Some people attempt to update their blog every day - that is far too ambitious for us!  We will attempt to update for milestone events.  Our sweet little girl is growing up so quickly - here is what she has been up to:

She has been exploring her creative side with a new favorite - Finger Painting!  She paints pictures for Grandmas, Daddy, & whoever she can think of at the time.

She very much enjoys playing with her babies.  Here she has brought anyone that would fit, for a ride in her shopping cart.

This was our front door after the blizzard & Emerson enjoying some of the tasty blizzard snow.



Every morning when she wakes up her hair is 'crazy' as she calls it.  This was a particularly crazy morning.  She gets a good spray down with detangler before we attempt to comb through the wildness.

More Craziness...

Baking with Mom...

Emerson also started sleeping in her big girl bed - you can see she is pretty excited about this!

She is helping her babies enjoy her new bed also





She is also getting very close to being potty trained.  Not sure what an appropriate picture would be for this...  It will be very exciting for us to not purchase diapers or pullups anymore!  Can't believe she is 2 1/2 already!  She brings us so much joy with the creative sayings & activities she comes up with!

Back Home

We are back home after spending a very relaxing week at Justin's parent's house in Iowa.  A huge Thank you to them for taking care of everything so we could relax & I could recuperate.  And a huge thank you to my parents for keeping Ammo for the week!  In Iowa we played games, played Wii, slept, shopped a little, and ate a lot!  I am doing a lot better, per Doctor's orders I am still off from work this week, but feeling stronger every day. 

When we got home last night we had a mailbox full of cards - we are so thankful for everyone's thoughtfulness, it was great to read all the notes and poems, and see the gifts they left for us, it was of course very emotional to look through everything, but that is also part of our healing process.

We started our blog to share a very difficult experience.  We now hope to continue it to also share the joys in our lives - mainly you will see a lot of pictures of the biggest joy in our lives - our sweet Emerson!

Here she is with Grandpa Dyk surveying all the Christmas presents.  Not all of them were for her - probably only half of them!

Stockings are always great fun!

This is one of her favorite gifts this year twin baby dolls (ironically she got this gift the day before we learned about our twins) she affectionately has given them the names "George" and "Mouth" -not completely sure where the names came from, but she sticks with those names and can tell who is who every time!  She wanted us to take this picture because they all matched.  Emerson was wearing her white t-shirt & when she took the dolls clothes off, they were wearing white t-shirts too!

One of her favorite things to do lately is have us roll her up like a burrito in a blanket & then take a picture.  You will notice the two yellow blankets next to her, she rolled up George & Mouth and put them there, then wanted to be rolled up right next to them.

While we were in Iowa Justin took Emerson sledding- here they are ready to go!

Here is the whole group of sledders - done sledding and almost ready to come in a get warmed up.

These two were the best of buds - thanks for being such a good sport Uncle Jaxon!

We forgot our camera at our Geurink Christmas party, once I get the pictures from my mom, I will post some of those too.

The day after

Things are looking up. Its about 20 after 11 and we are waiting for the doctor to come.    Her blood pressure & blood counts are looking much better.  Still a little low, but to a level that the Dr. is happy with.  Julie was able to be out of bed long enough to take a shower and we are very hopeful that he will clear us to go home.We have plans to celebrate Christmas today!!

I can"t tell every one enough how much all of your support means to us!! 

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for the Facebook messages, blog comments, texts, and phone calls,  Most of all for the prayers.  It is amazing to know that we have as much support as we do. 

I ask that you continue to pray for us in the coming days.  I know that we still have some emotional battles to fight.  Just this morning a lab tech came to draw blood and asked cheerily about "our Christmas baby".  We just stared at her for a minute thinking, she can't be serious!  But she didn't know & we had to tell her we lost our Christmas baby.  I'm sure this is just the first of many encounters we will have to deal with.

This however was our only negative experience with the Zeeland Hospital Doctors & Nurses.  They have all been amazing!  Offering meaningful comfort & professional help.  So many of them have cried with us & have the 'right' things to say. 

Our hearts go out to all the parents who deal with this with their first child.  We can't imagine what that would be like.  We still get to go home to our beautiful, healthy, busy 2 year old.  Without knowing it she adds so much joy to this experience.

Hope you all had a Great Christmas!!! 

Time for us to start ours!

Unbelievably Thankful,
Justin Julie, and Emerson

Christmas

We are spending all of Christmas in the hospital - no fun but I am physically not ready to go home.  After the babies were born I was losing a lot of blood.  They had to do a D & C to remove the placentas.  I was given enough medicine so I didn't know what was going on.  If you are up for a laugh ask Justin what kind of things I was talking about!!

After all of the procedures my blood pressure was down  to 58/34 - not good!  I am currently receiving a blood transfusion to get all numbers back up to a healthy range. 

They were able to determine why the babies died.  Usually twins, identical or fraternal each have their own amniotic sac.  Our twins were sharing one sack - their umbilical cords were all wrapped around each other not allowing oxygen or nutrients through.  It is good closure to know why they didn't survive & also encouraging to know this more than likely will not happen in any future pregnancies.

We did have a bright spot in our day though.  Julies family came to visit with Emerson and we got to see her open a few presents.  Don't worry though she isn't going with out!!  She will be getting plenty more in the days to come. 

We can feel all of your prayers & are encouraged to know we are surrounded my so many good friends and family.

Faith and Hope

Its 4:00 am and the babies were born about a half hour ago.  Two very tiny perfectly developed little bodies came into the world.  Both were girls, together they would have fit in the palm of my hand.  Officially they don't get to have names but we will always know them as Faith and Hope  While its heart breaking to see their lifeless little bodies they truly are amazing.  They are so small yet they are so perfect.  We rejoice this Christmas knowing that they are celebrating the birth of Jesus in Heaven with the Angels!!  Its hard to describe the rollercoaster of emotions we have experienced over the last 36 hours.  From finding out that there were actually twins, to the emotional kick in the gut when we learned that they didn't have a heart beat.  The waiting knowing that there is not a new life at the end.  The painful realization that your child/children are dead.  But knowing that they get to celebrate their very first Christmas in heaven.  Its amazing that you can love a child that hasn't even been born yet this much.

They have Julie on an iv to replace some of her fluids.  She is doing well and sleeping.  As long as nothing out of the ordinary happens we should be able to go home in the morning.  It will be a true blessing to be able to go home for Christmas. 

Rough couple of days

I wanted to send out a note of thanks for every one who is praying for us.  As some of you know we are having a tough Christmas this year.  Last night we went to the doctor for Julies regular 15 week appointment.  At that appointment the doctor couldn't find the baby's heartbeat.  He sent us to Zeeland hospital for an ultrasound.  During the ultra sound we found out that Julie was actually pregnant with twin girls, but neither of them had a heartbeat.
We took some time to talk with the doctors and decided to come back to the hospital the same night after bringing Emerson and Ammo to Julies parents, to be induced.  It is important to get the babies out so that Julie doesn't get an infection. 
It is now about 7:00PM on Christmas eve and we are still waiting for the drugs to take effect. 
Both of us are doing well and we know that even though this is and incredibly hard thing to deal with, this is all part of Gods much larger plan and while we may not understand it all has a purpose. 
We wish you all a merry Christmas with your families and we covet your prayers in the coming days!!!
Justin, Julie, and Emerson