Alex graduated from individual speech therapy on October 24th. (I’m a bit behind) Alex had a language explosion over the course of just a few weeks. It was amazing to watch our little man gain confidence almost overnight. We were at an individual speech session and Alex was playing with a train and said to the speech therapist, “The train went over the bridge.” and the speech therapist looked at me and went, “Yep. I think we are done here.” It was a great moment. I’ve never been more proud of my little boy. The boys are still enrolled in preschool through our state program 4 days a week. We recently had a large meeting at school with all the school therapists (speech, occupational, physical) and with their teachers and both boys got simply AMAZING reports. We cannot begin to thank the school for all the hard work this school has put in to getting our boys on track developmentally and at no cost to ourselves. Both boys can now repeat their ABCs, they know their basic colors, and they can both count to 12. They also have the puzzle skills of 5 year olds. I would have never imagined just 6 months ago that they boys would be on track developmentally. The school is still working on some minor sensory issues with Alex but we don’t expect the boys to need services once they reach the age of 3. It’s bittersweet. We absolutely adore the school and all the teachers who work tirelessly to educate these little minds. I’ve never seen a group of people with more belief in the abilities of every child no matter what challenges a child might face on a daily basis. We have a meeting scheduled in January to begin the transition process from the program. A representative from our local school district will officially evaluate the boys to determine if they will continue to qualify for services offered by our school district. We would be shocked if they did qualify. So then the teachers will help us to determine the best course of action for the boys. We absolutely want them in a multi-day preschool program next year. We will do whatever it takes to make this happen. We might actually enroll the boys as “peers” at the same school they go to now. We would have to pay but the cost is very, very reasonable. They are comfortable at the school and Kara and I love the structure of the school. Plus there is something to be said for all they are learning in terms of interacting with peers their age that have a wide range of developmental abilities. We think this will help them when it comes time to start kindergarten. But in terms of speech development both boys can now repeat anything that you say to them. They talk in 6 – 8 word sentences on a regular basis and can fully communicate their needs to us using verbal language (though both boys regularly still use sign language too). We will keep an eye on any pronunciation issues that might start to appear as the boys age closer to the typical preschool age. We would not hesitate to go back to individual speech therapy should the boys have any pronunciation issues. So that is a quick (much overdue) update. I promise to be back soon with an even better update. There are some many things I need to get down on paper so that the memories don’t vanish from my brain.
Mary
Monday, December 8, 2014
Sunday, November 2, 2014
halloween
We didn’t actually make it out to Trick-or-Treat this year.
I did manage to snap a photo of Jakob at a Halloween party we went to over the weekend. Where’s Waldo?
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But otherwise the boys were just not into keeping a costume on at all. So we just decided to stay at home.
Grandma and Grandpa came over to join in our fun. However, I made the mistake of telling the boys that Grandma and Grandpa would be over after nap. The boys get up from nap at 3pm. Grandma and Grandpa were not coming over until 5:30pm. Do we see where this is going? So needless to say when the boys woke-up from nap and immediately ran to the front door I knew we might be in for a long afternoon. Kara and I had plans to run to the grocery store after nap but that got shot down real quick with Mr. Jakob standing at the door going, “No store. I stay here. Grandma. Grandpa. Pizza.” So we just decided to sit at home and wait for Grandma and Grandpa. We used our free time to practice passing out candy to the trick-or-treaters. We gave each boy a pumpkin filled with candy. And within a couple of minutes they had the task down solid. They were ready to pass out candy. That was until we got our first trick-or-treater of the night. Alex carefully watched the semi-little kid approach our front door. But as the kid neared our door Alex placed his pumpkin on the ground and hightailed it for the playroom. I think he was calling it a night. Alex spent the remainder of the evening in the playroom with Grandpa trying to convince all us to make the kids stop coming to the door. Jakob on the other hand once again acted as our family ambassador. The kid took his job seriously! He would come running to the door each time we got a trick-or-treater and carefully place a single piece of candy in their bag. And of course he would always yell “BYE” as they turned to walk away. Jakob had a blast and really only got scared a couple of times. But even after a quick scare Jakob would return right back to his job. Alex on the other hand decided to spend time showing Grandma his new Thomas the Train potty.
