We Will Remember

     "Come, let us return to the LORD. He has torn us to pieces; now He will heal us. He has injured us, now He will bandage our wounds. In just a short time, He will restore us, so that we may live in His presence. Oh that we might know the LORD! Let us press on to know Him. He will respond to us as surely as the arrival of dawn, or the coming of rains in early spring." Hosea 6:1-3

     Today is our baby girl's birthday.  She is 28 and she was born on her great grandmother, Mary Bottom Fowler's birthday, and the 50th anniversary of Pearl Harbor.  She has been a joy from the beginning as she came out with her prissy little self in her first baby picture, indicative of the overflowing personality and sunshine  that would fill our hearts and our home.
     When she was 2 months, and then again at 5 months, we nearly lost her.  She had a growth across her windpipe that the doctor's were unable to find until she almost suffocated to death.  Even through this difficult time when her little chest would be working so hard to take deep breaths, she would be smiling.  She was in Children's hospital twice both for a week at a time while they first tried to shrink the growth with prednisone, and then when they did surgery to remove the growth.  After a rough start, we are so grateful for God's grace and mercy to protect her and deliver her from the hemangioma that almost took her life before she got started good.
     Hannah Beth has always been so full of life.  As a little girl, the more friends she had around her, the more full of life she became.  I tease her about it, because her little guy is just like she was and the more the merrier for her!  She loved playing with dolls, but she also enjoyed playing ball.  I always admired her because she was feminine, but she liked the outdoors.  She played softball, and loved dance.  When she was little she took ballet from a studio here in town.  I wasn't too happy with the older girls recital, and longed for Hannah Beth to take ballet from a Christian perspective like Heather Whitestone, the deaf Miss America, who was a part of the Briarwood Ballet.  Interestingly, after having to wait a few years, GOD raised up her babysitter, Melody Kiyak Locklair, to be that ballet teacher.  Melody took dance from the local dance studio and i asked her Mom one day if Melody would be willing to teach Hannah Beth at our home some ballet.  Little did i know that HB would be the first of many students that Melody would teach ballet and dance using music that glorified the LORD having large recitals at Friendship Methodist and then Trinity Methodist in Huntsville and impacting so many young ladies for JESUS.

Hannah Beth at 16 with "Troy," our little Maltipoo

    Hannah Beth took a break from ballet for a few years, to pour herself into karate and earned a black belt.  Not sure what degree, but she got it and then resumed her ballet again through her high school years.
   HB and i took a lot of road trips together and we had a great time and made some great memories in the midst of my doctor appts in Dallas, and we squeezed in the Mesquite rodeo on one of our trips.  She was always great at reminding me of stuff which i needed.  She was taking care of me!  We went to a ton of gospel singings, and had a big trip up to Ashville, North Carolina to see the Greene's at their homecoming. The young man she was dating was also up there with his family staying at the Biltmore Hotel while we stayed at the Motel 6.  True story.  We had a great time as they took us through the beautiful Biltmore and touring the grounds, and then we camped out at the Motel 6...Lol.  It was cheap and a place i could stay with my allergies.
    She was always a fun loving gal, and not as studious as her older brother.  So i was really pleasantly surprised when she took classes at Calhoun while she was in high school and earned A's and received the History award.  She went on to the University of Mobile and finished as one of the top students in her nursing class, gaining special awards there also.
   When she graduated from college, she got a job as Camp Nurse at SAMBICA out in Washington State.  We hated to see her go that far but GOD had a plan and she ended up meeting her future husband out there.  We are so thankful he was a CHRISTian first and from Alabama second.  Then, she came home, and a friend from our church helped her get a nursing job at UAB on the Liver and Transplant unit.  That was a big job for a gal fresh out of college and summer camp.  Summer camp was a big job too.  She had a lot of responsibility to give out a lot of meds.  She also managed to break her foot while she was there, and she kept on working.
    Next stop for her was Labor and Delivery, her true love.  She worked at UAB in L and D, and now at Madison Hospital, in L and D.  She is training to be a charge nurse there and we are so proud of her.
    Most of all we are so proud of her relationship with JESUS, and the great wife and Mom she is to her two boys, Bracken, 4, and Shepard, 15 months, who are full blast.  I watch her pour out her life day after day for her family, and work fulltime on the weekends, and work on her Nurse Practioner degree and knows she only does all this by GOD's help.

    A couple of weeks ago, she and her son, Bracken, were returning from the gym, and a car was stopped on the road.  She swerved but was unable to miss it.  Her car rolled over and over and they ended up upside down in the median.   WE ARE BEYOND GRATEFUL that she and Bracken, and the other people who were in the other car were not hurt.  It was truly a MIRACLE and happened just three days before THANKSGIVING.  It could have been a whole different scenario, and we are so grateful for GOD's divine protection of them.  This picture was taken of our baby and grandchildren the day after the wreck.

Celebrating THANKSgiving after  serving others at the hospital all day.

     This past week, Bracken celebrated his 4th birthday, and today is Hannah Beth's 28th.  GOD thank you for the privilege and blessing to be able to remember your great faithfulness to our family.  Thank you so much for the wonderful gift you brought to our family and our house 28 years ago.  We had no idea how much you wanted to bless us and use her to be a blessing to others.  THANK YOU, JESUS.  WE WILL REMEMBER YOUR GREAT LOVINGKINDNESS and FAITHFULNESS to our family and PRAISE YOUR NAME!!!

Playing "Pin the Tail on the Donkey," at Bracken's 4th birthday


"We Will Remember"
https://youtu.be/DzoxsxsIMCE.