Just Hangin' Out!

Grandma and PaPa stop by for a special visit today after long awaiting!

I believe Dani Jo has made PaPa's day!

Hi everyone,

It seems that all we do is take pictures of our family with our newest addition. Dani Jo seems very happy and smiles all the time.

Joey and I have been blessed with 3 beautiful angels. We have had some hard times, but today our eyes were opened as we went to Tessa's memorial service. As we looked into the eyes of our dear friends Nancy & Anthony today, our hearts were broken for them. I have posted a picture of our dear friends, please say prayers for this family. They have touched our lives more than they ever know. Please pray for peace and strength for our friends.

Anthony, Nancy & Little Angel "Tessa" Woodyard
www.nancyandbaby.blogspot.com
Please go and read her story!

We thought we would post several pictures this time and post blog news later...in a nut shell Dani Jo has loved her time at home.

This is one little girl that is glad her sissy is home!

Mama Teresa says good-bye to her darlin' Dani Jo.

The Hearl Girlz share a moment together!

Dani Jo is all smiles at home!

Dani Jo enjoys her first bath at home in her new tub that Mama Nurse Teresa bought for her.

Ryan finally gets to snuggle with his girl Dani Jo.

Dani Jo really likes her new nurse Amber & I don't think that Amber minds her either.

Sweet Tessa!

Hello everyone,

Please say a special prayer for our very special friends, Nancy and Anthony Woodyard in the loss of their baby girl. Dani Jo and Tessa were room mates at Brenners for a short while. After a long fight, God called Tessa home to be with Him yesterday. Please say a prayer for her parents. Go to www.nancyandbaby.blogspot.com to read about our sweet little Tessa. We love you Tessa and we know that God has you in His arms!

Night Night...Sweet Dreams!

Home Sweet Home!

Tonight, Amanda and I are at home with all of our girls. Dani Jo is sound asleep in her crib. She came home this morning about 11:30. Thank you Michelle and the Cana Rescue Squad for bringing her home safely this morning.

We have our nursing completely staffed. Thank you Interim Healthcare. We met our 1st nurse, Michelle, today. We are very excited about her helping us take care of Dani Jo.

I'll try to post some pictures sometime tomorrow. This afternoon has been a blur. We have been very busy getting all of her equipment set up and getting the nursing all squared away.

We had several visitors today--Aunt Jenn Jenn, Whitney & Ryan, Gram Jane & Papa Dickie, Melanie & Janice, Wayne & Lake--thank you all for your visit today.

Thank you Brenner's Children's Center for all your hard work and dedication to our little baby girl. Teresa, Karen, Lori, Jake, Dr. Parsons, Brian, Erin, Michelle, Pat, the twins, and all of you (I'm sure I left several out, sorry.) Thank you so much. We never imagined when Dani Jo came to you on October 14, that she would be there for 100 days. However, if she couldn't be with us during this time, we are grateful she was with you all.

God bless each and everyone of you that prayed for our little angel and our family. Your faithful prayers will not go unrewarded. Please remember all of the other babies in Brenner's. We were blessed to be able to come home today. We left many parents still waiting for their special day to bring their angel home. One special baby we will remember is Tessa. Anthony and Nancy, we are praying for her and you all. God does not fail.

We love you all,
Joey, Amanda, Jordan, Jamie, and Dani Jo

SHES COMING HOME!!!!

Tuesday is the big day! Dani Jo is coming home! We have all 3 nurses ready to go.

I had a meeting on Wednesday with the Social Worker, the doctor and 2 nurses. I had asked to meet with them to express some feelings that we had. We were told 2 1/2 weeks ago that Dani Jo was medically ready to come home, however the doctors felt that we would get too tired and also they were afraid that Dani Jo may not be covered by insurance since all 3 nurses were not lined up at the time. This was the "assumption" by the doctor that she would not be covered.

We called our case worker at our insurance company on Tuesday of this week just to see if they would cover her if nurses weren't line up. Our case worker stated that "under no circumstances would Dani Jo "not" be covered". This was never confirmed 2 weeks ago it was just assumed. It was also said that this was explained to the social worker at the hospital last week. So we were a bit annoyed when we found this out, so I called for a meeting. I explained at the meeting that we were frustrated that Dani Jo could have possibly come home 2 weeks ago if the insurance information had been verified at that point.

I explained to all of them that I have arranged for Cana Rescue Squad to pick Dani Jo up either Monday or Tuesday. I was told that we did not have any nurses, however I explained that after talking with Amanda at Interim right before the meeting that we did have one nurse, and potentially a second, which was also explained to the social worker last week. I expressed that if Dani Jo was medically ready to come home, then I was requesting that Dani Jo's discharge be Monday or Tuesday. The transport set up for either of those days.

We have just received a phone call from Amanda at Interim with WONDERFUL news that we now have a 3rd nurse! By the 3rd week we should have 7 12's covered! God is still in control.

