Christmas Letter

Dear Family & Friends,
We hope that you are enjoying the Christmas season and taking time to reflect on the many blessings that the Lord has brought into your lives.
Anthony is still working for Comdoc and Holly for the hospital. We are both thankful that in the economy of today that we have jobs that provide well for us, which includes an endless supply of cardboard thanks to Anthony. Many of his parts for work get shipped to our house. Anthony takes part in a bowling league every Tuesday that he enjoys a lot. Holly’s spare time has been taken up by catching up on scrapbooks not yet finished and blogging, which is replacing the time-consuming scrapbooking.
Hannah will turn 10 on January 4 and she is in the 3rd grade. She still lives with her mom and step-dad in Louisiana. We were able to see her a couple times this year plus most of the summer. Hannah likes that Kyndra is getting bigger and able to play and talk with her more. She’s excited about her new phone that her mom gave her.
Kyndra will turn 2 on January 10. It’s hard to believe almost 2 years have gone by since she was born! She’s constantly learning new things and making us laugh. She says a lot of words and knows her numbers up to 10, although she doesn’t always get them in the right order. Her favorite shows are Dora and Diego and she gets so excited when they come on. We have quite a few Dora books that she constantly wants us to read.
Last year in our Christmas letter we announced that we were expecting another little girl. Not long after we sent our letter out we received devastating news. We found out that our daughter Carleigh had a fatal neural tube defect called anencephaly. With this defect, the portions of the brain and skull are missing. We knew that even though she might not survive to birth or live long afterward that we would carry her to term-a decision that we will never regret. Just days after we received her diagnosis, we left for Hawaii. The trip was just what we needed. We came back feeling better and ready to face the road ahead. We spent the remaining months cherishing our time with Carleigh. We had maternity photos taken, set up a 3D/4D ultrasound session, were thrown a prayer shower, and created a belly cast.
The decision was made the last week of March to go forward with an induction as Carleigh’s growth was becoming more restricted. We went in for the induction on March 27th and our precious daughter was born still on March 28th at 3:49 am. There is no doubt that the presence of God was strong in the labor and delivery room that day. A sense of peace filled the room like we have never felt before. Those moments with her were bittersweet as we celebrated and mourned her life. We held her visitation and service the following weekend. We want to thank the many people who sent us cards, gifts, flowers, and made donations. Thank you to everyone who made the trip down for her visitation and service. Having you there at such a difficult time meant a lot to us.
We are still learning how to live a life without our daughter here. We have fallen into a normal routine again but our lives feel far from normal. The grief of losing our daughter still weighs heavy on us but our faith in God keeps us from drowning in our sorrows. Carleigh is ever present in our thoughts and in our hearts and we have no doubt she will remain there until we are reunited in Heaven. We have included in this letter a small collage. We want everyone to have a small piece of our daughter. She was born silent to this world but her little life spoke volumes.
We do have 2 websites that you can visit to keep up with our family: carleighmckenna.blogspot.com & haasfamilyblessings.blogspot.com
Much love from our family to yours,
Anthony, Holly, and all our little angels