God Strengthens

The name Ezekiel means "God Strengthens"

We can see the truth of that in our day to day lives. It has been hard but we are only getting by with God's strength.

I didn't write much in my last post and I hope that didn't concern people. We are doing okay...not good or great or even fine...just okay right now. Some days are better than others and God has been healing our hearts little by little over the past couple of weeks.

We have been comforted so well by our Heavenly Father through His promises in scripture and through His people. Our family and friends have been so wonderful to us over the past 2.5 weeks...literally they have brought us meals (we have only cooked 1 meal since we came home from the hospital), cleaned our house; loved on our girls; sat with us; cried with us; babysat for us; prayed with us and for us; run errands for us; sent us flowers, cards, email and texts. One friend even went head to head with a "not nice" sales lady at the maternity store for me when she didn't want to take something back that I needed to return...that is a true friend. We are so blessed to have such wonderful friends and family.

So, please know that although we are grieving the loss of our child, we are daily getting strength from our good and merciful God.

For those of you who are praying for us, thank you and please continue to pray for us. Please pray specifically for our health this week. We have all been sick on and off since the 20th of January.

One week ago...

We buried our baby boy Ezekiel Brian Laffin. He was born at 23 weeks (on the 19th) but died in the womb from a cord accident.

I have been writing down thoughts that I may or may not want to share on this blog but today decided that I would simply let people know that we had to say goodbye to our son.

Poor Baby

Telia with her first broken bone...hopefully the last

Holiday Cooking

Over the Holidays we actually had some fun cooking and baking. Most of what we made turned out good so I thought I would share with ya. I don't have any pictures so you will have to settle with some links.

I made 2 different cookies over for Christmas: Cranberry White Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies
and Andes Mint Cookies. I didn't save the mint cookie recipe but the link I posted looks like it.

For our Faith family get together I made a low sugar dessert for my Dad which turned out to be a hit with everyone. I made Strawberry Pretzel Salad but substituted sugar free jello instead of the regular stuff and used splenda instead of sugar.

I have decided that Christmas brunch will always consist of quiche (I never make quiche because of Brian's egg allergy but I love it) and other yummies that Brian can enjoy. This year I had some extra squash and zucchini hanging around so I made this Summer Quiche. I made it crust less, used mostly egg whites and didn't have onions or tomatoes on hand but it was still delicious!

This week I made a Breakfast Quinoa Recipe that I found on the Martha Stewart website. This was a nice break from oatmeal and most of the family loved it (minus Ruby). Telia had tons and Brian finished his bowl so that was a good sign.

For the New Year Brian made a wonderful Corned Beef, Cabbage, Carrots, Onions, and Potato meal. No recipe to follow but had to mention how great it was!

Christmas Down South

We visited Brian's parents and his brother in Bowling Green for a couple of days to celebrate Christmas. The girls had a great time with their grandparents, Uncle John, and Abby Dog.

The girls had lovely little Christmas dresses but I didn't get great pics of them in their dresses.

Grandpa L and Abby Dog

Both girls were interested in playing the piano with Grandma during this trip

Ruby was very excited that the southern part of the state got a bunch of snow for her to play in. In this picture she is actually crying because we made her put 2 layers of gloves on...it is hard to be 3 years old some days.

She quickly snapped out of it and had a blast as Uncle John and Daddy pulled her around the yard!

Sisters

Telia Abigail at 13.5 months Christmas 2010

Ruby Eleanor at 15.5 months Christmas 2008

Christmas Morning

We spent Christmas morning at home with my parents. We read the Christmas story from the book of Luke and discovered the goodies in our stockings before Mamaw and Papaw Faith arrived.

We ate a delicious brunch (I'll post new recipes I tried on another day) with Mamaw and Papaw before opening gifts. Ruby is at an age where she really gets into the gifts and has lots of fun not only opening her own but helping everyone else. She was very happy with every gift she received and everything her sister got too.

Waiting for Mamaw and Papaw

Look at my new ornament!

Ezekiel Brian (that is our baby boys name) even got some gifts

Telia helping Mamaw open her gifts

Of course they had tons of fun playing in this big bag

My parents brought us one of their trees on Christmas Eve Eve (the 23rd) to put up while Ruby was asleep. It was so fun seeing her excitement when she woke up to a "booo-ti-ful tree with boo-ti-ful things on it" on Christmas Eve.

Thanks Mamaw and Papaw for the new table!

Got our dresses on and ready to go visit all the Faiths and Bentons for dinner.