Here comes Baby Cummings

We are excited to announce that I am pregnant again!  I am 12 weeks along and my due date is October 9th.  We have already had 4 ultrasounds and  the baby has measured perfectly and had a strong heartbeat every time.  It has been a hard 1st trimester, but Praise the Lord, Hallelujah, we have made it to 12 weeks!!  I feel like I have been pregnant FOR.EV.ER!   It has been the longest 3 months of my life and I thought I would never reach this point.  I definitely have a LONG ways to go, but 12 weeks is a big milestone for me.   At my ultrasound last week, I saw the baby so clearly and he/she was moving around and it was very surreal.  I started to cry and the nurse was so sweet to me as she knew I had 2 previous miscarriages.  I felt that she took her time and allowed me to take in the moment of seeing the baby that far along.  I had gone to a specialist which was a wonderful experience for me and was released from the specialist at 10 weeks and now I am going to my regular doctor.  My specialist put me on extra folic acid, progesterone, and a blood thinner just as a precaution if I had a blood clotting issue.  Justin had to give me a shot every night and it was miserable!  I am usually not afraid of needles and don't get anxious at all about shots as they have never bothered me.  But this one was rough.  Some nights it would barely hurt at all, and some nights it would hurt so badly I wanted to scream out in pain (okay, some nights I actually did do just that)!  I think the anticipation was the worst not knowing if this was going to be a bad one or a not so bad one.  But Praise the Lord, I am now officially off all the medicine except the folic acid. 

We told some family and friends right away as we really needed the support and prayer.  We are so blown away by how many people were praying for us.  We received e-mails, texts and phone calls asking how we were doing and telling us that we were being prayed for everyday.  My parents Sunday School class even had a prayer time for us as well.  We were so thankful for the encouragement and support we received. Justin received a few texts last week stating that they were praying for us and Justin turned to me and said "do you know how many people are praying for us right now?"  It was amazing to see the body of Christ and those who don't even know us that well praying for us fervently.  We were beyond blessed.  We didn't make a point to bombard people with too many concerns or requests, and it was amazing to see how much we were prayed for without even asking.  And though I was definitely filled with lots of tears, fears and anxiety, the Lord has given me such peace in the midst of those difficult moments and I know it was part of people praying for me.  Thank you to all who walked through this first 3 months with us and battled in prayer with us!

Though I am technically out of the riskiest months, I know I still have a long ways to go and still really appreciate your prayers.  Here are a few requests that I wanted to share if you feel led to pray:

• Please pray that we would trust the Lord and give all fear and anxiety to Him. 
• Pray that the Lord would be glorified through this pregnancy and we would draw nearer to Him through this time. 
•  Please pray that the baby will continue to grow and be healthy. 
• Pray that we would allow ourselves to be excited and enjoy this special time. It has been hard to get too excited as we were trying to guard our hearts but I feel it is important for us to be as excited as if this was our 1st pregnancy
• Pray that the Lord would give us wisdom throughout the pregnancy

Anytime I would express a concern or fear to Justin, He was gently respond with "remember, we believe in a sovereign God who loves us".  It was just what I needed to hear.  He can't promise me that our baby will be okay, but He can promise me that God is good, He loves us, and He is sovereign and no matter what happens, that will never change.  It definitely helps to be reminded of that in the midst of my hardest moments and I'm sure will be reminded again during hard moments in the future.

Here is a picture of our baby at 9 weeks, I'm already so in love!

Thank you all for your prayers for us and for joining us on this journey!  I hope to post more about my 1st trimester soon so stay tuned....

Pics of the new home!

Well, we have been in our house a month now and feels like much longer than that!  We are loving our new home and thankful for the extra space.  I'm still getting used to the commute, but so far it hasn't been too bad.  Justin also got a new job where he works three 12 hour shifts a week.  He leaves the house at 5:30 in the morning so he's not in traffic and doesn't get home until 8pm.  It's super long days, but we are thankful for the days he has off during the week.  Now he has much more time to study for grad school on his days off, instead of having to study in the evenings when he gets home from work.  The hardest part is not knowing his schedule ahead of time as I'm a big planner.  Oh well, it's only for a season.  Okay, now back to the house.  Building a house was SUPER fun, but also very stressful.  That pretty much sums up house hunting in general, fun and stressful!  It was really fun picking out everything for the house together and that was by far the fun part.  I would say besides picking out the lot, house and what goes inside, Justin pretty much handled everything else, thank goodness!  He would come out to check on the house often, e-mail the sale associate about 3 times a day (okay, maybe not that many times) and have contact with the builder, lender, and our realtor.  He was so on top of things.  I know we said multiple times, "I just can't wait until we are moved in and this part of it is over".  And here we are!  And now looking back, I don't even remember what was so stressful about it.  It's like what women say about giving birth and pregnancy, they have amnesia and forget how painful and miserable the experience was because it's such a blessing and worth it!  So now, here is a short tour of our home:  

Kitchen

Living Room

View from the Kitchen, I love the openness.  The french doors lead to the study

Entry to the Master Bedroom

Entry to the extra bedrooms, bathroom, utility room, and hall closest

Entry way to the home

Part of the patio and backyard

Thanks for stopping by for the tour!  We just bought a new bed so we now have an extra bedroom for guests!  Please stop by Casa de Cummings at anytime!  

We moved to the burbs

The past month has been so crazy, hence the reason I haven't blogged in over a month!  We seem to have a lot going on right now, one of them being we have moved to our new house!  Who knew how much work it would be to build a house, move and get everything set up.  I'm exhausted just thinking about it.  I told Justin we aren't moving again for at least 10 years, so we're staying put, unless the Lord calls us somewhere else.  Moving from just inside the loop of Houston to the suburbs has been quite the change for us, and let me just say we love it!  Here are the top 5 things we've learned so far from going from an apartment in the city to a house in the burbs:

1.  It's so quiet!!  We had no idea how loud our apartment was until we moved to a house.  We lived right by 1-10 and 610 highways, so of course it was very noisy but we just got used to it.  We don't have any back neighbors and live on a cul de sac, so there is so much privacy and it's so quiet when we wake up in the mornings.  We can hear the birds chirp and it's just so peaceful.

2.  Neighbors are so nice!  We have loved meeting our neighbors so far.  The day we moved out, our neighbors beside us came over and with plates of lunch meat, cheese, crackers, coke, tea, paper goods, etc, to welcome us to the neighborhood.  It was so nice!  Sadly, in our apartment, it seems that everyone is on the go and busy and we only met the neighbor across from the hall from us.

3.  We can go for walks so easily!  In our apartment, there was no where to take walks or run, so we would drive to memorial park.  Though I do miss Memorial park, there is something peaceful about being able to walk outside our house and walk around the neighborhood.  It's also so quiet and you're not dodging other runners or trying to compete with other people who are passing you (you know you do that too!).

4.  More space!  This is pretty obvious, but it's so nice to have more space.  Going from one bedroom to 3 bedroom plus study has been great.  Now we just have to get the rooms furnished...but that will take time.

5.  Having a backyard!  We love having a small porch and a backyard.  We just finished getting the yard sodding and landscaped and now we just need some patio furniture so we can enjoy it.

And for a bonus:

6.  Cheaper!  Yes, our mortgage payment is actually cheaper than our rent payment in our apartment.  Isn't that crazy?  It's all about location!

We are thankful for our cozy little house.  We still have a lot of work to do as far as decorating and furnishing goes, but I'm hoping to post some pics soon since many people have asked me to.