Author Archive: 'Carrow McClendon

Oh what a beautiful day it has been. My prayer has been that Kayleigh would be healed, grow up, get married one day and have children of her own. I had hoped to have the opportunity to plan a big church wedding for her but that was just not God’s plan for my sweet girl. But that just meant that today needed to be extra special. Today was her big church party and it turned out exceptionally well.

Beautiful pictures of Kayleigh were displayed everywhere. Special treasures she received during her battle were set out for people to see. Flowers were at every corner. It was the perfect celebration of her life and we are so incredibly thankful for all of the amazing people that helped us make so.

God has been so gracious today to grant us amazing strength and His perfect peace. Tim and I have been able to celebrate our daughter and worship our Lord with family and friends from all over.

I especially loved this verse Bro. Rob used today. It has been one of my thoughts for a while now – that by taking Kayleigh to heaven now he has spared her from any additional hurts.

Isaiah 57:1
1 Good people pass away; the godly often die before their time. But no one seems to care or wonder why. No one seems to understand that God is protecting them from the evil to come.

I leave you tonight with the end of the letter that I wrote for Kayleigh’s eulogy.

Oh my darling Kayleigh, how I love you so. You, my beautiful girl, are one of the most precious treasures God has ever given me, and how thankful I am that He chose to entrust you into our care. I never could have anticipated God’s plan for your life. I never would have thought our time with you would be so short. The day we found out you had a brain tumor I remember very clearly hearing “seven is the number of completion” in the back of my head. Oh how I hoped and prayed that was just an errant thought. Yet now, as I can look back and see how your life has unfolded, I can see that you are indeed perfectly complete. Your seven years here on earth have been a joy. I knew you were my last baby and I treasured every little detail. I held you longer, rocked you more, little did I realize that was God storing up precious memories for me from the beginning. My good, good Father making sure we would have no regrets, only beautiful memories and hope for eternity. And while my heart is broken because it misses you so – at the same time my heart is filled with awe at the amazing things God has done through you.

You always told me you were, “just a little girl.” I would tell you how far you story was reaching and how you were making a difference and you would just shake your head. I hope now that you are watching from heaven you can truly see just what an impact you have had. Your legacy is one of joy through adversity and hope in all situations. You amazed me with your heart and your fight. I am so proud to call you my daughter, we will never forget.

I love you my Baby Duck,
Mommy

Fly high my beautiful girl, thank you again Heather Mitchell for this picture to treasure.

November 17, 2016

Tonight we lay down tired but with extreme peace and the love of all our friends and family holding us up.. Today we went to the church and helped finish decorations and all for the final touches to celebrate Kayleigh tonight at visitation and tomorrow with her celebration of life service. Tonight we had friends and family from all over show up for us. It was special and it was good for us to see everyone including new friends made from Prayers for Kayleigh. We have amazing support surrounding us that made the church look amazing for Kayleigh and we are truly thankful . Thank you taking the time to come this evening. I’ll end tonight with a verse and a line from something I wrote for Kayleigh tomorrow ..

John Chapter 17:3
And this is the way to have eternal life—to know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, the one you sent to earth.

And yes we have hope because we know Kayleigh is “Safe, loved and protected ” with her Heavenly Father. We are sad for now but we are not defeated and we will see her again.

“God did not answer our prayers the way that we had wanted for ourselves here on this earth and give her the miracle of healing this side of Heaven. Instead he granted her eternal healing in his presence and in the process showed all of us that Kayleigh was already the miracle he shared with us for over 7 years.”

Thank you all and good nite
Until tomorrow…Tim💜💜

What a whirlwind of a day. We have been busy making plans to celebrate our precious Kayleigh’s life. While we miss her terribly we still have hope in eternity and that makes this burden a bit lighter. We have planned the next two days to be special events to honor our girl and the impact she has had on so many.