Isn’t this how every kid spends Halloween?
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Now we just got to teach Alex that you have to actually pee on the potty and not just read the special potty books.
Overall it was a very memorable Halloween.
Mary
I did manage to snap a photo of Jakob at a Halloween party we went to over the weekend. Where’s Waldo?
But otherwise the boys were just not into keeping a costume on at all. So we just decided to stay at home.
Grandma and Grandpa came over to join in our fun. However, I made the mistake of telling the boys that Grandma and Grandpa would be over after nap. The boys get up from nap at 3pm. Grandma and Grandpa were not coming over until 5:30pm. Do we see where this is going? So needless to say when the boys woke-up from nap and immediately ran to the front door I knew we might be in for a long afternoon. Kara and I had plans to run to the grocery store after nap but that got shot down real quick with Mr. Jakob standing at the door going, “No store. I stay here. Grandma. Grandpa. Pizza.” So we just decided to sit at home and wait for Grandma and Grandpa. We used our free time to practice passing out candy to the trick-or-treaters. We gave each boy a pumpkin filled with candy. And within a couple of minutes they had the task down solid. They were ready to pass out candy. That was until we got our first trick-or-treater of the night. Alex carefully watched the semi-little kid approach our front door. But as the kid neared our door Alex placed his pumpkin on the ground and hightailed it for the playroom. I think he was calling it a night. Alex spent the remainder of the evening in the playroom with Grandpa trying to convince all us to make the kids stop coming to the door. Jakob on the other hand once again acted as our family ambassador. The kid took his job seriously! He would come running to the door each time we got a trick-or-treater and carefully place a single piece of candy in their bag. And of course he would always yell “BYE” as they turned to walk away. Jakob had a blast and really only got scared a couple of times. But even after a quick scare Jakob would return right back to his job. Alex on the other hand decided to spend time showing Grandma his new Thomas the Train potty.
Isn’t this how every kid spends Halloween?
Now we just got to teach Alex that you have to actually pee on the potty and not just read the special potty books.
Overall it was a very memorable Halloween.
Mary
Saturday, November 1, 2014
family pictures 2014
All credit goes to our fabulous photographer.
The family. This picture was the very last one to be taken that day and it so perfectly captures all our personalities. It is also scary how much Alex is a reflection of me and how much Jakob is a reflection of Kara. This picture was worth the entire day of chasing grumpy kids around the park. And note - Jakob's reaction is a result of learning that he could have ice cream for lunch.
Our life with toddlers. Negotiations.
The family. This picture was the very last one to be taken that day and it so perfectly captures all our personalities. It is also scary how much Alex is a reflection of me and how much Jakob is a reflection of Kara. This picture was worth the entire day of chasing grumpy kids around the park. And note - Jakob's reaction is a result of learning that he could have ice cream for lunch.
The boys. This was one of the first pictures to be taken that day. And the boys were being angels. We quickly learned that both Jakob and Alex thought that the promise of a visit to the playground after we finished taking pictures was being translated as "If you take one picture, then we get to go the playground." So that's why this was the best picture we got of the boys together all day. They thought after this picture we were headed to the playground.
Alex. The photographer got some great pictures of Alex while Kara and I were off calming down Jakob who was having a major meltdown over the delayed trip to the playground. This is again a perfect capture of his personality.
Jakob. This picture was taken at the playground. Pure Bliss.
Mary
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
what's going on?
Some random updates.
