Good McLean Fun

Levi says thanks! 2 weeks post op Day after We had so many people praying for us, and for Levi, that I wouldn't have been surprised if Levi had been miraculously healed overnight.  That, however, wasn't part of God's design. The blessings that came our way were surely Him though, working through prayers. Please be warned, I use the word "blessing" a lot in this post, which may become redundant to the reader, but that is the best word to use in this story...no pseudonyms for this one. I won't be telling people we were super lucky, or very fortunate, and I won't be giving credit to fate, or the universe. This story is about choosing to recognize blessings from God.  So for those wondering how it all went down, here is what your prayers got us: From the moment of the diagnosis, I felt peace. I drove up to Orlando with Levi by myself, having spent some time on the internet the day before googling "abnormal infant skull"...

I've never been one for too many details. I hope I'm known as a go-with-the-flow type of woman, friend, wife, mom...one who rolls with the punches. (I'm working on my epitaph, so far I've got "Danielle McLean, proven pelvis, rolled with the punches.) Truth is it's easy for me because compared to some, I haven't really had a lot of punches to roll with. As I've said many times, my life is beautiful. So I don't take a lot of effort in the planning of minor details. That is not how I've been wired which, it turns out, is fantastic, because I have a bunch of kids now and details get lost in the mess.  Sure, I have some general and unambitious "plans" for my life, such as: 1. Get my own bedroom.  Check. (freshman year of college, first time having my own room) 2. Graduate from college. Check. (UCF, c/o 2005) 3. Marry my high school sweetheart  a humble, funny, handsome, strong, kind, honest, pre-screened and pre-selected by God, most pat...

Being a mom is the most amazing job out there, and yet the pressure and daily self-induced guilt that you are just not good enough can be so heavy and unrelenting , it can break even the strongest woman. Like, say, um...I dunno...me.  The twins at 2.5 are showing some progress in their "expressive language", but haven't reached a vocabulary explosion I was hoping to see by now.  They say more now than ever before, but never sentences, not even stringing 2 words together. There's still a WHOLE lot of grunting and whining going on, and it's been slowly eating away at my heart. I see other two year olds, or ONE year olds, speaking more than the boys, and it is hard not to compare. In my gut I know they will be fine, every child is different, but by this age both Luke and Juliette were much more vocal.  But their limited communication isn't the only area I find myself questioning my parenting skills. I find myself expecting less of the twins because they don...