As I visited the church and the florist all I could think was I wanted to be doing this with her, in fifteen years, planning a wedding. And while it would be so easy to let that fill me with sadness. But each time the grief draws near a remember the following two verses…

Isaiah 55:8-9
8 “My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord. “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. 9 For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.

James 4:8a
8 Come close to God, and God will come close to you.

These are the verses that are getting me through right now. With every wave of grief I remind myself that His ways are higher than my ways and I continue to ask Him to draw near to me. It does not mean my grief is gone, it just helps me keep things in perspective.

Tomorrow night we will have visitation. Friday afternoon at 1:00 pm will be her celebration service. I know many of you would like to attend but cannot. Our church will be live streaming the service live on Friday.

You will need the livestream app if you do not have it. Click the link below to get you started and take you to the right place.

https://livestream.com/cbcdecaturlive/prayersforkayleigh

Please continue to cover is with your prayers. The reality is beginning to truly set in for Grace and Cole. It is so hard to see their hearts breaking and not be able to take the pain away. Yet, I know we will get through this together, as a family, as long as we keep our focus on Christ.

Until tomorrow,
‘Carrow💜

I can honestly say this has been the hardest days of my life personally and safe to say for all of this family but God is still good! God has blessed all of us in the past 6 months more than we ever could have imagined with Kayleigh’s journey. Not only seeing Kayleigh be baptized but seeing how her story affected others all over. How can this dad even begin to express how proud I am of my child and more importantly “His Child”? Kayleigh’s story will continue to reach many for God’s Kingdom from now on. At one given point a couple weeks ago Kayleigh’s page (Prayer’s for Kayleigh) had reached over 2,000,000 people from all of the shares and people following the page. So to answer Kayleigh’s question ..”I’m only 7 , what can God do with me?”. Each and every one of you are witnesses to the amazing things God has done through our 7 year old miracle. ‘Carrow and I have talked about the different things that Prayer’s for Kayleigh could become moving forward and we have a new found love for those fighting along side of us for our DIPG kids as well as all of those fighting pediatric cancer. But as you pray tonight, also pray for more direction and discernment to See what God would have us do to help those fighting Pediatric cancer especially DIPG and brain cancer. We are continually thankful for all of you surrounding us in prayer, texts, cards, food. Everyday we are blown away at your love and kindness for us and for Kayleigh.

I’ll leave all of you tonight with my favorite lines of a song I love right now:
�Now death where is your sting�Our resurrected King has rendered you defeated
Forever, He is glorified�Forever, He is lifted high�Forever, He is risen
Read more: Kari Jobe – Forever Lyrics | MetroLyrics
�Below are also the arrangements for Kayleigh.

Visitation will be Thursday November 17, 2016 from 4:00 P.M. to 8:00 P.M. at Central Baptist Church in Decatur, Al.

We will have a Celebration of life service Kayleigh Blair McClendon on Friday November 18, 2016 at 1:00 P.M. at Central Baptist Church in Decatur, AL with Dr. Rob Jackson officiating with burial in the Roselawn Cemetery and Peck Funeral Home directing.

Until tomorrow Tim💜💜

At 10:05 this morning our precious girl slipped from earth to eternity. Oh how our hearts are broken. There are no words for the hurt. The void. Yet even now, at our darkest, our God is good.

God granted Kayleigh perfect, beautiful peace. She was not in pain. She was wrapped tightly in my arms with her Daddy by her side as she gently drew her last breath. God was so good to spare us from watching her struggle. And is she is in heaven. Dancing. Twirling. Laughing. Beautiful. Whole. Healthy.

I don’t know how we are going to continue on, I just know that we will. That God is going to continue to meet us where we are. He’s going to continue to carry our burden. And for now, I am going to continue to write. I don’t know what else to do. But not tonight. This will be you update from me today.

Psalm 34:18
18 The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; he rescues those whose spirits are crushed.

Until tomorrow,
‘Carrow 💜