Will this be funny someday?

Look at this cute face... it's cute no? Pretty cute right? Innocent?
(He now says "cheese" for the camera, I have no idea where he picked this up...)


So Sara and I are watching some terrible reality show, Madison's playing on the floor and Duncan's eating some pizza and apples. Well, pizza anyway... he's on an apple strike. In fact, I actually mentioned to Sara that I don't know why I still give them to him, I guess I just do it in case he decides to eat them. (This comment will be ironic in a moment...)

All of a sudden he starts crying. I thought he bit his tongue or something, not too odd and that's why he would cry out for no reason right? Whatever, fine... he gets over it. Gets done eating and then I wiped his hands and face after eating and he cried again when I wiped his face. Weird. But stopped and it's nap time so whatevs... So I went and laid him down in his crib, and that's when I noticed. He has something up his nose!!!

After a weak attempt on mine and Sara's part to dislodge said item, I call the doctor. Turns out his Pediatrician isn't in, in fact only three are in the office today so they don't have a lot of openings. The nurse asked if I had ever taken him to an InstaCare or something. Because they have a flu shot appointment tonight at 6:50 I asked if I could just get him in to the night clinic. She said she would talk to the Doctor on call to see if we needed to get him in sooner and call me back. She did, and said we needed to go in right away, and that Dr. Bean would make room in the schedule to yank the thing out even though "anyone with forceps could do it".

So Sara stays with Dylan until Matthew can run home from work. I wake Duncan up and we run in to the office. Oh my... my poor traumatized kid. Seriously, I have seen a lot of things done to these little people (NICU stay and all...) but honestly, it was really hard. Dr. Bean got a little bit of it out too, but this apple was really lodged up there! The nurse holding his head didn't hold on tight enough and Duncan got jabbed and there was blood everywhere. In fact, once it dried and we tried again he was so worked blood was coming out of both nostrils. He has broken blood vessels by his temples from screaming and fighting and the thing is not out yet!! Poor sweating little monster.

Dr. Bean told us we should see an ENT and asked my insurance. She called the ENT next to her office and they don't take my insurance but the doctor said he would be more than happy to see Duncan. Well, at this point, I would have paid hundreds to get it over with so please... yes... we will go see this doctor next door.

So this doctor sprays something up his nose (yea... good times, still going...) to numb it up and then he gives it a minute. So every time someone does something , Duncan's convinced that it's over and it's sooo not. Then the doctor held his nose open with some tool that's probably familiar to any one who's ever gone through something similar and pulls a little something out but it was just bloody gunk. So then he suctions him all out again, lots of bright blood, nasty. Then, he looks again and mentions that because they have been poking around in there it's a little swollen and even though something looks out of place, it might not be, and that he would hate to grab on to something that really belongs there. He gave it one more try and Wala! Apple! I could tell it was hurting Duncan because he seemed so relieved! He sent us on our way and didn't even charge us! So tomorrow I think they will be getting a cookie bouquet from Duncan.

Anyway, I am so glad I didn't go to InstaCare! This ENT totally pulled in a favor for our Peds office by getting him in. I would have had to run up to Primary to see an ENT there and I am pretty sure the process would have taken a lot longer! Traumatic indeed, the question is... was it traumatic enough for Duncan to never do it again? That remains to be seen. All I can say is that I will no longer be cutting up his apples, should he choose to stuff it up his nose he will have to bite off a chunk first... that is if I ever give him apples again!

Edited to add: We just went in for their flu shots and man... you should have seen the look on his face when we walked in the building! It was priceless! He looked sooooo concerned!

In other news, turns out I may have to pull some strings to get Pat back as Dylan's PT. I plan to do what it takes though, let's call it a challenge shall we? Dylan crawled across the room on Monday, both legs, straight across probably 5 feet? What was so enticing? Jessica's flip flops. We have to hide flip flops around here, I am not sure what the draw is...

Smiling, daddy fed her a piece of a swedish fish!


It took her ten minutes to forgive me for putting that pony tail in this morning.


We replaced the toy that Duncan 'fixed'.

And I'm glad, because she loves it, obviously.

