Just the beginning...

Well, here goes nothing!  Since I have recently found myself with quite a bit of extra time on my hands, I thought I would dive into the world of blogging.  I don't know if any one out there is interested or even cares (except my husband) but our life is about to get more interesting and it is difficult to keep in touch with everyone.  Let me start with why I have the time to do this.
Today I am 20 weeks 3 days pregnant. And yes, I count every day!  It has been a very difficult first half, so we earn those days!  We knew I would have problems before  I was even pregnant because I have an autoimmune disorder that makes my blood clot too much. Therefore, I have been taking shots since the beginning, every day.  I also had a large subchorionic hemorrhage very early on that worried the doctors as well as us.   God answered our prayers and the hemorrhage re-absorbed on its own and everything seemed to be going well.  Our doctor encouraged us that this was possible but not likely to happen again.  So, just as I was starting to feel more at peace about everything, I ended up in the ER in the middle of the night with excessive bleeding.  We couldn't believe Baby Johns was completely unaware of all the drama going on around him/her!  This time the subchorionic hemorrhage was fairly far away from baby and since I was about 17 weeks at the time, our baby was big enough to handle the ordeal.  Praise God!  So, needless to say, I was ordered on bed rest and here I lay.
It has been quite an adjustment but I know God knows best.  I am ashamed to say that I had the feeling early on that God was prompting me to quit working when I was having problems and I did not listen, so He did something that really caught my attention!  My family and Chris have been great!  And now Chris realizes how many little things I do around the house.  The dogs love me being home.  It's just our cat's schedule that I  have thrown off and she retaliated in the worst way at first.  But I think we have come to a mutual, unspoken agreement as of late.
Through this entire journey we have experienced God's grace more than ever.  I have really struggled with handing everything over to God, but He is gently teaching me every day how to do this.  There are several verses I have really clung to over the past few months. Here are a few:

"The Lord will perfect that which concerns me;"- Psalm 138:8

"For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind."-2 Timothy 1:7

So, we continue to hold on to the hope we have because of Him.  We rejoice because we have our "big" sonogram tomorrow where we find out if we are having a boy or girl.  But, of course I am worried about the other part of the sonogram where they evaluate everything else and make sure everything looks ok. So, your prayers would be appreciated!