Isn't it Amazing?

Hello all!  Hope you are enjoying fall - I sure am💗😍😊

Over the weekend I got to go do something I always "think" about doing in the fall, but never seem to get around to it - I went "tromping in the woods".  Most of the family (the baby is away at Purdue) went to Lincoln State Park and the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial.

We hiked through the woods, around the lake, climbed up the fire tower, and visited various landmarks of President Lincoln's childhood.  It was great!  Then we went to Denny's and I had pumpkin pecan pancakes - what a day!!

You can't be in nature and not marvel at God's creation, but what really got me thinking - God Works in Mysterious Ways - was thinking about the past.

We walked around the Lincoln's original cabin site, the farm, and down to the spring where they drew their water.  Walking ancient paths you can't help but put yourself into their shoes.  What would it have been like to be them?  How would our family have lived if we were living in those times?  What would daily life be like?

As we saw where the Lincolns had to walk to draw their daily water I commented to our daughter, "that would have been your job" and her older brother laughed - he didn't think she'd have been able to do that.

That got me thinking, isn't it amazing how God works!  I told my husband that if we had lived in the 1800's our daughter, Bailey, probably wouldn't have been alive to carry the water...

When I as pregnant with our oldest child, Tyler, I was put on bedrest because of my elevated blood pressure and puffiness (I looked like the Pillsbury Dough Boy!!).  I never developed full blown preeclampsia, but would I have survived the delivery back in those days?  Only God knows that!

And even if I did survive, Bailey (my 2nd born) most likely wouldn't have survived her first week.  She was very little when she was born and did not have the fat reserves needed to keep her going - she used more energy trying to breastfeed than she was getting!  Her first night she stopped breathing.  Thank God she was in the nursery where they noticed and got her breathing again!  But in the 1800's that wouldn't have happened.  She was also hospitalized for jaundice and even with supplemental feedings she didn't gain any weight for a few weeks.  So there's no way she would have been the one carrying the water for us if we had lived in the 1800's.

But here in the 2000's she's alive and healthy!  A college graduate still looking for a job whose household chores consist of emptying the dishwasher and walking down the lane to get the mail! 😂 But that's just for now, she has great things in her future.

This makes me think of one of my favorite verses, Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

Bailey might be an Esther - born "for a time such as this" -  because God has a plan for her!  That's why we're here in this time period where modern medicine could keep us both alive so we can fulfill what God has planned for us!