They boys love to play outside with the neighborhood kids. We can’t even drive down our street without Alex going, “Landon home?” in hopes that he can play outside with our little neighbor boy. I’m going to be extremely disappointed with the arrival of winter temperatures. Our neighborhood is full of kids and several of the kids are under the age 5 and they are mostly all boys. My neighbor is pregnant with baby #3 and I keep insisting that “our neighborhood really needs a girl”. The kids typically play outside from about 4:30pm – 6pm every night. They love to chase each other with their swords. They wrestle each other to the ground. They dig in the dirt. They play in the rock pile under our swing set. The play in the neighbors sand box. They would play with the hose and the water table when it was really hot outside. They swing on our swing set. They love to race each other in their “cars” down our driveway that has a fairly decent incline. They will race each other in their “cars” down our street (we live on a court and I am always supervising when they are in the street). My favorite is when they count off to start the race it usually goes something like, “1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, GO!” They love to run to the neighbors house and explore the toys in their garage. It’s just a great time all around. And I just love to see kids playing outside too.
The boys are also starting to get really good at independent play. Of course it is hit or miss on some occasions but there are long stretches of time where the boys will just occupy themselves in the play room. This is definitely something new for us. And it is quite enjoyable. They are also playing more and more with each other. They definitely act like brothers in the aspect that they either love to spend time together or they hate to spend time together. And to be honest it is mostly Alex that reaches a limit on certain days. And on those days you will hear “No Jake. No Jake. No Jake.” over a bazillion times. Jakob has such a sweet heart that he usually obliges to Alex’s demands and will go elsewhere to play but on certain occasions Jake will have reached his limit and will give Alex a nice bite (typically on the butt). Oh boys.
Both boys love to color. They don’t quite grasp the concept of finishing a picture but they love to flip to a page scribble a bit and then flip to another page and scribble some more. They also love to have Momma and Mommy color alongside them. I also love it because Alex can’t quite grasp the difference between “draw” and “color” so Alex is always “drawing a picture”. There are occasions where the crayons end up on items other than their coloring books. I think because the window, the wall, the table, the trashcan, the play set, and the blocks all appeared to be missing something according to the boys. But I guess that’s why they invented magic erasers!
I was trying to teach Alex the difference between “I” and “my” last weekend. He was outside dropping his toy cars into the bushes. I outlined the conversation. But let’s just say I’m going to embrace the fact that Alex is talking these days and leave pronoun conversations to the experts!
A: “My drop car.”
Me: “Good job. But you actually mean ‘I drop the car’”
A: “No. My drop car.”
Me: “I drop the car.”
A: “No Momma. Alex drop car.”
Me: “Yes I know. That’s why you should say ‘I drop the car’ instead of ‘My drop the car’”
A: (looks at me like I’m a crazy lady) “NO! NO! NO! My done.”
Me: “You mean ‘I’m done’”
A: (walks off)
The boys are doing great in school. We have had some bumps with the drop off process but Kara has now mastered the drop and run tactic. And the teachers have done a good job in making sure there is a special toy or project for Alex each day during drop off time. This captures his attention and then he doesn’t notice Kara leaving the room. Kara then spends pick-up time visiting with the teachers. This seems to work out better. We still cannot say enough about the services being provided to the boys at school. We are simply blown away by their development over the past several weeks. Alex has had a language explosion and he can now repeat just about any word thrown in his direction. We are still working on Alex initiating conversation himself but even this is getting much better. I love to sit and listen to the boys talk to each other. We ask the boys who their best friends are at school and Jakob always repeats “Mason” and Alex always repeats “Grace” and it absolutely melts my heart. We have been told by their teachers that Alex, Jakob and Mason are the instigators at school. I don’t think this is a good thing. Haha. They teachers have already had to have a conversation with the boys about when it is the “appropriate time to rough house”. Sigh. I foresee many trips to the principal’s office over the years.
