Friday, November 7, 2008
The Most Respectful Student Award
When we got to the car he told me that he wanted to use his gift card to buy something for his school instead of for him. I hope he never looses that loving, giving heart he has.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Monday, September 8, 2008
First Tooth Gone
Nathan lost his first tooth last week. He was very excited that the tooth fairy gave him a dollar. He has been showing everyone his window.
Nathan's school sends home a new book for him to read each night. He is reading so much better after his first month of Kindergarten. Nathan is very analytical and he loves math because it is always consistent and follows all the rules. But unlike reading, where he has learned the rules for complex words, many words in the English language do not follow the rules. For example, if a word ends with the letter e, the 'e' becomes silent and the vowel in the word says its name, or if two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking. When he is reading a book and a word like have or their comes up, he gets so frustrated. He said “When I get done learning this English language, I want to learn a language that is smart enough to follow its own rules.” I thought he should talk to his Aunt Gisele and see what language she recommends. Luckily, he has memorized most of the troublesome words, but he still just likes to complain about them.
Saturday, August 30, 2008
Lauren's Getting Orthotics
Her therapists have been concerned about her left foot. Lauren has always had very tight achilles tendons. This is a common trait among children diagnosed with Sanfillipo. Her left side is weaker than her right. If Lauren gets overly fatigued her left foot will start collapsing in and turning out. The orthotic specialist is going to make her foot inserts to take some of the pressure off of the achilles tendons and stop the left foot from collapsing in. They made the foot impressions by casting Lauren's feet. For a few minutes she had purple casts on both feet. She did great and was in a great mood. She sang Old Macdonald, Mary Had A Little Lamb and Itsy Bitsy Spider for her. It was some of the easiest to understand singing I have heard from her in a long time.
Lauren has been doing great at wearing her hearing aids. I am praying the more she hears the easier her speech will be able to understand again. Lauren had been wearing her hearing aids all day long with out touching them. Her therapist forgot they were even in. I guess Lauren had decided they had been in long enough. She put one in her mouth and chewed up the hearing aid and the mold. Luckily we have insurance on any kind of damage the child causes to her hearing aids. So she will be getting a new hearing aide in a week or two.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Almost Home
Today, we are travelling back to our timeshare in Ramona, which is outside of San Diego in the mountains. We are currently visiting with my Uncle Richard and Aunt Dianna at their campsite in San Onofre. What an awesome set up they have. Words don't even describe the scenery and luxury that they have as retirees. But, they have certainly paid their dues and deserve everything they have. We are waiting for the sun to burn off the clouds and then we are going to walk down to the beach and play in the sand and water.
Disneyland was fun but not much to report. Nathan did go on Space Mountain this year and really enjoyed it. He wouldn't go last year. We did go back to the hotel in the afternoon so we could all catch a rest. Then we went back to the parks, caught the electrical light parade and fireworks before calling it a night.
We are actually ready to get back home to see our girl. We only saw her two days out of the entire trip.
Brian
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Legoland 2 Days in a Row
Yesterday, we went to Legoland with everyone. Lauren was bored on the kiddie rides but loved the roller coasters, so we have two thrill ride kids. Mia and Papa had a great time and we were so thankful that they were able to join us. Every time we go on these park vacations, we wish they were with us, so it was very enjoyable to have them be with us. They really enjoyed it, but they were worn out by the time we left in the late afternoon.
Today is a rest day before we are off to Disneyland and Knotts Berry Farm on Thursday and Friday. Lauren is going back to Arizona with Mia and Papa tomorrow.
Saturday, August 16, 2008
The Plaid Boys and a Pink Princess
Nathan was always such a mommy's boy growing up. He followed me around like my little shadow. I have felt like a part of me is missing this last week with him in kindergarten. Without thinking, I would turn around and look for him. It is hard to believe my baby is old enough to be in school all day long now.
As he has grown older, over the last six months, he has started to become a Daddy's boy now. He now has started following Brian around the house instead of me. He loves being Daddy's little helper and loves for them to build things together. They have built some pretty elaborate Lego projects together lately. He was so excited that Daddy and him could wear the same outfit that I decided to take a picture of my boys.
It is scary to think in a few more years, Nathan will change again. He will no longer want to be seen in public with Brian and I. My friends have also shared with me that he will soon reach a stage where Brian and I don't know anything anymore. Fun times to look forward to! Maybe not our Nathan...we can only hope.