Another cute drooly face

I found the love

For the Vision Therapist. I found it... it was missing... but it has been found. She came over on Friday for Dyan's first appointment. The other first one was more another assessment but this time she did her thing. She has a book of baby faces, actually called "Baby Faces" and she was reading to Dylan and Dylan actually started laughing at one of the faces! It was adorable! There's another book in the same series and the babies have accessories, like one's wearing a blue hat, another yellow glasses. She had a baggy full of the items in the book to help kids make associations. There's a green ring in one of the pictures, one from the old school ring stackers, and Dylan was loving it... eating it and stuff. So Linda took the book and was flipping through the pages with her, when she got to the page with the ring, for the very briefest of moments, Dylan glanced down at the ring she was eating. She recognized the ring from the picture! This was a huge thing for her to make that connection! I saw one of those ring stackers at the store today for $5.99 and I almost bought it... just 'cause, but I didn't.

Linda suggested that if I knew anyone that was good with pictures I could get pictures of some of her favorite toys and make her a book. I was like, "I can do that!" So... I invested in a Laminator which I will be getting shortly, I am so excited! I can make her her own flash cards and stuff! I mean sure... I can go somewhere and pay by the foot, but I thought it would be a fine investment and I would much rather do it here than drag 2.5 kids to some store to do it. Jill laminates her kids paper money and game pieces too... so I am sure I will find plenty of uses. Woohoo!

Friday the kids and I went to lunch with my mom and some of the gals that we worked with at GE. It was really fun to see everyone and Duncan behaved quite nicely, even though it was nap time. When my mom got Duncan out of the car he rubbed her head... he either noticed her brand new hair cut or was just wanting to show her he loved her.

The girls and I did a little scrapbooking on Friday night. We need to really get going on the scrapbooking thing since two out of the three of us are preggers and not exactly caught up on the kids that we do have! You know we don't really crank the pages out on these nights but at least it's something right? Then Jill and I hit a scrapbook sale on Saturday... because, you know... we can never have enough 'stuff' to choose from when we do get together!

Dylan's last shot was Sunday, she's officially done with ACTH treatment. We don't really know how long the effects will last, there's no telling, but we can sure tell that she is in much better spirits! Really, our little girl is pretty happy most of the time, greeting everyone with a smile. We are loving that she's back! She is still having the episodes though and we are kind of stumped as to what to do about it. We can try other medications or just wait to see if they get worse to treat. I am leaning toward the latter since once they put them on meds they don't tend to take them off again... so why medicate if it's not going to make a difference and there's no end? Especially seizure medications... Yikes.

And Duncan's been very cranky the last couple of days... I think it's his turn for the molars but I am not sure. He's had a serious fever for a couple of days and it would be right on schedule, a few weeks after Dylan but who knows. I hope so, he's in a bad way...

I have been working on that fluffy blanket for a couple months now but it's not going very fast! The yarn is not very fun to work with, you can't tell where you leave off so you really have to finish a section at a time. As such, I really have only been working on it on knitting nights and with Jess's travel schedule it's very slow going! I did sew the parts for the middle together last night and just will need to do the border next. Maybe it will be done some day... It's hard not to eye the next project but this one won't ever get finished if I don't just get it done!

My husband has kidnapped the camera... so I don't have any pictures this week! Oh sure, I know he has his own camera and all, but mine, the one we didn't need, is super-fab and he needed it for something. I think there are a couple cute ones on there, I will have to look and maybe add them tomorrow.

I can't contain myself any longer...

No really, I can't. And I think I have done pretty well for a few days but I just have to let it all out. Here goes... PAT'S COMING BACK! Wahoooooo! She's coming back from Canada and she's going to try and get back on with Early Intervention. Please please please let us get her back as our weekly PT. Please please please. Either way, I am glad she will be back in town, but I need to be a little selfish for my little person here and demand her! I was so excited when I got her note the other day! I secretly shared it with some other Pat lovers and we are over the moon with the news. Over the moon. My little one needs her help, Pat's knowledge goes far beyond PT and that's what we need. Plus, she likes my kids... I can't see Sara checking the blog from another country if she moved, if ya know what I am saying. Woot woot woot. (Is this a secret Pat? Because if so, somewhere there's a cat that's missing a bag!)