The boys also love electronics. We are doing our best to keep it at a minimum but they are obsessed with anything that turns on and off. We will admit to using our iPhones while we are in a public place. It is seriously the only thing that keeps Alex calm and rational during a shopping trip. That boy is simply amazing with our phones. It’s like he came out of the womb knowing how to operate an iPhone. The boys also get to watch one video before story time each night. I let them each pick a video of their choice but right now the only videos in rotation are “The Wheels on the Bus” (Jakob) and “Bob the Train – Transportation” (Alex). I’m still waiting for them to change it up one night. They do get to watch television during the day. We watch it for about 30 minutes in the morning while the boys eat breakfast. It is the only way they will eat breakfast and allow Kara and I to get ready for the day. They have a rule that they must finish their breakfast before they can drink their milk. And that seems to be working. The boys always eat breakfast now. I wish I could say we fix them super healthy breakfast foods but we do not. Our rotations are between pancakes, waffles, and pop tarts (rare). They also get to watch television when we come in from outside each night. This allows me time to make dinner in peace. They have a lot of favorite shows at the moment but they tend to rotate between Bob the Builder, Caillou, Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, Thomas the Train, Mater’s Tall Tales, Curious George, Mighty Machines, and Handy Manny. The boys also eat lunch most days at preschool but according to their teacher our boys don’t actually eat all that much but they instead drink their milk. That sounds familiar. I have never met two kids so obsessed with milk. The teacher at school even commented on how excited they get at lunch all because they get to drink milk. So on most days Kara tends to do a mini lunch before nap time or a snack in the car if they get out of school super grumpy.
They boys are definitely in the midst of the “terrible twos” and can switch between a “world is ending” meltdown and “angel” toddler in a matter of minutes. I often find myself just shaking my head at the end of a temper tantrum. We have been those parents dragging their screaming children from our local grocery establishment. That would be us. It’s actually nice that Kara has preschool time to run errands now so that keeps things we need to do at a minimum during the weekend. We instead just try to have fun as a family (which can also be rather hit or miss). The boys tend to get a bit crazy when both Momma and Mommy are home. They know there are two of us around and so someone is always able to be paying attention. There are also certain things the boys do just to drive us crazy. Jakob loves to tear up books. We can put him in timeout a bazillion times. I can yell at him until I’m red in the face. But the little man will just look me straight in the eye and tear up a book. The brain of a two-year-old!
They boys love to play outside with the neighborhood kids. We can’t even drive down our street without Alex going, “Landon home?” in hopes that he can play outside with our little neighbor boy. I’m going to be extremely disappointed with the arrival of winter temperatures. Our neighborhood is full of kids and several of the kids are under the age 5 and they are mostly all boys. My neighbor is pregnant with baby #3 and I keep insisting that “our neighborhood really needs a girl”. The kids typically play outside from about 4:30pm – 6pm every night. They love to chase each other with their swords. They wrestle each other to the ground. They dig in the dirt. They play in the rock pile under our swing set. The play in the neighbors sand box. They would play with the hose and the water table when it was really hot outside. They swing on our swing set. They love to race each other in their “cars” down our driveway that has a fairly decent incline. They will race each other in their “cars” down our street (we live on a court and I am always supervising when they are in the street). My favorite is when they count off to start the race it usually goes something like, “1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, GO!” They love to run to the neighbors house and explore the toys in their garage. It’s just a great time all around. And I just love to see kids playing outside too.
The boys are also starting to get really good at independent play. Of course it is hit or miss on some occasions but there are long stretches of time where the boys will just occupy themselves in the play room. This is definitely something new for us. And it is quite enjoyable. They are also playing more and more with each other. They definitely act like brothers in the aspect that they either love to spend time together or they hate to spend time together. And to be honest it is mostly Alex that reaches a limit on certain days. And on those days you will hear “No Jake. No Jake. No Jake.” over a bazillion times. Jakob has such a sweet heart that he usually obliges to Alex’s demands and will go elsewhere to play but on certain occasions Jake will have reached his limit and will give Alex a nice bite (typically on the butt). Oh boys.
