Donna, Thanks for sharing. The gourd is lovely and so is your granddaughter. Our grandkids all love to paint gourds and its one of our favorite family things to do. Jan

Our grandson was also diagnosed as autistic. He is now 4 and is in several therapies plus has a special needs teacher in his preschool. He's an only child and my DD and DSIL are great parents to this little guy. It is a challenging experience, he is just learning to speak, he's slowly making progress and raising him takes a lot of patience and love. Lynn

Daughter-in-law, Nadine, is at 28 weeks. She is having contractions and they haven't been able to stop them. She will have to have complete bedrest until she delivers. They are giving her steroids for the babies lungs. The doctor said today that for every day she can keep from delivering it means 3 less days in the nic unit when they are born. We are all jumping in to help. They have a 4 1/2 year old. We will all keep her at night and get her to school. We want to keep things as normal as we can for her. I will do alot of the cooking if she gets to go home. Her hubby, our son Scott, is wonderful to help in every way. I am free every day from noon on. We live about 35 minutes from them.. I will go every day if I need to. Sadly her Mom died unexpectly 2 months after the 4 1/2 year old was born. This is really hard for me because we lost a son this same way. I delivered 8 weeks early and he died. I know they can do wonderful things now to save babies. This brings back so many memories for us.. I have a strong faith and it will get me through all of this. I will be there for the kids all they need me to be.. We are a very close loving family.. Please continue praying for us . And thank all of you for your kind words and prayers. They mean so much. Susie

HI Brittnee! A daughter is much different than a girlfriend. Always remember that. If you've been dating your boyfriend for a long time and know his parents well, and they knew it was your birthday, ....and she does buy birthday gifts, it was kind of rude. But she may be the type who doesn't buy gifts for boy/girlfriends, only sons and daughters in law. This is something you need to discuss with your boyfriend and see if there's a problem you're unaware of or if this is the norm. As for me, only boys here....short term girlfriends gets a smallish gift. Long term girlfriends gets a nice gift, a DIL gets spoiled more than I do my boys! :)