Speaking of the pickle... she cut her other two 2 year molars too. Bottom and top. I almost lost a finger last night when I stuck it in there. CHOMP. She's a little biter when she wants to be. I think this was probably pretty uncomfortable for her... along with the ACTH. She's in great spirits today though. She smiles every time I look at her and we weren't sure if we were ever going to see those smiles again so it's rather encouraging!

Her crawling is going great but she's stronger on her right side, so it's a bit like paddling with one ore... she will go in circles or sit up and go in circles. We need to get her to paddle with the left oar too so she will go in a straight line. I am supposed to kneel over the top of her and not let her go to one side. Yea... RIGHT. Kneeling. Haha... Good humor right there. I'll do what I can.

Matthew and I had our 4th anniversary yesterday. I walked in while he was getting ready and I said "Happy 4th Anniversary!" and he was like "4th?" and I said "I know... 4th" and we had a discussion about how anticlimactic 4 years was. (After he asked me if I had consulted the plaque our Realtor Wendy gave us that's by our door to make sure) He said being married to me was like dog years... so it actually was a lot longer than 4 years. WHAT?! It was quite the convo. I am going to throw in the time we started dating (kind of...) which was 10 years ago just to have some street cred in the marriage department (and to have the dog years and anticlimactic attitude thing make a little more sense!).

I have noticed something silly about my son. When I go in to get Duncan out of his crib in the morning, if I had gone to bed with wet hair the night before and it's sticking up funny, he looks at my hair, giggles and rubs my head. Like 'You're so silly mom!' He doesn't do it if it has dried first and looks semi-normal, only if it's funky and crazy. If I haven't glanced in a mirror yet that morning I can tell how bad it looks just by his reaction. It's so cute.

He is getting funnier by the day now. He's starting to realize when things in stories are funny. Matthew was reading the Animal Fair to him the other night and when the monkey slid down the elephant trunk he chuckled. So CUTE!

Duncan's got the Duplos figured out... Well, kind of, he doesn't know quite what to do with them but he's working on it.


I was pretty proud of him for being able to snap them together. Snap, unsnap, snap, unsnap.


Dylan's very tactile. She likes to rub stuff on her palms to sooth herself. She will frequently rub the edge of her blankets, or the bottom of her sleeves. So you can imagine the pleasure that she found with this outfit, she was rubbing her belly all day!


She's trying to shove the butterfly far enough in her mouth to get her sore molar gums!

The outfit is funny too, she's so skinny she crawls right out of the pants. All day long I have to chase her and put them back on. Look at this crazy hair!

What is that hand doing?! He was actually going to rub her little head, he likes to do that because it's what we do to each other around here. He's a good brother. And that's a tired little pickle face.

Ahhhhhh!

Apples? Who needs apples!

Well - As promised in the last post, below are the pictures of Duncan attacking the caramel that was supposed to be eaten with the apples that are chopped up on his tray. But, apples? Who needs apples! He went straight for the caramel, with everything he had. He was covered! So was his chair, and the kitchen chair it was on (not sure how that happened...). He kept squishing his hand which would POP when the air gushed through the caramel! He went straight in the tub! I even drained the water once because it was so cloudy with caramely goodness!

Now, I see that McD's probably had good intentions with the caramel apples in the kids meal instead of fries thing. But it just does't work that well with a 2 year old. In fact, usually I eat them (yum!!) but these were still in the fridge the next day and he needed an adventure. I am sure he had fun.

So, Matthew had to go back to work today which is so sad for us! A coupleof weeks ago he realized he had oodles of vacation to take before the end of the year. Not only that, but AmEx has Paternity leave... so he needed to take some time off. With the exception of a couple meetings he was off Tues-Friday last week! Duncan loved it, he was like Matthew's little shadow and it really helped with the whining that he had started doing because Matthew was out of town so much there for a little while. It was nice having him here and blah... boo to today!

