Our "Wonder Years"

This post is about a month late, but not forgotten. On May 15th Josh graduated from law school. A few hours later, we jumped in our Suburban and with a trailer in tow we made a 39 hour drive in 60 hours with only 2 major stops. (We HAD to visit the Derr family in Dallas one evening and we spent a whole day in Colorado with Dad & Donna.) This drive gave Josh and I the opportunity to reflect on the events of the last 3 years. They were challenging, but not bad because we have learned so much. In the last 3 years we have:

*Sold our home and moved across the country.
*Sold our beloved mini-van for a Suburban so that we had more room for travel. (little did we know it would be full within a year!)
*Gave up Josh's good job for student loans and a new life of poverty :)
*Sent our oldest child off to first grade for a whole day!
*Traveled to visit Kevin in Buffalo and visited Niagara Falls and some of Canada.
*Found out we were expecting.
*Found out we were expecting twin girls.
*Visited Kev & Ronny for Thanksgiving and were able to see Palmyra and the sacred grove.
*Finished the first year of Law school.
*Gave birth to our twin girls and discovered they had Down Syndrome.
*Had our oldest diagnosed with ADD.
*Spent most of the summer with Kim & kids in UT and Josh doing an internship in Toledo.
*Drove from UT to NY to see the Palmyra pageant.
*Sent our oldest 2 children off to school all day (K & 2nd grades).
*Started learning about life with therapy and special needs.
*Had Josh's mom move in with us for 9 months.
*Spent most of February with our twins in the hospital for RSV (including Abigail in the ICU for 4 days).
*Rushed our 3 year old to the hospital after a seizure in the grocery store and learned that he has problems with his lungs--resp. airway disease.
*Baptized our oldest son.
*Finished our 2nd year of law school and packed up a family of 8 and moved across the country again.
*Met Josh's parents in Key West and enjoyed a mini-vacation with them.
*Josh's "perfect" summer internship was cancelled because of rumors that the firm couldn't make payroll.
*Discovered that Andrew had several physical problems including SPD and developmental delay along with a growth issue.
*Felt impressed that we needed to homeschool.
*Started PT & OT for 3 kids in addition to speech therapy for the twins and horseback riding therapy for Andrew.
*Watched our twins learn to sit, scoot, crawl, and finally stand up on furniture.
*Visited Sea World, Epcot, & Magic Kingdom on temple trips or when family came to visit.
*Went on a fan boat ride through the everglades and visited them several times to see gators.
*Celebrated 10 years of marriage.
*Found out we are expecting a baby boy September 1st.
*Took a trip to Cape Canaveral to see a launch and visit the Kennedy Space Center.
*Finally convinced a doctor after months of illness to get our twins surgery.
*Somehow survived recovering babies, packing and finals.

Although our lives have been very busy, we have been blessed beyond words with every need being met in some way by our Heavenly Father. It has been such a blessing to have met so many amazing people and have felt so many prayers on our behalf during this time. We sure hope that life will become a little more low-maintenance from here on out!