Prayers

I have been meaning to post for several days, and have some cute pictures of the kids to blog, but we are back in Iowa today and those will have to wait. Well, this week our friends and family have been dealt some difficult cards. Lately it really does seem like we have had lots of trying news, and this week has not been much better. First off we are back in Iowa to celebrate the life of Josh's grandma Shirley. If there was one woman I ever thought could defy death, it would have been her, but it was her time. Many of you will remember her as the grandma who traveled with us to Jamaica for our wedding about 6 years ago. The last few years had been rough for grandma, as she has battled cancer and other illnesses, and was recently told that her cancer was back and had metastasized to several places in her body. She chose not to do further treatment, and to be honest, was probably not strong enough for much more. She passed over the weekend so today we will be attending the wake, and the funeral tomorrow. She was a quirky, loving, caring, funny woman, and as Josh said it best in the car last night, "a fancy lady" who will be sadly missed. The world is one less a wonderful woman this week.


Additionally, yesterday a good friend of Josh and I's had a large tumor removed from his brain. Although the surgery went well, the findings were not what we had hoped for. It was discovered that our dear friend Lane has brain cancer, and he needs every single prayer that you can muster. He is only 28 years old, and his wife Rachel, an amazing friend, is pregnant and they also have a one year old little boy, Kamden. They have a blog, linked to ours, if you want to read about his situation, but more than anything: Please pray for Lane. Words are hard to describe how we are feeling about this, but we are hopeful that their strong faith will heal Lane and will carry him, his wife, child, his parents and siblings, other family, friends through this difficult journey as he begins his battle with cancer.