Cherise is very smart. She got her first electric wheelchair at eight years old, and a computer with a man's voice. She could type phonetically what she wanted to say, and a strange voice would come out from under her chair! Well, she never did enjoy the computer, as we could all understand her just fine without it. Also, she did not like a man's voice, speaking for her, from beneath her chair! But she used it for school. However, the power chair set her free! Finally, she could travel from one room to another on her own, any time she felt like it! Now, her sisters and brothers could say, "come on, Cherise, come and play!" And she could go with them all by herself! It was a big, sprawling house, and she had lots of places to go. She enjoyed her collection of lifelike baby dolls, and I had her half of the bedroom set up so she could play, sitting in her chair. Her dolls, and doll beds, and doll clothes were all on a row of tables along one wall. She would play for hours. She named them, and invented disabilities they all had, making lists of her children, and their handicaps! Her first baby doll, and favorite child, Michelle, rode around the house with her. Once she asked me to measure her daughter on the wall where I measured the growths of everyone else. I did. Once, she got her older sister to cut a hole in her favorite baby doll's stomach, and sew a gastrostomy tube in place! Then she could be seen attaching a feeding bag to it, and poking a syringe into it, and pretending to feed and medicate her baby, the way I did mine!

   As the years went on, Cherise became more and more able to be a real help to me. And she was truly happy to have jobs on the job chart with everyone else. I remember well how she would sit on the kitchen floor, and put away groceries for me. Laboriously, one by one, she would pull cat food cans, or tuna cans out of the paper bag. Carefully hanging on, she would move her arm over, until she was able to place the can on a low shelf. She took great care to stack them neatly, and she did not mind how long it took her. I was so proud of her! She could tell me if a certain child was doing something they shouldn't be; she could watch until steam came out of a pan, and tell me it was boiling. She could carry things on her wheelchair tray all over the house, for other people. It was very helpful to me, when she carried laundry I had sorted, to her sisters' and brothers' bedrooms, so they could put them away. She would wait while they put them away, and bring the basket back to me.

   The child I adopted after Cherise was baby Joshua. He was a tremendous thrill. Everyone loved it that he was a little baby. Cherise would sit beside him, and stroke him, and hold his little hand. Cherise was thrilled to be in on the selection of new siblings. She studied the books with great interest, and put her ideas in, on what we would name each new child. I always chose in the end, but it was great family fun. When she came to the airport with us to greet her new siblings, she was so excited!

   Cherise became a Christian as a little girl, and has followed the Lord ever since. She eagerly memorized Bible verses for me, and drank in all that I taught her. Her faith has sustained her through a number of real trials. Cherise lost her ability to bunny-hop around the house, when she had a tendon release when she was seven. She developed severe asthma when she was fifteen. She had to undergo a spinal fusion also, in her teen years, and was never able to roll over again. But her spirits remained high, and she had an active spiritual life. God gave her an abundance of patience. She prayed earnestly, and loved to sing hymns. Jesus was certainly more than just a story to her. She knew Jesus, and knew he loved her. She trusted him to work all her trials together for good, because she loved him. The Bible tells us that he will do this. She still holds that pure trust. Praise God.