Dylan is almost done with ACTH, she only has 4 shots left. Today, Wed, Fri and Sun and then it's over and we hopefully get our little girl back. I hope it happens fairly quickly, she's pretty cranky and I expected the 1/2 doses for the last week to have helped her little attitude but... not so much. We will hang in there and see. When I posted last I said the ACTH did not help, and I may not have been telling the whole truth. It seems like when she spasms she only has about 10, rather than 40-50. Which is actually a HUGE improvement. I don't know if that's just been the last couple of days or if that trend will continue but I like it! We will see. I hope it helped, poor little kid.

The Little People Fairy landed at our house the other day. Aunt Melissa dropped off three garbage bags full of little people! her girls had just grown out of them and they were their favorites so they had all sorts of cute big sets! We split them up with Aunt Eden for cousin Bridger and sent the doll house and the Princess Castle back so hopefully Mel can find someone who will love them more than Bridger and Duncan will. We got a great Alphabet Zoo, Noah's Ark, and School House playset though! Very exciting!

And for an update on the little little pip squeak. I went in for an ultrasound on Thursday to check on a few things. Mainly the placenta location, my cervix length and the kiddos placement. One not so good and two goods, in that order. The placenta has still not moved far enough away from my cervix for the Doc to be comfortable with a normal delivery, bah! There's still time, so I will envision the placenta moving right up and off of my cervix... let's all do this together! Move placenta, move! They will check again later to see where it is. The cervix length looked good and the kiddo is head down, facing my back right. Right where it's supposed to be. Hanging out... head (and often fists) on my bladder. It measured big, I was 27 weeks, 4 days and it measured 28 weeks 6 days and a whopping 2 lbs 13 oz! I say whopping because that's a whole 4 ounces bigger than Dylan was when she was born! There's a little Dylie in there!

I must say though... having had four arms and four legs moving around in there they didn't do anything compared to this little one's two arms and two legs! This kid is always moving and kicking. It's a busy little person! I realize the other two may have been cramped for space but not too bad at 27 weeks which was four weeks before they were born. I might have my work cut out for me with this little person!

Apples?


I don't need no stinkin' fruit!


Here's the new picture, face and a cute little hand. It was hard to get the picture so it's a little fuzzy, she had the wand clear over to my hip since it was facing my right front.

"I look like my big brother!"


See, told you! What, you need a side by side?


Here you go!


Let's not jump to conclusions here people, we have no idea what big sister Dylan would have looked like if she didn't have HPE which affected the midline of her face (nose and lips...) so, who knows! That and Aunt Jill said when they went to see their little girl she looked like her big brother Noah!

Start saving for Med School!

I know, I have been a slacking blogger over the last couple of days haven't I? You see... I just spoil people by posting twice a week or so, so when I don't you miss us. Well, more the kiddos, but I understand. What you should do is visit some of my friends blogs, then you would see how spoiled you are. Just kidding friends, love you! (Since I have decided throwing a 'love you' after everything I do to Duncan, like remove something from his hands that he shouldn't have, all is forgiven.) Anyway, as a result, I do have a few more pictures than I usually do, so lucky lucky!

So the title... Duncan's obsessed with the stethoscope. Obsessed. Trina let him play with the cheaper one and he was running around all night with it. Originally he wouldn't give it back to her so we figured I would just get it from him later but that was still tricky! Megan and Michael came over to watch Glee (Best.Show.Ever) and he was not giving it up. I finally had to trade him for a binki and it's been hiding ever since. I told Trina she started something and her reply was "Start saving for medical school!" Yikes!

I was all mixed up on my days last week and Dylan's PT came over the day of the last post. She was surprised about Dylan crawling. We just need her to keep going in a straight line. She had this little dance routine she does where she crawls a little bit and then rolls into sitting a couple of times and often ends up even further away than she started! She has this butterfly toy that she ADORES... So every time she grabds it and drops it, the PT would throw it accross the floor and make her go get it again. This went on and on. I bought another one but the new ones aren't exactly like the old ones so who knows if she'll like it. It's for her birthday (shhhh, don't tell her).

The vision Therapist came on Friday too and I don't get it. I mean, we will ride this thing out and all... but I am failing to see the value at this point. Okay, it's only been one session, but... I am just not so sure. Some of the things she said was play peek-a-boo with her, give her choices when it comes to dressing to see if she cooperates more, and help her to see the food as she's eating to see if she's more willing to eat. Uhmmm... okay. I know, give it some time. I will, I will. At least she's nice.

