This time of year is a precious time for me. I love the month long focus on the birth of Christ. Our Pastor has had some amazing messages this month which have really given me a fresh and new way of reading about the birth of my savior.

This year, things have been kind of crazy with Erin's surgeries. Nothing has been our "normal" holiday or break. But before I go into anything, I had some wonderful news on Sam that I wanted to share. For the past 2 years, Sam has really been focusing on the military. He has a goal to attend West Point or the Naval Academy. It is a very high goal, but one he is very serious about. Sam has faced so much rejection and disappointments that it has been hard for me at times to watch. West Point has a Summer Leaders Seminar that juniors can apply to attend. Not everyone is accepted into the Seminar. It is a wonderful way for a young man or woman to be able to experience West Point. 50% of the candidates who are accepted to the Summer Leaders Seminar are invited to attend West Point. Of those 50%, 45% accept the invitation. Sam just received an invitation to attend the Seminar. He was very, very excited. We are very proud of him and are praying that he can go forward with receiving a senators nomination, pass the physical, and have everything in place to be accepted into West Point. We also are hoping that he can do the same for the Naval Academy as he begins to narrow down and figure out what God's plan is for his life.

As for Erin, the shoulder surgery has not been an easy one! In fact, it has been very hard to watch. She was in more pain then I have ever seen her in. For 3 days, the oxycodone (a very strong pain medicine) did not touch the pain. I think much of the problem is that she can not adjust her body to be comfortable simply because her right leg is in a brace and she can not move easily....even to sit down or move back in a seat. She has slept in a recliner (nearly straight up) for 5 days. Yesterday was the first day that I finally saw a light at the end of this tunnel. For the first time, she ranked her pain at a 4. For the first 3 days, the pain never went below an 8. There were 2 nights when I watched tears streaming down her cheeks because the pain was so intense. For me, that was very difficult. Erin has a higher tolerance of pain then anyone I know. For her to cry, killed me.

Elizabeth, Ri, Erin and I all spent the first night at my in-laws. My brother and his family had been with us. The night before surgery, my neice spent all night throwing up. I made a decision not to take Erin back to our house. If the flu was there, I couldn't risk Erin getting it. I couldn't imagine having the stomach flu at the same time of recovering from shoulder surgery! The first night, I was up with Erin until around 3:00am. She finally fell asleep. At 4:00am, Elizabeth woke me up and was restless for a good hour and a half and then began telling me her belly hurt. I wanted to cry! I was avoiding the flu, and all of a sudden I imagined Elizabeth had it (though she had had it 2 weeks earlier). By 9:00am, her belly didn't hurt anymore and she was totally fine the rest of the day! But I had only had a couple of hours of sleep (if that). By that evening, I was exhausted and not happy with the fact that Ri and Elizabeth were with me. Mark came to take them home, but Elizabeth was clingy and crying not to leave. I was angry, but gave in and told her that wasn't allowed to wake me up. She agreed. Emily and the boys came and planned on taking the little ones to the zoo that night to see the lights. But Sam couldn't get there until 7:30. By the time they would have gotten to the zoo, it would have been near closing. Emily begged Elizabeth to come home with her. We tried everything to get her to go, but she wouldn't budge. I gave in again, but wasn't thrilled about it. I couldn't figure out why she was having such a hard time leaving me. She was more then willing to go to the zoo with Emily and go home with her after the zoo, but once the zoo was out of the picture, she was not about to go home with anyone.

So, when it was time for bed, I laid with her in the bed until she fell asleep. She was fine and happy. I went into the room Erin was in and crawled into bed. I was just laying there watching Erin in pain. My mother-in-law was in the room that Elizabeth was in and heard her making noises. She got up and checked on her and thought she was having a nightmere. She came in and told me. I got up and went to comfort her only to find her body trembling all over and her limbs stiffened. She was having a seizure! I couldn't believe it. It had been over 2 years since her last seizure. I grabbed her and held her close to me while Mamaw got a cool wash cloth. She felt a little warm but not much. Her teeth were clenched and her lips trembling as if she was freezing. The rest of her body trembled and shook. She curled up against my body in a fetal position and continued for a good 5 mintues or so. I kept talking to her and rubbing down her head with the wash cloth. We took her temp under the arm and it was only 99.1. It took a few minutes for her to come to enough to start crying "mommy". By the time she opened her eyes a little, her temp was over 101. under the arm. I didn't take it by mouth because she couldn't stop grinding her teeth. Her body continued to shake off and on for the next 20 minutes or so (not in a seizure, but just jerking off and on). We called Emily (who had left only 20 minutes earlier - can you imagine if she had actually gone with Emily?). We asked her to come back with meds and to be with Erin so that I could be with Elizabeth all night. I couldn't have Elizabeth in the same room as Erin, not knowing what was causing the fever. By the morning, Elizabeth was totally fine, no fever and no indications of sickness of any kind.