Please pray for us as we bring our long awaited bundle of joy home. She has been doing awesome all week. She has been smiling to all the nurses. The best news of all is that we have our sweet Dr. Parsons that will discharge Dani Jo on Tuesday. We are meeting with the Pediatric Specialists to go over her equipment on Monday morning at 10am and plan to bring her home at 9am Tuesday morning.

We just want to thank you all for your gifts, prayers, cards, calls, thoughts, and dedication towards our family in this our time of need. The road is all but over, our journey has just begun. Dani Jo has a long road ahead of her, but with our continued prayer and God's unconditional love, we will make it.

Dani Jo will not be able to have a lot of visitors throughout the winter months as she is more prone to respiratory infections due to the trach being an open airway to her lungs. As she grows and the days get warmer we hope to be able to take her out more and receive more visitors. We will continue to keep you all posted on our site with recent pics and her status. Thank you all again for your prayers. We love you all very much more than we can express!

Happy Girl!

Our girl is growing more everyday! She weighed 8lbs 3oz today! I can't believe how big she is getting. Her nurse Lori put her in her swing today and she was off the vent quite a bit. We are ready for our girl to come home.

Nurse Update:
I talked with Interim today and we have 2 nurses hired to care for Dani Jo! YEA! I want to thank Amanda and Amber and all the people at Interim for working so hard to try to hire just the right nurses for our angel. Hopefully they are going to be interviewing another nurse on Wednesday and we should know something by the end of next week. All the nurses have to do is meet Dani Jo and all other fears will go away! She is so precious and touches everyone that she meets.
___________________________________________________________________

Our Special Prayer Today.

We are saddened today because of a special loss. One of Dani Jo Suite mates in the NICU passed away yesterday. He was a very special baby and we will miss him greatly already. We visited him everyday as we visited Dani Jo and now he is in the arms of Jesus just where he belongs. God has a special rocking chair for all those babies gone on to be with him

--Night Night, Sweet Dreams, sweet Maudey--

January 8

Dani Jo continues to do well. She seems to get more and more alert each day. Amanda and I weren't able to get to the hospital tonight; however, my sister was able to visit with her for about an hour tonight. (See pic) Jennifer said Dani Jo was off the ventilator for about an hour while she held her. She said that she did great the whole time she was off.

The nursing agency was supposed to interview two possible home healthcare nurses today. We haven't heard yet as to how that went. Hopefully it won't be too much longer before we get her home.

We love you all and thank you so much for everything.

Joey, Amanda, Jordan, Jamie, & Dani Jo

Happy New Year!

Dani Jo is starting to come out!!!!

Happy New Year everyone! I hope you all didn't make too many resolutions that you can't keep---I've started weight watchers 3 times and it is only day 5 of January--Ha Ha! (This is Amanda talking by the way---I am going to "re-start" on this Tuesday for sure this time lol)...

Anyway, we just wanted you all to see our little pride and joy is growing!!! Can you believe it? Over the past week, Dani Jo has been smiling and interacting with us more everyday! I caught half of a smile in the picture above. You know how it is, you hold the camera all the time and just when you lay it down or forget it, they do the cutest things! Well, I hope that maybe we will see this on a daily basis very soon!

I talked with the Doctors last week. Dr. Block has taken over Dani Jo's case from this point on. His plan for her is to move along the process of staffing nurses for Dani Jo. This has shown evident just this week. I spoke with the RN at the nursing agency yesterday and she has 1 nurse hired and 2 more coming in on Tuesday that are very interested in Dani Jo's care.

A Big THANK YOU to Amanda, Amber, Bobbi & all of you at Interim Healthcare from Galax for all your hard work you all have done thus far and we know in our hearts that it is only the beginning of how hard you will work to get what Dani Jo needs! We look forward in working with you on a daily basis to get what is best for Dani Jo.

I know that God is working in our favor: Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. 1 John 3:2 KJV

Even though we cannot see what the future holds, we know who holds our future! My God is an AWESOME GOD! Please know that we are trusting in our Father above for everything! God has given Dani Jo to us for a reason and only God knows this reason and one day will know His plan, but until then we have to believe that God is in control of all situations~

I was reading on the sovereignty of God and it refers to the fact that God can simply do whatever He wants, whenever He wants, to whomever He wants and however He wants. In other words, God is completely free to do whatever He wants either in heaven above or on this earth below.

Webster's dictionary describes the word sovereign as:
"One who exercises supreme, permanent authority. Self-governing, independent, having supreme rank or power, complete independence, the right to exercise supreme power and dominion." I believe that God is sovereign in all of His ways. He can heal who He wants, protect who He wants, help who He wants and have mercy on who He wants. God cannot "cause" evil to occur since there is no darkness in Him - but He can "allow" things to happen.

The Bible tells us that the gift of healing is one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and that each one of these gifts - including the gift of healing - is a manifestation as God wills, not as we will!

It will manifest when God chooses to manifest it, and the best we can do is to approach God in prayer and try to persuade Him to move on a particular situation with His healing power.
We are to ask, to seek, to knock, to state our case before Him as to why we would like Him to release His healing power - but the final decision will always belong to God as to whether or not He is going to sovereignly choose to heal someone in a particular situation. God gives us daily tests to see just how strong our faith is!

