..to love would be an awfully big adventure.

I was getting stressed throughout today since I wasn't in Los Angeles anymore and didn't really know how I could give my detailed accounts of Ella's day! I'm sure that someday I will blog about something other than my beautiful niece, but for now I'm perfectly happy keeping her as the star. :) So as bedtime inched nearer I started to feel depressed that I wouldn't have tonights Ella blog and the phone rang from my sissy...wow, was I wrong. Before I get to the amazing story I'm about to share, I want everyone to know that Ella has continued to do wonderfully...I'm talking better than better. She is doing so well that if she remains stable over the next day, they will be closing up her chest on Sunday...which is very fast! They tell us "no news is good news," and lets just say...this baby has zero news!!! :) Tonight they started draining some of her fluids, which have been the cause of her puffiness and I guess this draining is the next step in the process to close her chest. I am so proud of my sweetheart and so thankful to God for helping her stay strong and keeping his best angels beside her...which leads me to the story.

A friend of ours, who shall remain nameless since we haven't actually asked her if we could write about this ...but I just thought it was too amazing not to, sent lissa a text earlier about a dream she'd had the previous night. I didn't know this, but apparently throughout her life this friend has had dreams where she can communicate and/or see people who have passed on. When Lissa started out the story this way, I sort of half rolled my eyes and said "yeah, ok," but she said "no, I'm serious, just listen." 

Our friend had a dream that she was walking through Ella's hospital with Brady, on her way to see Ella in her room for the first time. They got to a door and Brady told her he couldn't go any further with her and that he wasn't able to go where she was. When she stepped in the room there was a girl with blondish hair standing over Ella's bed, illuminated in radiant white colors, and she could tell she was someone who had passed on. The girl handed Ella to our friend, who held her in her arms, kissed and hugged her. When our friend turned to the girl and asked her who she was, the girl held out her hand, where there was a pair of angel wings upon it, in dark, bold black ink..like a tattoo, she thought. The girl then placed her hand against her own back. Though she didnt say her name, our friend got the feeling that it began with an L. (* I'm adding this in now, bc I'd forgotten it and Lissa reminded me that when our friend asked who the girl was she told her, dont worry, they'll know...she was right). The girl took Ella back to lay her back in her bed and our friend asked her, "can you just tell me if Ella is going to be ok?" She told her, "no matter what, she's going to be ok." At that moment our friend saw in her mind this girl standing over Ella's surgery bed with her hand on her, while the Drs preformed her heart surgery. This was someone who had been there the whole time, guarding our baby and continued to protect her even in this very moment.

The whole time Lissa was reading me this text (it was much more detailed, amazing and beautiful in her words, but we didn't feel it was right to post them without her permission), my whole body had broken out in goosebumps and I felt like I had a sort of electricity running through my body. Completely speechless and almost in tears.

Lissa had a best friend growing up named Lauren, who was very dear to her. Lauren was in a terrible car accident was she was 18 or 19 (this was about 10 years ago) and was killed, which of course was absolutely devestating to Lissa and everyone who knew Lauren. She had beautiful blonde hair. A couple years after Lauren died Lissa got a tattoo in her memory, on her lower hip, where nobody could see it unless she showed you, which she never did. Very few people know about this tattoo. The tattoo is of a pair of angel wings. I have chills all over again as I write this. This friend of ours has never heard about Lauren and would have no way of knowing this. * I'm adding this in now, bc I'd forgotten it and Lissa reminded me..but when our friend asked the girl who her name

Tonight I dedicate this blog to the memory of Lauren Slaughter, who has taken it upon herself to be my baby nieces very own guardian angel. I've never really believed in this type of stuff before, but there isn't a doubt in my mind that she's standing over Ella's bed, protecting her, as we speak. Lissa and Brady thanked her when they went in there tonight and I know I'll be making a very special thanks and prayer when I get there this weekend. God is good...all the time.

"Miracles are a retelling in small letters of the very same story which is written across the whole world in letters to large for some of us to see"