Both boys love to color. They don’t quite grasp the concept of finishing a picture but they love to flip to a page scribble a bit and then flip to another page and scribble some more. They also love to have Momma and Mommy color alongside them. I also love it because Alex can’t quite grasp the difference between “draw” and “color” so Alex is always “drawing a picture”. There are occasions where the crayons end up on items other than their coloring books. I think because the window, the wall, the table, the trashcan, the play set, and the blocks all appeared to be missing something according to the boys. But I guess that’s why they invented magic erasers!
I was trying to teach Alex the difference between “I” and “my” last weekend. He was outside dropping his toy cars into the bushes. I outlined the conversation. But let’s just say I’m going to embrace the fact that Alex is talking these days and leave pronoun conversations to the experts!
A: “My drop car.”
Me: “Good job. But you actually mean ‘I drop the car’”
A: “No. My drop car.”
Me: “I drop the car.”
A: “No Momma. Alex drop car.”
Me: “Yes I know. That’s why you should say ‘I drop the car’ instead of ‘My drop the car’”
A: (looks at me like I’m a crazy lady) “NO! NO! NO! My done.”
Me: “You mean ‘I’m done’”
A: (walks off)
The boys are doing great in school. We have had some bumps with the drop off process but Kara has now mastered the drop and run tactic. And the teachers have done a good job in making sure there is a special toy or project for Alex each day during drop off time. This captures his attention and then he doesn’t notice Kara leaving the room. Kara then spends pick-up time visiting with the teachers. This seems to work out better. We still cannot say enough about the services being provided to the boys at school. We are simply blown away by their development over the past several weeks. Alex has had a language explosion and he can now repeat just about any word thrown in his direction. We are still working on Alex initiating conversation himself but even this is getting much better. I love to sit and listen to the boys talk to each other. We ask the boys who their best friends are at school and Jakob always repeats “Mason” and Alex always repeats “Grace” and it absolutely melts my heart. We have been told by their teachers that Alex, Jakob and Mason are the instigators at school. I don’t think this is a good thing. Haha. They teachers have already had to have a conversation with the boys about when it is the “appropriate time to rough house”. Sigh. I foresee many trips to the principal’s office over the years.
The boys also love electronics. We are doing our best to keep it at a minimum but they are obsessed with anything that turns on and off. We will admit to using our iPhones while we are in a public place. It is seriously the only thing that keeps Alex calm and rational during a shopping trip. That boy is simply amazing with our phones. It’s like he came out of the womb knowing how to operate an iPhone. The boys also get to watch one video before story time each night. I let them each pick a video of their choice but right now the only videos in rotation are “The Wheels on the Bus” (Jakob) and “Bob the Train – Transportation” (Alex). I’m still waiting for them to change it up one night. They do get to watch television during the day. We watch it for about 30 minutes in the morning while the boys eat breakfast. It is the only way they will eat breakfast and allow Kara and I to get ready for the day. They have a rule that they must finish their breakfast before they can drink their milk. And that seems to be working. The boys always eat breakfast now. I wish I could say we fix them super healthy breakfast foods but we do not. Our rotations are between pancakes, waffles, and pop tarts (rare). They also get to watch television when we come in from outside each night. This allows me time to make dinner in peace. They have a lot of favorite shows at the moment but they tend to rotate between Bob the Builder, Caillou, Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, Thomas the Train, Mater’s Tall Tales, Curious George, Mighty Machines, and Handy Manny. The boys also eat lunch most days at preschool but according to their teacher our boys don’t actually eat all that much but they instead drink their milk. That sounds familiar. I have never met two kids so obsessed with milk. The teacher at school even commented on how excited they get at lunch all because they get to drink milk. So on most days Kara tends to do a mini lunch before nap time or a snack in the car if they get out of school super grumpy.