So... as far as we can tell the ACTH did not work. I called on Friday after she had an episode and we did three more full dose days bring her grand total of full doses to three and a half weeks. She is still having the spasms though, she had some in the grocery store today. There are a few other medications that they can try, she's on Topomax, but she's not on her full dose yet so we will probably up that and see what happens. Bummer... but it was worth a shot. That was as much of it as they were willing to try so we have officially lowered her dose (for good this time) and she will be off of it within two weeks and life for her should get back to the semi-normal she's used to.

Sara and Madison came over Monday to watch some reality TV, more Sara than Madison. But the kids got a chance to roll around on the floor a bit and get used to each other. Madison just gets so excited to see Dylan but then it wears off quickly and they both just do their own little playing. Madison can teach Dylan a lesson or two, she's already cruising and occasionally standing on her own.

And, the other news is that nothing is safe around here any more. Duncan can climb up onto the couch on his own. He's very proud of himself. He's also caught on to furniture rearranging. As in... moving around the kitchen chairs to strategically place them near things he thinks he needs on the counter. Like this laptop for example. Honestly I know I am lucky that it took this long. It's actually kind of a blessing because I can say "Don't move the chairs" and he knows what I am saying, course whether or not he chooses to obey that is a different story.

While I am writing this, Duncan's in his chair eating caramel and apples (more the caramel), you should see the mess.... those pics are for next time. I almost started to wipe him down, but he needs to go right in the tub and we are about to eat our dinner so... it will wait.

Dr. Duncan, enjoying Glee


And enjoying the stethoscope


Really enjoying the stethoscope


When Aunt Megan was holding Dylan the other night she was just being so cute!


Making some cute faces

And some cute sounds... (videos below)

And then daddy got home, look at this smile! (With all those adorable pointed teeth!)

Tracy, Shannon and Charlotte brought us a delicious dinner on Friday night. It was so yummy!

From the playdate with Madi

There's another picture where Madision is holding Dylan's favorite butterfly and Dylan's giving her the stink eye. It's kind of funny...

And just because Madi is so darn photogenic!

Wassup?!

We are laughing because she's going on like 15 minutes straight of listening to herself talk.


She's just so cute!

Last full dose of ACTH! (Knock on wood!)

So yesterday Dylan had the last full dose of ACTH for the additional week. I actually haven't seen any episodes in a couple of days but it's hard to be encouraged since I have gone a couple of days without seeing them before. With typical Infantile Spasms it's very upsetting to the children, and easier to pinpoint the episodes, but with Dylan she just has them and keeps doing what she's doing. Often this is right before she falls asleep or right as she's waking so, if she's in her crib, we will miss them. I am trying to keep an eye on her. We shall see. As for now we are planning to drop down to the 1/2 dose for today. We have no follow up EEG planned, no next course, no nothing, so I left a message for Neuro this morning that I would let them know if I saw another episode and for them to let me know if we need to schedule another EEG. (Boo! Hiss!)

When the shots are done we will miss Trina coming over every day to see us though. Duncan's got pretty good at waving good bye with her fly-by visits and she brings presents! Yesterday was cute too, Duncan kept running at her and hugging her legs! He's such a little charmer. Running for Mayor already.

As for crawling, yes, Dylan's still going... and she's fabulous. I love it. I can't wait for her PT to see her tomorrow. A month ago when we did the IFSP and set goals for the next 6 months the PT wanted crawling as Dylan's only goal! I actually pushed back for her to add 'pulling to a stand' telling her that I thought she would be crawling within a couple months and that left 3 or 4 months to work on pulling to a stand! I can't believe she would have left it at just crawling. She did say that at the rate she was going it was a possibility but then I wonder why she wouldn't have added it. Seriously... that's what goals are all about people! I love it that Dylan's doing something in a month that she thought would take 6 months. It's the 'neener neener' side of me coming out I think. Good on you girl! Keep proving everyone all wrong!