All I could do was say "God has a funny sense of humor". And then recognize my selfishness and bitterness. I am so thankful that she had insisted on staying with me! If Mark had taken her, she would have had a seizure while in bed and Mark would have never heard her (not that that is a bad thing.... but it might have been very difficult for Mark to have found her in the middle of the seizure). If Emily and been able to take them to the zoo, she might have had a seizure at the zoo. If she had taken her home, she WOULD have had the seizure in the car while Emily was driving.

So... as I have written over and over.... never a dull moment at the Miller home!!!

Hello to everyone. Sorry for the lack of updates...again. ONce again, as if this is news to you, my life has been taken over and things are crazy. Emily and Erin both made it home last week. Emily left school early so that she could be with Papaw for his surgery. He had come major surgery and she wanted to see him before he went under. He did GREAT and has blown all of us away with his recovery! Both Erin and Emily hit major snow storms on their trip home. But both arrived home without any problems (just much later then expected). Emily got home and ended up in bed for 2-3 days with a horrible cold; I suspect more from exhaustion then anything else.

Erin got home in the evening and we were at the orthopedic center by 6:00 the next morning. She had her first surgery that morning and we were home again by 10:00am. The surgery went well. The doctor said she needs to stop tearing her meniscus (with a huge smile on his face - knowing that there is no way of stopping her nor stopping a tear from happening). Evidently she doesn't have much meniscus left. If she keeps tearing it, she is looking at arthritis setting in. As for the patella tendonosis, he said her knee was in pretty bad shape. He went in and cleaned it up. He said she did well and he seemed happy with the surgery. I am praying that it relieves her pain. She is in a brace that nearly covers her whole leg. She is on crutches, but has to be off them by Wednesday in order to be allowed to have her shoulder surgery. Today is the first day she has put any weight on it. She is feeling ok, but hesitant to push it so quickly today. She plans on trying to walk some without crutches tomorrow.

She is not going back to Houghton for the Spring Semester. Instead, she is going to take online courses at Columbus State and then transfer back to Houghton in the fall. There just isn't way she can manage everything; physical therapy, showers, and more surgery. We did alot of thinking and came to the conclusion that she would be better being here. After experiencing the surgery and watching her, I am confident that we made the right choice. I asked the doctor what he thought and he assured me that we had made the right decision.

Well, I am very busy right now. My niece and nephew are here with us. We are heading out the door soon.

Five years ago, in October, we received this picture of our little girl:



Five years, on December 5th, our little girl was placed in our arms. This is a video of that day (the first 5 mintues are of Elizabeth's gotcha day. The 2nd half is Ri's.


This is our first family picture:











Five years ago, our family was in China. We were sharing our first days with our daughter, Elizabeth. She was 10 1/2 months old. On December 5, 2005, she became our child. It was an amazing day for all of us. Our life has been more fulfilled and much more blessed because of her. I can hardly believe that 5 years have gone buy already.

We have watched her grow leaps and bounds. It is so hard to describe all the changes that we have seen in her. I wish I could put it all into words. Our little girl is growing up. Once, a little girl who became terrified when I left the room... is now jumping up and down as she waits to step onto a bus and wave goodbye to me. She still shuts down with strangers and visits her own little place when she is apprehensive about things... but oh how much she has grown and developed! She is full of life. Her imagination is amazing; often grabbing a stuffed animal or a toy figurine and carrying on an entire conversation. She loves to play with animals though she is beginning to let go of the stuffed animals and is now focusing on littlest pet shop figurines. I even caught her playing with a Mulan Barbie doll. Wow - now that is a change! She still enjoys the leapster and will sit through ANY cartoon I let her. If I do not monitor her TV time, she would sit there all day. She is discovering the joy of having friends and has excitedly announced with whom she will marry. She has asked over and over if she can marry Kyle (from school) because he says that she is her girlfriend and he is her boyfriend. Wow - never thought I would have to have the "boyfriend" conversation at the age of 5!!!! So, I have shared with her the rules of dating (not allowed until you are 16) and the fact she can not date/marry someone who does not know Jesus (of which she went straight to school and asked Kyle if he knows Jesus). It may be a long road that we face.... filled with lots of boys chasing my girl (and, as I am beginning to discover - filled with lots of boys that she may be chasing as well!).

