in the first two weeks of January.

While moving twice and being “homeless” for a period might not sound like an ideal situation, nor was it what we would have originally planned, it’s been full of grace.

These past few weeks with Bella have been tough. She’s got something going on with her tummy that is turning our normally sweet spirited, easy-going girl into a demanding, unhappy, zapper of energy. Which means there hasn’t been a whole lot of leftover mommy for the toddler. Consequently, having Papa around to play, and read, and pour into Eliana has been an extraordinary blessing.

When Arabella is feeling good, she continues to be a people-loving flirt. Her smiles continue to melt the hearts of pretty much anyone she encounters.

And those eyes…need I say anything about those eyes? They have remained strikingly blue, and mommy gets lost in them daily.

Fortunately, whatever is happening in her tummy doesn’t seem to be impacting her weight too much, so those cheeks are still perfectly chubby. And her heart? Between her babbling and bubble blowing, her pediatrician couldn’t even hear her murmur this week. It continues to function quite well despite the defect, and we’re thankful for the time for growth this gives us before surgery.

She doesn’t hate tummy time quite as much anymore, although she definitely doesn’t love it either. She rolled over multiple times this past weekend, but hasn’t seemed too interested in repeating the trick much this week. Her favorite things are faces, her sister, bath time, and blowing bubbles. Blowing bubbles is her primary mode of communication right now. She starts out slow and playful, but as she gets more annoyed the bubbles come more fast and furious.

And each day with her is a gift. This fact alone is carrying me through these long, hard days. Because simply put, I’d much rather have a difficult day than no day at all. But for those of you still striving in prayer for our sweet girl, would you pray that we would be able to figure out what’s going on? We’re running through all the more probable causes first, but as Bella is quite uniquely formed, there could be some more unique issues going on. Our little fighter continues to be a head scratcher in so many ways!