Duncan thinks he's big. He can climb up in the kitchen chair now and he thinks he's hot stuff. The couch is still a stretch for him but he will settle for the chair. I find him up there quite frequently. And yesterday he wouldn't take a nap, that was a joy... what's that all about? I was supposed to help Uncle Michael with something while the kids were down and it didn't happen. He did finally fall asleep but then I went in and woke him up after and hour and a half because... by golly... he was going to go to sleep at night!

Duncan was so cute over the weekend with Matthew too, he was Matt's little shadow. I loved it... not only because i'ts adorable, but also because Dylie and I can spend time together. Matthew had him out in the garage, doing boy stuff, getting dirty. So dirty that Matthew penned him in the big bathtub while they got ready for a shower and there was dirt marks in the tub! Ahhh, boys!

Duncan loves books now, he's obsessed. I thought this obsession usually came a little later but I must be mistaken because he's always running around with one. His favorite for a loooong time was Tails which Jessica totally called because her Nephew apparently loved it. Now it's a flap book with lots of first words and LOTS of flaps that he got from grandma for Christmas. He practically climbs the TV stand to get in the basket and get this book. Its crazy I have to tell him to be very gentle with books and he actually is pretty good... now. You should see Tails, it's taped and glued together. We read to him every night and then he patiently folds his arms to say a prayer, it's an adorable bed time routine.

Playing with the Cheerio book that Aunt Jane got him for his birthday.


He played with Aunt Ami's the other day and decided that the book, a bowl of Cheerios and the Cheerio book all belong at the table... often, throughout the day.


So big, sitting up there with his beverage of choice. Feet dangling.

Again, just cuz he can.

I have to take pictures like this every once and a while to prove to myself that he's still my little baby. Look at his cute little bum up in the air!

And yesterday... Dylan was complaining so I put her food on to get warm and it got quiet while I was waiting. I looked over and saw this. Uhmmm... maybe I misinterpreted her complaints to be hunger when it was really tired? Poor kid, I felt bad!

She's crawling!!

No really! This time she's crawling! And I saw it with my very own eyes! She started on Saturday... we wer eplaying on the floor in her room while Matthew vaccuumed the whole house (yes... really). New colors, new toys... I told Matt when he came in and he said "Oh... now you believe it?!" Like she really did crawl a week ago when he said it the first time. Well... actually yes. Now that I have seen it, I believe it. And she's already gotten better.

Here's the cutest little crawling video ever!! She's a woman on a mission... just kept getting better and better at it yesterday.


Not only this but my poor little multi-tasking/over-acheiving littlest person also cut TWO of her two-year molars! Not only is she not two for another month and a half, but she wasn't due until December! Poor kid! What a week! She was smiling (yes, we actually had one very good day the other day) and I noticed both molars on the top were through, one all the way, the other almost. Yesterday she was realy sad so I think they are still bugging her though.

I am sure there is other very important news to report (other than Jess winning Ticket to Ride which Steve specifically asked me to put on the blog) but I just can't think of it at the moment. The crawling thing is just too exciting!

And, a sullen... post bath Dylan with tamer hair.

Yup! Still broken!

So I heard back from Paula yesterday... the truth is, had I called her again I probably would have heard back from her sooner but I have been stuck in an insurance mess. Matthew is no longer a GE employee.... he's now Amex as of September 1st. This means, his insurance changed the DAY of her EEG. Which also means that they will try to bill the wrong place and come back and cause another big mess in a couple weeks, but that's a whole nother story! Anyway... I didn't call because if Paula wanted Dylan to continue on ACTH we would have her barking up the wrong insurance tree for approval so I wanted to hold off until I had more information.

I think most people don't have such broken kids so company's can take their sweet time passing out insurance information. Yea... uhm... that doesn't really work for us. We will need to get her daily shot medicine sent to us very very soon and, at $$2700 for a 2 month supply, it's not really a bill I wanted to be stuck with. It kept me up all night one night! We still don't have all of the information yet but fortunately if I need a prescription filled in a pinch we do have that stuff, no health info yet.

