So much to be thankful for

Our family has so much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving season. I could write for hours. We did this cool family project this year that I hope to do every year (in fact I think I'll stock up next year from Oriental Trading Co. in case they ever stop carrying this cool craft). It was this large foam tree with foam leaves. It was made for a classroom but we just kept the leaves in a bowl on our kitchen table with a sharpie and some double sided tape and every night at dinner we'd go around the table and we would each say what we are thankful for. I would write it on the leaf and each person would stick their leaf to the tree. By the end of November the tree was full of beautiful fall leaves. Okay, so our leaves fell ONTO the tree instead of off but it was cool! A couple of days ago the neighbor kids were over playing and saw it and asked about it and Jake explained what it was and one of the boys said, "Wow! You guys are thankful for ALL THAT?!?!" Yes, yes we are! We are so blessed. No only do we have a roof over our heads, food on our plates, our health, warm clothes on our bodies, the abundant blessings of Jesus Christ, all of our friends an family, but Craig has a stable job, we have high quality therapists and consultants in place to help Jake, we are able to homeschool our children, we are thankful for Lydia's birthparents for realizing that they would be unable to appropriately care for her, we are thankful for the Chinese government for allowing us to adopt one of their children, we are thankful for our church family, we are thankful for our pastor and his family, for our neighbors, for modern medicine, more modern amenities.....I could go on and on and on.

My children and my husband are such a warm and true blessing to my life. I thank God for them every day. I can't imagine my life without these two little people and this one big person surrounding me with warmth and love. At dinner last night Lydia commented about how it is fun for the four of us to be together. I was surprised she said that because we eat dinner together every night and lunch together almost every day as a family. In addition, I homeschool them with the exception of Lydia going to preschool 3 mornings a week. But, she meant that we didn't spent the ENTIRE day together because Daddy had to go to work and she had to go to preschool for 3 hours. So, I enlightened her that there are some families that don't spend hardly any time together and don't eat dinner together. She got the saddest look on her face and said, "Oh, that is so sad and not fun, Mommy!" I totally agree with Lydia. There is nothing more I want in this world than having my family together no matter where we are or what we are doing.

This year I am especially thankful for Sarah at CARD and all of her knowledge and wisdom. I am also thankful that Leeann Whiffen wrote her book A Child's Journey Out of Autism so I would learn about CARD's higher level program for children with autism. It has already made such an amazing impact on Jake in just 3 months. We certainly have a ways to go, but if we can see this kind of progress in 3 months I can't wait to see what a difference 24 or 36 months will make!

I am also very thankful for our church and all of our friends there. Not long after Jake was diagnosed it became too hard to attend church. He was too much of a handful to have in the church service and there was no cry room. We would try taking him to the nursery but the 90 year old lady in the nursery couldn't handle him either. So, it ended up that we were getting 3 people ready to go to church for 1 person to get anything out of going to church because Jake and 1 parent were in the nursery. So, we made the decision to stop going to church for a while so that we could do Saturday and Sunday therapy time to prevent weekend regressions. We ended up staying out of church for a year. After about a year we started looking for a new church. Craig and I tried several while my mom would watch Jake after she got home from church. We knew we wanted a younger congregation with many children (our previous church was a much older congregation with few children). We wanted something smaller but not too small. We figured we'd know it when we came across it. We went to every United Methodist Church in town. Some 2 or 3 times. If we went for a 3rd time, we would take Jake. That was the true test. And it would usually blow up there. You would think that church would be an all welcoming place for children with special needs. Ya, no, not really. We finally hit Grace. And, we knew it within 5 minutes of hitting the door that it was our new church home. We went twice without Jake. Then we took him and I stayed with him in his class. I left him in the most loving hands imaginable after a few Sundays. I will forever be grateful to Miss Jetta and Miss Dee. Not only for Jake but then also for newly adopted Lydia. What wonderful, loving, caring ladies to take both of my children to who both had their own special needs in their own right. And they understood both of them because they saw them as CHILDREN FIRST and loved them unconditionally. Jake was 3 when we started going there. He is 7 now. Everyone knows him. Everyone loves him. We are very actively involved. My children can run around all over that church with the other kids like it is a big playground (within reason) and all the mommies and daddies are watching out for each other's children and mine are no different. Everyone accepts and loves my Jake. They treat him no different. They give him anything extra he needs but they don't over do it and they RESPECT him. Our pastor is also so wonderful with him. Our awesome pianist is his piano teacher and has the patience of a saint with him and Jake LOVES playing the piano and just thinks the world of Loren and his time with Loren. I am SO THANKFUL for our church family.

Our greatest blessing is that God had a virgin woman give birth to the savior of the world, Jesus Christ, and that ultimately He sacrificed his only son so that we would have everlasting life. What greater blessing is there?