They boys are definitely in the midst of the “terrible twos” and can switch between a “world is ending” meltdown and “angel” toddler in a matter of minutes. I often find myself just shaking my head at the end of a temper tantrum. We have been those parents dragging their screaming children from our local grocery establishment. That would be us. It’s actually nice that Kara has preschool time to run errands now so that keeps things we need to do at a minimum during the weekend. We instead just try to have fun as a family (which can also be rather hit or miss). The boys tend to get a bit crazy when both Momma and Mommy are home. They know there are two of us around and so someone is always able to be paying attention. There are also certain things the boys do just to drive us crazy. Jakob loves to tear up books. We can put him in timeout a bazillion times. I can yell at him until I’m red in the face. But the little man will just look me straight in the eye and tear up a book. The brain of a two-year-old!
Mary
Friday, October 10, 2014
recovery
It’s been an interesting couple of weeks. I’ve cycled through a lot of emotions. The immediate recovery period was fairly straightforward. The recovery from the actual surgery was fairly straightforward and outside of some minor annoyances I have zero room to complain. Of course I grew tired of not being able to “truly” wash my hair. I got tired of not being able to sleep in a comfortable position. I got tired of taking medications. I got tired of an itchy ear. I got tired of not being able to pick up the boys. I got tired of the lasting “sluggish” effects from the anesthesia. I also had some side effects from the antibiotics and steroids which have actually proven to be more an annoyance than anything related to the healing of my ear. But in the grand scheme of things all of these are annoyances are really no big deal. To be honest my recovery has been more of an emotional recovery than a physical recovery. I keep trying to describe my emotions to the people around me and to be honest I don’t think a single person has grasped my experiences the last couple of weeks. And that’s okay. We all have our own personal experiences that are truly unique to only ourselves. I’m okay with that. But I long to have someone to talk to about this new world because I have definitely found myself in a completely new world. I am trying to enjoy each “hearing” moment but then I find myself panicking and pushing the experience aside for fear that in a single moment my new sounds will disappear. I’m not sure why I’m so terrified of something going wrong. But it’s probably because I got so close to not being able to function in a hearing world that I have an idea of how tough life would be should my hearing disappear altogether. I also went for a long time, possibly years, without being able to adequately hear the sounds around me. So in a nutshell I’m a bit terrified of the future. I’m also excited. I am perhaps a bit impatient to see if there is a possibility of fixing my other ear. This taste of the new world has filled me with a bit of greed and I find myself wondering what possibilities exist in a world where I can hear without any problems. But then I also find myself dreading the idea of doing this all again. I simply long for an outcome. It’s also an outcome that cannot be guaranteed. I know that just because the surgery seems to have greatly improved my hearing in my left ear it does not mean that surgery would have the same outcome with my right ear. So where does this all leave me at the moment? I am taking it day by day and trying to get back to my “normal” life. I went for my follow-up appointment with the surgeon and all appears just fine in the healing process. They did a quick hearing test and while the audiologist would not provide me with specific results I managed to get her to say, “things look much better”. But then again I could have told you that too. I know I can hear. I actually know that I can hear much better. I just refuse to announce it to the entire world. I will go back to the audiologist in a few months for another hearing test. The world around me is simply amazing at the moment. And I am extremely grateful. I am grateful to the amazing surgeon who took on the task of fixing my ear. To be honest I’m not sure I could ever appropriately communicate my gratitude. And then I am grateful for so many special moments I have experienced over the last couple of weeks. I was putting the boys to bed last night and it was our normal cuddle time after baths. The boys each get to pick one video to watch on my phone before we do story time each night. And while we were watching “The Wheels On The Bus” (the only video that exists according to Jakob) I got a spontaneous hug from Mr. Alex. But then something amazing happened when I heard the words “wuf you mama” in my ear. Alex mumbled them in a fleeting moment and he mumbled them into my left ear. I heard those words. And had it been only a couple of weeks ago I would have never heard them spoken to me. I would have missed this moment. And for that I am extremely grateful. My heart exploded into a million pieces and the tears streamed down my face. That moment, like so many others, was a blessing. So I think that is all I will talk on this subject for now. I will let the world know when I decide to embark on the next surgery. I promise to get this blog back to its original intent very soon. You all deserve a much needed update on our wonderful (and simply amazing) boys!
Mary
Mary
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