As for her health, we are truly blessed. We have discovered what I knew was possible. I thought about the day we recieved the referral and how we prayed for a healthy little girl. I remember thinking that we would at least know that she was healthy but always be reminded that anything could happen and that we would love her despite any health issues. But I knew that she was a "healthy" child and not a special needs child. I was happy about that.

But God has a way of reminding me that HE is in control and He has a plan. I originally didn't want to adopt a special needs child because I wanted a healthy child. But it never set well with me. I kept thinking that at any time, my children who were born healthy could end up with some disease or some injury that could effect them forever. I felt guilty for wanting a healthy child (just like I felt guilty praying for a healthy child during pregnancy and even saying "I don't care if it is a boy or girl, just healthy". What... what would I have done if one of my kids had not been "healthy" when they were born? Would I have loved them less? Oh the silly and stupid things we say at times.

Well, Elizabeth has ended up to be our special needs child. And there is not one thing about her that bothers me or makes me love her any less. I am so thankful for her and for the lessons God teaches me through her life.

Well, I am realizing that I am rambling on and on. I praise God for my little girl and for choosing us to be her family. We are blessed beyond words.

I would post pictures, but I am having a hard time finding my camera that I use to transfer my pictures onto the computer. When I do, I will post.

It has been awhile since I last posted. Thanksgiving has come and gone. The girls have both been home and are back in school. We thoroughly enjoyed having them home with us again. Our house is full of life when they are around. Mark and I are still learning to adjust to the coming and going of the older 2. We don't get a lot of time with the entire family together anymore. Even when we do, the dynamics are different. I think there was only one night when we had all of us together and even during that one night, Erin's boyfriend shared it with us. We didn't mind, though. He is a wonderful young man who treats all of the kids well. We all enjoy him. Even though it was only one night, it was one of the best I can remember.

We spent Thanksgiving with Mark's family. It was such a nice day. I love spending a day with the entire family around. My parents always travel to Florida for Thanksgiving. Both my brother and sister live there. It has been nice because Mark and I don't have to worry about which family we spend which holiday with. It has been very easy on us.

News on the kids.... Well.. when Emily was home, she raised up and hit her head on a shelf. Evidentally she hit it very hard. That was on Saturday night. Sunday, she spent as much time as she could sleeping. SHe had a horrible headache and a very tender head to the touch. We all felt it was just from the hit. Sleeping really isn't something we concern ourselves with. Emily and Erin are both power-nappers. Monday, she had planned on leaving for school. She was excited to spend the morning with me. She woke up around 8:00 to say goodbye to the kids. Then she laid down on the couch. The entire morning, she slept. I was a bit concerned, but felt if she was that tired, she needed to sleep (especially since she would be driving nearly 8 hours). She kept waking up and telling me she was sorry, but she was just so tired. He head was still in a great deal of pain, but she insisted it was just because of hitting it on the shelf. At noon, I said goodbye. By 1:30, she was calling me telling me that she didn't know what was wrong but she was fighting with all she had to stay awake. She stopped and got caffeine. She was stopping by a friends an 2 hours, I was relieved because I knew she could rest there or they could take her to urgent care or something. Long story short... she struggled staying awake for the entire drive, got to school safely and went to bed. She failed to tell me that she was dizzy, nauseous, and shaking a LOT more then usual (she told me she was shaking). The next day, she called me from the nurses office. The nurse wanted her to go to the ER. Once again, Mark and I were faced with decisions to be made 8 hours from our daughter. The doctor was not in, but called and told the nurse to just let her rest one more day. In the meantime, the nurse was very insistent that she would advice considering the ER, but the doctor was the boss. Em's roommate called and told me that she couldn't walk up stairs without holding onto something and when she laid down, her legs shook uncontrollably. Her head was throbbing, there was a "mushy" spot behind her ear and it was swollen, and she felt as if she was going to throw up all the time. So... a dilemma! Do we go with the doctor who said wait (but never saw her) or with the nurse and the scared roommate? So I called my doctor and got his advice. His was to send her to the ER. So we did. She went through a CAT scan and the conclusion was: concussion. So the first doctor was right... rest and sleep it off. As of yesterday, all symptoms were the same. She isn't any better, but she isn't any worse. I am so thankful that we know for sure there is no bleeding internally. I am so thankful that the next semester is her final one at BBC!

