I recently made the trip out to North Platte for the Miss Nebraska pageant, where I celebrated my 20th anniversary of winning the title. During my trip back, I was asked to keynote a special event for contestants and their families that was also a benefit for the American Heart Association - an organization whose mission was my platform during my year of service as Miss Nebraska. As you can imagine, it was an emotional and cathartic experience - reminiscing about such a pivotal year, and sharing the lessons learned after the devastation of losing my brother just one year later. I’m usually more of an extemporaneous speaker, but for this one, I needed to write it out so I could maintain some semblance of control over my emotions. Keep reading to find out what I had to say…

Since the moment I stood at the back of Saint John’s waiting to walk down the aisle to marry Nick Hudson, I have been praying for my children. I lit candles for them in churches across the UK and France. They are my prayer. And they finally met!!

Grahame may very well come roaring into this world like the kool aid man! We had an exciting weekend in labor & delivery…about six weeks earlier than expected!

I teamed up with Kori from @Irokthekitchen to make a traditional British Christmas treat, Battenberg Cake. I first had this beautiful cake while visiting Nick’s family in England over Christmas in 2011. Nick’s dad Graham, like me, had a sweat tooth and took great joy in introducing me to many of the dessert delicacies that are Christmas traditions in the UK.

Our family just had a really tough week. Nick and I have been trying to have another baby for a few years now.  I was shocked to finally get a positive test result on September 11. Shocked because what precipitated me taking a test wasn’t a missed period.  It was a period that wouldn’t go away.

It's been six weeks since I returned from Mayo and started my new migraine treatment...here's how it's been going...

Yesterday I posted on Facebook about seeing a snow rainbow (I didn't know that was a thing?) when I was on my way to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester. I was seeing a neurologist because I suffer from chronic migraines...between eight to 15 days a month. I was surprised by how many people responded to my post wanting to know more about my experience, because they too are dealing with migraine.  So here it goes...

You know you better listen up when your grandma calls early in the morning and this is one of the first things she says.