Wednesday night's visit

Last night Roy, the kids and I only had a short time for visiting due to a meeting I needed to attend. But that short visit was one of the best visits ever! When I walked in and saw mom sitting up with a tray of food in front of her and feeding herself I was so excited. Then Adam told her to say Hi Melissa, and she did!!!!! I was so overwhelmed with emotions! It was so exciting and encouraging. I also took joy in finding out that she played the Wii and liked it! :-) I'll be going in this afternoon and maybe I can challenge her to a game. God is so amazing!!! I know that only He can work such miracles! For her to even have a sense of humor during this is amazing in itself. I love to see her smile and hear her laugh. I can't wait to hear her throw out her own jokes soon!!!! I can't thank everyone enough for the love and support shown to our family during this journey.

~Melissa~

Wednsday Dec 30 2009 5:45 pm

Mom ate her breakfast this morning, real solid food. Her lunch got cold before she started it, so she never ate that. She makes better progress every day in all her therapy sessions, the people here are just awestruck at the pace shes moving along at. They tell me that "no one recovers this fast!".

Its the power of prayer, of that i'm certain. So lets just keep on praying!

Also, after therapy she rested for 20 minutes, then she wanted to do somthing. So I asked away without success for about 10 questions or so. Finally I asked if she wanted to play the Nintendo Wii, she got all excited and said yes! So we did some Wii bowling today too.

'Tis so Sweet to Trust in Jesus

~Krista~
The chorus to this song is the one that was going through my head while we were on our way to the hospital, the day that Mother had her stroke! 'Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus!

~Words: Louisa M. R. Stead, 1850-1917 Music: William J. Kirkpatrick, 1838-1921~

’Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus,

Just to take Him at His Word;

Just to rest upon His promise,

Just to know, “Thus says the Lord!”

Chorus

Jesus, Jesus, how I trust Him!

How I’ve proved Him o’er and o’er

Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus!

O for grace to trust Him more!

O how sweet to trust in Jesus,

Just to trust His cleansing blood;

Just in simple faith to plunge me

’Neath the healing, cleansing flood!

Yes, ’tis sweet to trust in Jesus,

Just from sin and self to cease;

Just from Jesus simply taking

Life and rest, and joy and peace.

I’m so glad I learned to trust Thee,

Precious Jesus, Savior, Friend;

And I know that Thou art with me,

Wilt be with me to the end.

Tuesday Dec 29 2009 4:32 PM

Mom had a fantastic day in speech therapy, she sang twinkle, twinkle, little star, row, row, row, your boat, and she can say many other words now. She needs to take some time to think about the word, but she is able to speak on command now, Praise God! She ate her lunch orally today, and tomorrow they are going to try to feed her all 3 meals puree.

God is answering so many prayers,so quickly! His hand of mercy, love, and power is over us.

Purple and Scarlet

Mom Laughing

Yummy!

Monday Dec 28 2009 7:50 PM

Mom had A tiring, but very sucessful day in therapy today, she was able to swallow without coughing, water, thickened apple juice, tomato juice, and apple sauce. I am praying she will be able to get rid of her feeding tube soon!

Today she walked further than she has yet, about 140 yards! Today her occupational therapist hooked her up to this electro stimuli doohicky, hope that wasn't to painful. I tried one of those when craig bought it for isolated muscle workout, felt like being roped to an electric fence! All of her therapists were extremely pleased with her efforts and her ability.

Sunday Dec 27 2009 11:12 am

Mom's feeling good this Sunday morning, we both got lots of sleep last night. We read the first epistle of John for devotions, and for a teaser, listened to Keven Swanson's Generations Radio program, his Christmas day's broadcast.

Yesterday they had to put a catheter in Mom because she can't control her functions fully yet. So you can pray that she would be able to lose the catheter soon too. Her medication from the hospital has he plugged up, and that problem has only surfaced in the last 48 hours, they wait so long to take care of constipation, that by the time they take measure against it, its a bigger problem than it needs to be. Anyway, that's torture for her and they keep asking her if she wants pain medication (the culprit) and she keeps turning it down. Thankfully they are trying a natural method, prune juice!

Saterday Dec 26 2009 9:32 am

Adam:

I think this will have been one of the most memorable Christmas's for my family. In the Roy took a turn spending the night with Mom on Dec 24, so Christmas morning I was able to go eat breakfast with the Clark family, and we just had a great time of fellowship there! Krista taught them how to make Egg Butter, a Van Cleve Christmas morning tradition. We ate taco's for Christmas dinner, your taco's are a hit with us Mrs Macdonald!

We spent most of the day with Mom, and were excited to see she had learned new tricks! she can now move her right ankle and toes! A large part of the Criss family came to visit Christmas night and Mom was So happy to see them.

Mom had a really hard night and did not sleep much at all Christmas night. The staples that held Mom's Skull together been have been pulled out today.

Prayers are being answered every day, her right side is coming back now. It will take a lot of therapy to get her strength back, but we have great faith in Jesus that he can, if he wills, restore her strength and health.