As for Erin... well.. that is another story. They won their game in Indiana. We LOVED watching her play. She did an amazing job. She scored the first goal in a very, very tough game. They made it to Nationals and traveled to Alabama. She was able to come home (Emily picked her up). We met the team in Ohio and put her on the bus to Alabama. They played their first game Tuesday. It was very exciting. We were able to listen to it. Due to technical difficulties, the video was not working. She gave it all she had (the team did too), but they lost by one. My heart ached for her! Our team dominated nearly the entire game... but that is how it falls sometimes. Anyway... they headed back to Houghton Tuesday night but stopped in Louisville Ky for sleep. I was able to make an appointment with the doctor for her knees. We have been trying to see him for the past month. If we couldn't get her in then, we would have to wait until Dec 29th just for the evaluation. Then we would have to try to fit things in before she went back to school. As it panned out, it was a huge blessing for her to be able to be seen yesterday. I met the bus on an exit near our home and grabbed her. It worked out perfectly. We saw the doctor and found out that she has a torn meniscus (again) so she is facing surgery in that knee. But ... worse and far more complicated.. is the issue she has in both knees. She has patella tendonosis in both! Normally, the doctor would take platelets our of Erin's blood and inject them into the tendons in hopes to promote healing. But.. Erin's are in or near the "severe" case. The doctor came in with a smile on his face and said "do you want to see the MRI?". Then as we walked out of the room, he looked at another patient and said "these are fugly". I guess he was excited because they were cool to look at. He showed us were the tendons have huge amounts of scarring from tears. Behind the patella, there should be a completely empty black space (between the patella and the tendons. In Erin's case, the first couple of views are black, but as he began to rotate the knee (on the MRI), the completely black spot began to show white "hairlike" images. As he further moved, the entire spot began to fill up with the image. It was that way in both knees. He looked at me and said "she isn't faking it, mom". She is in A LOT of pain. He confirmed it all! So... the answer isn't simple or even at the point of trying the injections. The answer is to make in incision in the front of the knee, cut the tendons, go behind them and scrape it clean, bleed the patella (I guess the bleeding helps for healing of the tendons), then sew the tendons back up and then be in a straight leg brace for 1 month and therapy for about 6 months total.

Well, did you catch that she will be in a straight leg brace for 1 month? And did you catch that this is in both knees? And did you catch that it is a 6 month recovery period? Well.. with soccer and school... we are on a pretty tight schedule. AND.. if you remember, she has to have her shoulder worked on. Let's talk about crutches and a shoulder that is completely immobile?! This will get tricky! But what a blessing that we can get it figured out and started now.. and before the shoulder surgery (otherwise she wouldn't be able to use crutches for the first 4-5 days that he wants her on it.

So, at this point, here is the plan: Surgery on the meniscus tear and the incision to repair the tendonosis of the same knee on December 16th (if he can schedule it then and she can get out of her final exam for that date. That will give her 6 days of being able to use the crutches before her shoulder surgery. At that point, she will have surgery to repair the shoulder and will be in a sling (unable to use that arm at all) for 6 weeks or so (total recover - 4 months). She will be home and will not have to return back to school until the 10th of January. She will go back in a brace and will have to deal with her room on the 3rd floor (elevator not working) and the ice and snow of Houghton (carrying books). If she hadn't been seen yesterday, she would not have that long break at home to recover at least a partial amount before having to face all that. 2 months after the first surgery (sometime in February), he wants to repair the 2nd knee. That means a trip back home and send her back to school dealing with a great deal of discomfort and facing the same thing. He has to wait 2 months so that the first knee can heal enough to be able to deal with supporting her body with the other knee in a straight leg brace.

And all this needs to be done so that by soccer season next year, she can be ready (as ready as possible) to play. The doctor is amazing. He is the doctor that works on the knee of the CREW soccer team. So we hate to have anyone else work on her. It will just not be a lot of fun for her. It may mean we run into issues with her being in New York, but I think the doctor will work with us as much as possible. So.. prayer is the only thing I can think of. Please pray for her body, her surgeries, her healing.

Erin ended up taking my van back to school. She is only there 2 weeks before coming home for Christmas break. It seemed the most logical choice in order to get her to be able to see the doctor yesterday. But.. when she began heading back, there were snow storms that the entire route seemed to be bracing for. It was snowing as she left. Time wise, she would be traveling through Erie at the exact time they were expecting 4-8 inches of snow. And... she would be doing it alone... at night. It was a stressful night for us. But God is faithful. I had a lot of people praying for her. She never faced any real amounts of snow and only ended up adding an extra 1/2 hour-45 minutes to her trip due to traveling at a slower rate. God is so faithful. I am confident He will be faithful with her surgeries as well.