A Bug She Loves!

By chance, I disovered the local Kiwanis club has an annual butterfly festival. It had been raining for days and things came up to make it difficult to go, but I told David it was REALLY important to me. He knew why and made it happen.
These pictures are from the only other butterfly festival we have ever been to. They were taken in November two years ago at the botanical garden in Tucson.

It was a good day. After a lot of hard days.

Two days before on Thanksgiving she was so miserable. The good days were cherished then and they still are in my memory. We HAD to go.
We had only been out of the hospital for about two weeks (I know I look terrible) after being there so long straight.
Sometimes I am surprised at how much we did, we really did try to take advantage of every good moment and still make her life happy. Looking at these pictures of her smiling, when I know what was going on makes me feel good. Sometimes the hard times stand out so much in my memory, funny because I hardly have any pictures of some of those really hard times. There are some big gaps, so any pictures at the time are so very precious to me.
This was the first time she was able to stand again...yes it was with assistance but we were so excited. I think she was encouraged because her cousins were there and because it was such a good day. It was almost another month before she could stand on her own again.
That's why she's sitting on the ground, she can't walk or stand. But just a few weeks before she couldn't even sit or crawl, so it was a big improvement.
This pictures makes me smile, it is SO our Natalie. Look at her personality still shining through.















Can you tell by my face how much this meant to me and how much I was enjoying it? It was so special. These kind of moments make my heart beat faster and I just try to soak it all up.
Poor Stephen was asleep for the whole thing. I was SO tempted to wake him up, it killed me that he was missing out...BUT I knew he would be crabby if we woke him up and then the rest of us wouldn't be able to enjoy it. I just had to at least take a picture of him with a butterfly. So sweet!