Bumps, Bruises, and Ballgames

It's been a hopping week. This could be long!

Last Saturday we finally turned the kids around in their car seats. That's right, they have been backwards until now. About the time I thought about turning them in the spring I started seeing articles about the American Academy of Pediatrics recommending kids ride backwards until they are two, not one. Knowing this and that we were going to be doing a lot of traveling this summer, we left them turned around. But now we are home and they are two so we turned them around. We took the inaugural ride to the car wash and to get milkshakes. They seem to enjoy facing forward. It's strange to turn around and see them looking at us!

As far as appointments go, Lindy had PT on Tuesday morning. She got to walk on the treadmill again. She walked 4 minutes and was not happy at the end! I think it wore her out for the rest of her session. The kids had a big appointment on Wednesday morning - a swallow study to see if either were able to come off thickened liquids. The quick answer is NO but the long answer is that both did improve. Right now we put thickener in all their liquids and we mix it up so it is a nectar consistency. Both kids did great on this consistency. Neither of them aspirated (let liquid go into their airways and past their vocal cords instead of down their esophagus). When we tried them on plain water Will had trace silent aspiration and Lindy had mild to moderate silent aspiration. It is considered silent aspiration because they never cough or give us any signs that they are actually aspirating. This is improvement over their last swallow study 6 months ago though. Last time Will was actually penetrating (letting a little bit go into his airway but not down far enough for it to be considered aspiration) on the nectar consistency and had mild to moderation aspiration on the thin liquids. Lindy had moderate to severe aspiration on thin liquids last time. So although they still need their liquids thickened, they did recommend that we can make them thinner than nectar. We have been adding 1 tbsp of thickener to 4oz of liquid and now we can we add 1 tbsp of thickener to 6oz of liquid. Slowly but surely we are getting there. We are happy with a little bit of forward progress! The last appointment for the week was Lindy having hearing therapy on Friday morning. We got to play with play-doh and a cool play-doh toy. So what if I liked it more than the kids? Lindy is doing great with her play audiometry we've taught her. She holds a shape up to her ear and when she hears us make one of her 6 sounds she puts it in the bucket. She smiles so big when she hears the sound and slams the shape in the bucket!

Now for the excitement of the week. Lou Lou had a ROUGH week! Last Sunday evening we had a family fun night at the local elementary school with our church and the kids got to play on the playground. It was all fun and games until someone (Lindy) got hurt. I was holding Lindy and saw Will about to fall off this ledge (about 3 feet high). I reached to catch him and basically flung Lindy into a metal bar - accidentally. She got the biggest goose egg I've ever seen on her forehead. I was a wreck. She was fine in a few minutes but I felt HORRIBLE. We got ice and it went down pretty quick but it looked SO bad. She was so cute holding the ice on her forehead. Multiple people told us it was a good thing that it popped out so I guess that was good. We watched her close the rest of the night and I kept nudging her all night to make sure she would stir and wake up and she was fine. Her bad week continued on Tuesday when she fell out of her bed at nap time. Yep, she fell out. Again, she was fine in about 2 minutes but it definitely scared Drew and me. Her bed was on the middle setting and one end was elevated for her reflux and she walked up to that end. Not sure about what exactly happened because we just heard a thud and found her on her back on the ground. Needless to say her bed got lowered that evening! She ended that bad day by busting her lip that evening on her car toy. The worry wart in me had visions of all this head trauma somehow knocking something loose in her shunt but so far we've seen no evidence of that. We've watched her close and she acts completely normal. Thankfully no other mishaps have happened the end of the week.

Other news for the week: We took away the pacifier. The kids had been using them only at nap and nighttime. I have been talking about getting rid of it but they basically forced our hands this week. A week or so ago they started playing the 'throwing my paci out of the bed and screaming for you to come pick it up' game. For the first half hour each night we'd go in and pick it up a few times and then they would go to sleep. Finally we got tired of this game and one night we decided not to go in and pick it up. The first night and nap the next day were pretty traumatic for both. That was all it took for Will. The third time he went to sleep without it. He pretty much went to bed normally. Not so much for Lindy. She is still struggling without it. That girl has stamina. I thought she'd be getting a little worn out by now but she's hanging in there for a good 1-1.5 hours every nap and bedtime of playing/crying. Tonight she actually didn't cry much at all, just played for awhile. It's S L O W L Y getting a little better each time she goes to sleep!

And the final news of the week is that we had our first Wake Forest football game today and the kids went. They went to a couple last year but they weren't mobile yet. We were a little anxious to see how it would go. Besides it being pretty hot and sticky, and Wake losing, it was a good day. The kids did as good as they could for being 2 and confined in pretty tight quarters. We were thankful for Grandbob, Suzette, Ed, and Jamie and their willingness to hold them for awhile. We were also thankful to the guy in front of us that was way more interested in playing with Lindy than watching the game! He let her play with his plastic bracelets, glasses, hat. And he hand sanitized his hands without me even asking him to!

So I warned you I had a lot to write about! And get ready for a lot of pictures!

First time facing forward!

Church outfits last week.

The Will we see quite often these days - the temper tantrum Will!

The banged up forehead. This was after we got home. The bump was almost gone. The bruise never got much worse, thankfully. Also thankful for bangs, to cover up her forehead!

It was pretty cool in the mornings this week so we had to bust out some pants for some early morning appointments.

The kiddos reading some old college textbooks one morning.

Stinking cute when he's not pitching a duck fit! Check out his first pair of Converse shoes!

Will loves his chair!

Will after the first traumatic nap without the pacifier!

The kids got a neat toy for their birthday. It has a tepee, tunnel, and tent.

We spent lots of time outside this week enjoying the great cool temperatures!

I found Lindy crying at the backdoor one day after Drew had gone out to his office.

Tailgating before the Wake game!

At the ballgame!

Lindy and her new friend.

Stretching during halftime.