Carrie
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Still in Helper Mode
Day four and Nathan is still loving kindergarten. Nathan spent a lot of time at the therapy center being a typical example for some of the special need children. Today, when I picked him up from school the teacher said he did “awesome.” They had to do a worksheet with a mix of addition and subtraction questions. Nathan finished early and helped a boy at his table that had added all the questions. He taught him the difference between an addition and a subtraction sign and helped him fix the questions he had gotten wrong. Nathan is now in a classroom with typical children and he still likes to help the other kids. The teacher acted like she appreciated the help because she still doesn't have an assistant in the room to help. She has 25 kids in the room all by herself. The parents were told that the classroom would be a 1 to 13 ratio. I hope they are able to hire someone soon.
I had been worried that Lauren would regress on her potty training now that she has started back at the center. Over the last nine days she has had no poopy accidents and only four pee pee accidents at the center. YEAH LAUREN!!!!
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
That's Nathan For You!
This morning as mommy was trying to get him to write some words, he asked the following, "Mommy, why do you make me do so much work?" Mommy answered, "because I love you sooooo much." Nathan responded in his air conditioned home, "Well, could you not love me quite so much, because all this love is making me sweat."
Oh, they say the darndest things....
Hammerin' Nathan helping daddy
The Finished Product - Organizer Shelves and Drawers for Nathan's Room
Lauren's First Day of School (with Michelle, her therapist)
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
How's Lauren?
In March, Lauren started having “seizure like” episodes during the night. As many as 15 to 20 were occurring every night. She continued to get weaker and weaker until she eventually lost the ability to walk. It progressed to the point that she couldn’t even hold her own head up. She was admitted to the hospital and they ran test after test on her and could not figure out what was going on with her. The tests did reveal that the episodes were not seizures. She was placed on IV antibiotics and a couple weeks later, she had a surgery to remove fluid build up in her ear. Our prayer’s were answered and she stopped having the episodes at night and started walking again. She has not only regained all the skills she has lost, but she has surpassed her previous levels in all areas except speech. Lauren is able to sit at a table and feed herself for the first time independently. We used to worry that she was going to throw her food or plate. She isn’t doing that anymore. When we put her in bed now, she stays there and puts herself to sleep. We use to have to stay in the room until she fell asleep. We hardly ever have to change a soiled diaper anymore!!!
Lauren walking on the treadmill tonight before bed (10 minutes on speed 1.5 inclined at 2.5) - you go girl. Normally, she does 15 minutes per day.
Unfortunately, Lauren lost the ability to talk and sing within the past year. Over the last few weeks, she has started saying a few words and singing a line or two of some of her favorite songs. Singing her songs brought her and all of us so much joy as we loved listening to her. We have been so blessed since Lauren’s transplant having such a happy, healthy little girl. This experience has been a good reminder for us and how thankful we need to be for every year we have Lauren. God has blessed us so much with this extra special little girl. She has this amazing spirit that is infectious. At least 90% of the time, Lauren has a beautiful smile on her face and you can’t look at her smile and not help feeling a little better.
It is just amazing to see how calm and content she is now. We can take her to a restaurant and she will sit with us in the booth and eat her food. We take her to movies and she makes it through the whole movie, giggling occasionally. We are just so thankful for how well she is doing.
One of my favorite recent pics...
Monday, July 28, 2008
L.I.F.E.'s One Year Anniversary
I can't believe we are at our one year anniversary. This year has gone by so fast. The business has kept us very busy. We started with a staff of 35 and were seeing almost 100 children on August 6, 2007. As we approach one year later, we have a staff of over 100 people and are seeing over 300 children each week. Praise the lord for the center's success and all the little miracle's we see each week. Every week we seem to have something wonderful happen. A child is able to start walking or says their first word. Seeing a mom's face the first time a child is able to say I LOVE YOU or a dad's face the first time his son is able to ride a tricycle or catch a ball makes it all worth while!!! I am so blessed to have an amazing partner that works 60 plus hours per week. She is an answer to prayer because with the kids I am unable to work near as much. I am able to work from my office at home.
We opened with 7,500 s.f. of office and therapy room space. Less than 2 months ago, we grew another 2,700 s.f., so we are now leasing over 10,000 s.f. and still busting at the seams. The new space has provided some much needed space for our physical and occupational therapy department. Thank you to all of you who have provided generous donations to the center to make this all possible.
Carrie
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Blogging Again
We will do our best to keep it up to date, provide pictures, tell you the latest "Nathanism", give the prognosis on Lauren, etc.. We are excited to join the blogging life. It should be a fun ride.
Brian and Carrie