Audrey: Noble Strength

This girl is doing some amazing things this week. It may not mean anything special to anyone but Andrew and me, but watching how far this girl has come these past 14 months is just remarkable. I have often felt like whenever I start to feel discouraged or anxious about her development that God will give me just enough to find hope and peace once again. It is not necessarily a hope that things will turn out exactly how I want, rather that God is still working in her precious little life.

Exactly one month ago (you can click here to read that post), I was feeling very overwhelmed by so many unknowns in my life...the unknown of how much longer before our home sells, the unknown of everything with Audrey...just simply a feeling of being unsettled. Does that make sense? Faith is such a difficult thing. I feel like I put my faith on a timeline. Basically if God doesn't "work things out" for me in what I consider a reasonable amount of time, I start to feel forsaken. It is a constant spiritual cycle for me. But, I continue to be given little gifts and reasons to keep clinging to that faith. I am so thankful for God throwing me a life preserver on those days where I start to feel like I am drowning.

Audrey has made so much progress this past week. She has started getting up on all fours and rocking like she wants to crawl. She also has figured out how to get herself into a sitting position when in her crib (and she isn't using anything to pull on!). And then this evening we watched her sit up on the hardwood floors. I was beaming!! It takes a lot of abdominal strength to do that and that shows me she is getting so much stronger.

And then tonight she picked up a cheerio and tried to put it in her mouth three times. Amazing.

I felt my anxiety level go down after witnessing these amazing strides she has taken. I asked her physical therapist (we go every Monday) if she thought Audrey would be walking by age 2 and she said that is her hope. We love her therapist. Audrey was so mad at her this Monday because she was working hard with her on flexing her legs and bending her knees (Audrey is very stiff in her lower body)...but, at the end her therapist picked her up and just walked around with her for a little while and hugged and loved on her. She said she didn't want her to leave upset and start having anxiety when she would see her. I thought that was so sweet. It is going to be a celebration the day that girl takes her first steps.

Her name means Noble Strength. I'd say, she is living up to that.