Ava

Medical training can be roughly split into two halves.

The first is composed of learning the seemingly impossible complexities of how the human body works. From a biochemical level upward to whole organ systems, there are details that would require the most hardened cynic to not see the fingerprint of an almighty God who knit us together with an unfathomably delicate touch.

The second involves learning how this perfection of creation can be assaulted. It is time in the hospital working with people who are afflicted in ways that just don't seem fair. Nowhere is that disconnect more glaring than when kids get sick. It is during those times that it requires the most hardened faith to still see God's hand working in the details.

My niece Ava is one of the best people I have ever met. She has a tumor in her brain. One cell, at some point, just kept multiplying because one gene, out of 100,000 or so, isn't working to tell it to stop. And now it is up to us, the believers who trust in a God who loves us, to steel up our faith and ask to see God's hand still working in the details.

God still does miracles. The same God that knit those genes together out of 3,000,000,000 base pairs of DNA into 46 chromosomes for the first man He made can fix any of them at any time. He asks us for faith. Faith that has seen what the devil can do and then stands defiant in a belief that God still rules this world and can hold us together when we can't to it ourselves. Pray for Ava. God still hears us and He is still in the details.

Matthew 21:21: Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, if you have faith and do not doubt...you can say to this mountain, 'Go, throw yourself into the sea,' and it will be done."

Hunter Vacation

Luke Bonding with Uncle Jan

I just got back from the Hunter family vacation in Put-in-Bay Ohio. If you don't know where that is, I don't either but it is beautiful. It is in Lake Erie and you can see Canada from where we stay so it's somewhere near Canada. We take a plane, an automobile and a boat to get there and it's worth every mode of transportation.

Our Uncle Jan and Aunt Michele own a beautiful home on the island and the whole family (this year sans Joel and Josh) spends a week together there. They are kind to invite us and are pretty incredible hosts.

Luke finally had some quality time with his Hunter cousins and he seemed to love every moment. He's a lucky kid.

I came back home to a completely empty house. Actually, all of our furniture had been replaced by dog hair. Our movers must be practical jokers. Or else the never vacuuming under furniture finally caught up with me. I could have made a complete second dog. A large one. That is hollow. And has random pieces of currency in its fur.

We move back to Florida in 5 days. Today our Kansas friends are throwing us a going away party. They are all really great and we're going to miss them.

Happy 8-Months Son!

Luke-1 Day old

Luke-8 Months Old

Well Luke is growing like a weed. An extremely attractive, quick-witted, financially responsible, career driven yet family oriented, weed. I can't believe he's getting so big. It seems like yesterday I was lying in an OR hopped up on morphine and now I'm sitting at a computer drinking coffee. And also Luke is a lot bigger.

I can't get over how blessed we are to have him as our son. He's just so much fun. And also really good at chess. We don't play with pawns though. Those are a choking hazard.

Before too long he'll be walking and talking and hopefully growing some teeth. I know he won't be my baby forever and I will fight the urge to treat him like he is.

As for now, I am embracing every moment of him loving to be cuddled and kissed and sung to. It won't be long before he notices that the songs I make up don't rhyme at all. And are all sung to the tune of Billy Ocean's "Caribbean Queen." I don't know why. I can't help it.

Luke, I can't believe I get to be your mom. I can't wait to see the amazing man you become. Just don't become him too fast. I love you son.

7.75 Months

Luke is rapidly approaching 8 months of age. In that time he has reached the following milestones:

Rolling over

Rolling over the other way

Saying, "Mama"

Saying, "Dada"

Saying, "Yaya"

Inventing the word, "Yaya."

Growing extremely long sideburns...

and the list goes on a little bit.

He's well on his way to crawling. He rocks back and forth on his hands and knees. I was hoping he'd wait a few more months to become mobile because I quite enjoy not having to chase him around the house but I'd give it two weeks tops.

Having this amazingly brilliant, well-mannered, incredibly articulate young man in our lives for the past eight months has resulted in a quite a lot of video footage. I was recently watching some of our almost eight month old footage and realized that our son has become much more handsome with time. Although in our euphoric new parent haze, we couldn't imagine our son becoming any more attractive than he was at birth. Here is some of said footage. You can see how the months have been good to ol' Luke.