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When Dan and I started looking for a house, we knew we wanted something we could grow into- not something we would grow out of.

Something unique and fun. The house all the kids would want to be at.

We found it, and we love it.

But, when we bought our home, it was for a family of five, that we were about to be. (Yes, we count our dog-she is 88lbs- you can't ignore her.)

We wanted both kids to have their own room and argued about how Spencer's was smaller. We loved the massive great room that encompassed the living, kitchen, fireplace and the 'nook' which currently serves as a play space.

It has a basement big enough for both kids to have friends over. Space for birthdays, parties, sleepovers. Things we thought about when looking and buying our house.

Once we got the genetic diagnosis on Spencer, our dream house worried us. There was no way to our main floor without a flight of stairs, and they expected delays in his walking-and for it to be difficult for him at times.

The kitchen was wide open-impossible to close off. Part of his condition, the most extreme part, was around food and controlling access. The pizza parties, pancake breakfasts, treat pantry plans that we loved the house for, were thrown out the window.

The schools were great, but small and the special education system wasn't the strongest. Would a smaller town be more inviting or less for him? Would his restrictions make him too much of a burden to such a small classroom?

We worried. We didn't have enough information, but we had enough to worry, as all parents do.

But, the basement was big- we could easily house pt equipment for him. He would have room to stretch out in the house, if being out of it was too hard. We had a yard we could fill with fun. The above ground pool-surrounded by a fence-could aid in his pt.

But still, our dream home was a reminder of all the crushed dreams his diagnosis took. We were still grieving the loss of those dreams, when the much larger loss of Spencer took hold.

Now...now the easy access to food, the plans for pizza parties and pancakes are ok again. Kenzie can grow up here as we imagined. But at a very high cost- one I would never have offered to pay.

Now the house feels too big. Empty. It has space waiting for her brother to fill, but he never will. Now we rely on friends and family to help fill the house.

But still- the house doesn't feel like a home yet, and it will feel empty, I expect, for quite a while.

We plan to make our house the hangout house as Kenzie gets bigger.

We plan to honor Spencer's memory by always keeping him present in the house and by living large and loud in the house he would have called home. A house, he would have made a home.