Mar 4:37
And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full.

Mar 4:38
And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow: and they awake him, and say unto him, Master, carest thou not that we perish?

Mar 4:39
And he arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.

Mar 4:40
And he said unto them, Why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith?

The past few months have been quite difficult for me to deal with , as well as for my husband. I think we both have felt like we were on a sinking ship at times. That is why after reading the above verses tonight God spoke so boldly to me.

In the above verses the disciples find themselves quite literally on a ship that they feared was sinking. A tremendous storm had arisen, and water was flooding into the ship.

Through of all of this, their Master and leader was sleeping. They felt that their lives were in great danger. They were somewhat angry and upset that Jesus would allow all of this to happen while He slept.

Upon being awakened, Jesus first calmed the storm with three simple words, "Peace, Be Still" and then He rebuked His disciples for their lack of faith. He questions, "How is it that you have no faith?" as if to say, "If I (Jesus) am in your boat, how could it possibly sink?"

Here the disciples were on a boat with the very one who had created the waters and the seas, and yet they had so little faith that they feared for their lives.

It is easy for us as Christians to look at the disciples and question their faith, yet we are guilty of the same lack of faith in our daily lives. We have Jesus living inside of us; He is always on board when our boats set out to sea. Yet we let the stresses and problems of life overtake us to the point that we think our boat is about to sink.

Regardless of the source of our stress, whether it is from sickness, weariness, overload at work, placement on a new project, tension with family members, or struggles at our churches, the simple fact of the matter is this: if Jesus is in our boat, it can never sink!

All we as Christians have to do is show a little faith when times get difficult. It is easy for us to call ourselves faithful when things are going well and our boat is sailing smoothly along, but the true test of faith is when the storms and tides start to come in.

I don't know why God has chosen our family to go through the things we have, but it is not for us to question--It is only for God to know; we are only to prove to God just how much we love Him and believe that He will be with us as our storms rage. Maybe it is to show others that no matter what happens in our lives that every situation is just a test that God gives us when He is trying to get "our" attention. Or just maybe it was so that we would create this site so that others can see that God is in charge of our lives and life is easier when we turn to Him for wisdom, strength, and guidance.

No matter what you are going through, my mom always said, that God will bring you through. My mom was diagnosed with Polio upon the early months of her life, however she never used her disease as a "crutch" yet she always thanked God. As her "Homegoing" approached she developed Breast and Brain Cancer--even in the tough days, she never complained, but always assured that God was her Savior and that no matter what, He was in control!

Please don't look at our family with pity, but know that we are God's children and He gives us strength to overcome anything!

If Jesus is in our boat, we will never sink.
If Jesus is not in our boat, perhaps we need to find Him as our new Captain.

Sorry this was so long, God just put this on my heart as I was reading my devotions for the night and felt led to share my thoughts to you all!

We love you all!
Amanda

THANK YOU!!!!

Toby Tracheasaurus

Thank you Aunt Jenn Jenn for my new Toby Toy---I can't wait until I can get home and play with him. This will be my very special toy...I love you and look forward to coming home soon!

Thank you all for gifts that were given to our family this Christmas season. Your gifts of love were overwhelming with joy and our family will never find the words to say how much we have for each of you. May God truly bless you all for your kindness even though we may not be able to personally thank each of you. Happy New Year to you all...

The Hearls

January 1, 2008 (Happy New Year!)

Yesterday was a very frustrating day at the hospital. We received a phone call last Wednesday afternoon that they were going to discharge Dani Jo on that Friday. We got all excited, only to be disappointed the next day, when the hospital called back and said that they didn't want to send her home over the weekend and the New Year holiday. They rescheduled her discharge date for Wednesday, Jan. 2. When we got to the hospital yesterday, we were against disappointed. The doctor said that Dani Jo would not be allowed to come home until all of the at-home nursing was taken care of and lined up. She said that Dani Jo was healthy enough to come home, but she felt like it would be too much of a burden on Amanda and I to take care of her without a nurse. I had a lengthy, heated discussion with the doctor and told her that if my child was healthy enough to be discharged and we were ready to take her home, then it should be our decision as to what is too much of a burden on my family. Nursing care for Dani Jo will only be from 7 AM - 7 PM anyway. We will be taking care of her by ourselves at night. The doctor expressed that it would be unfair to Amanda and I to have to do it all on our own. I expressed that I thought it was unfair for someone else to decide what is a burden for me and my family. I explained that driving to Winston everyday and leaving Jordan and Jamie with different people was more of a burden than they could realize. I also expressed my frustration with the hospital giving us a definite discharge date of Wednesday if they knew nursing care wasn't completely taken care of. Long story short, the hospital is not going to discharge Dani Jo until the nursing agency has a full staff to take care of Dani Jo for 12 hours a day at home.

Please pray that they will find the nurses for Dani Jo soon, so that she will be able to come home soon. Thank you all for all your continued prayers. Happy New Year.