Tyson Hugh Hooper

Tyson Hugh Hooper
Our son, Tyson Hugh Hooper, was born with coarctation of the aorta, hypoplastic arch, and a transitional avsd. His first open heart surgery reconstructed his aorta and was on day 9 of life. His second open heart repair was not anticipated to be needed until two or three years of age. Ty had other plans. We spent the vast majority of his first 3 months of life at Vanderbilt as he went into heart failure and was diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension. As a result, the medical team concluded that he needed the repair much sooner than usually recommended, and at just shy of 3 months old Ty underwent his second life saving open heart surgery. God has already worked so many miracles in Ty's life and the life of our family and we know he is using our story. Because of this, we are grateful for Ty's special heart and feel beyond blessed that God chose us to travel this road. We ask for prayers as Ty continues to heal. We are praying for a full recovery and life without restrictions for Ty. We are praying for God to use our family and Ty for His glory.

Thank you to each and every person who supports us through prayer, giving, or just by loving on our family! We are humbled and blessed by all of the ways the Lord is providing for us and know that he is using Ty and his story to do great things!

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Beach Babes...

For the first time since Bentlee was three (six year ago), we took a "family" as in, all most of us, vacation! 

I started scheming this about a year ago and mentioned off and on, planting the seed of thought throughout the year.  When I got the go ahead and we were all able to find dates that worked (shocking and miraculous, I tell you), I was thrilled!

My sister and brother-in-law couldn't come with us.  For one, they aren't big beach people, but more importantly, they had a mare expected to foal around the time of our vacation.  They wanted to be there, of course, and they were able to witness the birth of an adorable little colt! 

So, we missed them, but the rest of us (My Mom and Dad, Brother, Sister-in-law, nieces, the girls, Chris, and myself) loaded up and headed to St. Augustine, FL. 

It was a great trip!  Chris, the girls, and I went down a day early and enjoyed a long 8-night vacation!  What a treat!  We had the first day and last day all to ourselves.

It was so fun having all the girls there to play together!  It really took the usual what-can-we-do-to-entertain-the-kids thing out of vacation, which was great! 

With cousins as playmates and extra adults to keep eyes on everyone it was a remarkably relaxing vacation! Granted, it was a far cry from the do-nothing, sit-on-the-beach-and-read-sleep vacations of my past, but it was still restful and fun!

 Of all the fun things we did and saw, the best part for me was watching the girls have such fun!

 I now know for sure that both girls are 100% beach bum... just like me!

The second best part of vacation?  We converted my not-a-beach-person husband in to an ocean-playing, wave-riding, crab-catching beach bum!  Self-proclaimed, I tell ya!  The words came out of his mouth on day two and I will never forget them!  "This is fun.  Alright... you've converted me."  Turns out he just needed to go to the beach with the right person... and to the right beach.  ;-)  We *might* just retire to a beachy town some day... just sayin'.

Many Many more beach pictures to come, but that's enough for one post!

Good night!

1 comments:

Sarah said...

You were holding out on my with the pictures! I hadn't seen a lot of these! And I'd like a copy of the one of you and mom and sarah with the girls, please!
Wish we could have come too. Next year (since we won't be expecting a foal)!