Okay, okay... on with the Dylan news. So Paula said that the doctor that reviewed the EEG made even a stronger case for Infantile Spasms and Hypsarythmia. Did I take this to mean it's worse? No... I just think he wrote it up differently and in a way that better justifies treatment with ACTH. Paula seemed pleased since the use of the ACTH was kind of questionable and this confirms that they are trying the right type of treatment. Dylan's Neuro wasn't in but Paula said she would talk to him and recommended another week of the full treatment. So... after 2 half-dose shots and starting the weaning process we are back up to a full dose. I ran all over the valley today to get more meds for her.

Speaking of running all over... it just made me so grateful that I have the opportunity to stay home with my kids. I get to thinking about having a little Dylan and having to go to work everyday. I know we would figure it out, but between appointments, meetings, therapists etc... I just can't imagine. We are so blessed. I am so lucky.

Speaking of Therapists appointments, Dylan saw a Vision Therapist on Wednesday for an evaluation. She came over to see if Dylan's vision is affecting her play and she did some preliminary tests. Dylan would follow something all over but when it's dropped she didn't look down like "Where'd it go?" It's hard because Dylan's definitely not at her peak performance but the Therapist did say she would like to see her every other week. So, okay, bring it on! Early Childhood Intervention is a government program but you pay on a tiered scale, and we pay a monthly fee so I will take all of the services they have to offer. Especially if they have someone available to help which is the greatest problem. When Dylan's better and back to herself we will also see about getting a Speech Therapist to see her as well. Then maybv we will just see the Physical Therapist every other week. Either way, I am not going to be the one to lessen the appointments, they will have to ask me to. I am selfish like that.

We didn't do much this week, still staying in for the most part although I have ventured out to Target and such. I don't think that type of getting out the house is as bad as some since she stays in the car seat... it's not like people are holding her and she's touching things like if we went to someone's house so I went for it.

Duncan's been a little crazy the last couple of days but only when Matthew's home. He's just extra needy and whiney. Even Ami said he didn't make a peep until we walked in the door and then he turned it up a notch or twenty. Course, we did get him up early so he was tired that day. He just wants Matthew all the time, just a sign that Matthew was gone a wee bit too long I think. I hope after this long weekend Duncan will relax a little. He fabulous when we are here by ourselves, I swear!

Duncan had his first Fruit by the Foot the other day...


You wondering what's over there? The TV.


He loved it, and I thought it was kind of fun to watch him eat it since he's never had anything like it before.

You can see that it's after the attempt at lunch right? There are peach remnants on his tray. I tried.

He had his 'crackers' in the back drink holders and his drink next to him on the seat. Dinner and a show.

Ahhh.. Another EEG, good times.

So we went in for another EEG this morning. It was a follow-up to see if the ACTH is working or not. Well, I am getting pretty good at reading these things! Okay, not really, but I can at least tell there's no change from one to the next which I do believe is the case at this point. She actually had an episode as they were putting the little things on her head and then we went to the store after and she had another one... I am going to go with a negatory at this point but what do I know. I will put a call in and hopefully be discussing the next steps this afternoon. Duncan got to spend some time with Aunt Ami and Andy Jack and it seemed like he had a great time... I told Ami there are plenty of opportunities to watch him if she really offers!

Meanwhile, Duncan is adorable. I know, that's old news for everyone right? BUT, get this! He was super whiney yesterday, it was 10:45 in the morning and it was odd because he gets that way before nap time but naps usually aren't until 12:30 or so. Anyway, I start in with a mom threat and I say "What is your deal?! Do you need to go to bed?" his eyes lit up and he goes "yea". And then he quietly climbed down from the couch and I followed him to his room where he stood at his crib with his arms in the air and said "Up, up." So I put him in bed where he then napped for 3 hours. WHAT?! Seriously? I listened closely too, thinking if he didn't go down he could certainly come out but when I went in to get him his car and blankets were right where they were when I put him in there. He literally rolled over and went to sleep! I was shocked! And impressed! What adult reasoning right? I mean seriously, I know I would say 'yea' if someone asked me if I needed to go to bed.

Really, try it, someone ask me. Please?

I will post again when I know more about next steps. Heck, maybe I might have pictures next time too, they better do something especially cute between now and then!