a day at the hospital. November 20, 2009

Miles had his eye surgery today. We have known this day would come since he was about 4 months old. It was nice to finally get it over with. We woke up early and drove to Omaha. We arrived at the hospital and got our “CARES” room. This has been the worst part in the past because Miles loves to crawl and explore and we are stuck in a small room with a big boy  uncomfortably restrained in a stroller. Today, we decided to let him crawl and explore the room. He was a much happier little guy.

Then Miles and Mommy had a little photo shoot. You can really see how his left eye crosses inward.

On the way home, Miles was NOT happy. The nurses gave us elbow splints to keep him from rubbing his eyes. Rubbing your eyes can cause the stitches to burst! yikes!

About 10 minutes into our drive home, we pulled up next to a semi-truck. I heard a quiet little voice in the back say, “choo-choo”- that’s when I knew he was doing just fine! By the time we got home, had a little dinner and watched a little veggie tales, Miles had figured out how to crawl with his elbow splints!

 

my favorite book. November 14, 2009

Here is a video of Miles and I reading his favorite book. You can hear him say a lot of new words (in his own way ) and get a glimpse of his sweet little personality!

children’s museum. November 14, 2009

Today we went to the Children’s museum with Greta’s preschool class. I took lots of great photos with her friends, but I won’t post them on here (I’d have to get consent from each parent first). Here are a few shots of the kids playing.

Of course, Greta found the cakes. This girl loooooves cake. For her birthday last year, she received 2 wooden cake sets from 2 separate people.  She played with them obsessively for about 6 months until she moved on to making her own cakes out of play-dough. Then of course there was the time she put some fresh parsley in an angelfood pan and asked me to put it in the oven. She was genuinely disappointed when I pulled the pan out of the oven and it hadn’t turned into an actual cake.

Then there is Miles and his choo-choo’s. This is his new favorite word and he makes sure to let us know whenever he sees a choo-choo (semi-trucks are also choo-choo’s) which is quite often, especially on the interstate on the way to Mommy’s work.

 

cruising. November 12, 2009

Miles is still not pulling himself up as much as he was about a month ago, but once he is  up he now comfortably cruises around.  He will have an MRI sometime this month to check if he has a tethered spinal cord.  When he stopped pulling himself up altogether a few weeks ago, we were very frustrated because every time we could get him into a standing position, he would cry and repeat “down, down, down!”.  He no longer objects once he is standing, but still rarely will pull himself up to stand. We are baffled, but it is now our goal to work on him getting up and down to the standing position by himself. Here is a video of his newest accomplishment!

 

Happy Halloween! November 1, 2009

The kids and I (Daddy had a performance) had a wonderful Halloween!

First we went to Aunt Jessica’s for a yummy dinner and LOTS of candy. Then we “borrowed” her neighborhood and went trick-or treating.

Miss Greta was a ballerina.

Who naturally did this with her arms whenever she yelled “trick or treat”

Mr. Miles was the oh-so-hip, DJ Lance.

It was the perfect fall evening for a stroll with my two favorite cuties.

 

 

 

so…… October 23, 2009

I was sitting in the dining room this evening catching up on some ever-so-important online news. The children were off playing in Greta’s room.  I could hear them laughing and laughing. Then Miles came to visit me like this-

I’m actually surprised that Greta was willing to share her tutu!

Miles updates. October 21, 2009

Well, we have a few updates from the last couple of weeks.  We recently met with Dr. Legge (Ophthalmologist) and set up Miles’ eye muscle surgery for November 19th. It will be nice to have this out of the way. It will be the last of the planned surgeries.  With a shunt, there is always a chance of an emergency surgery, but so far- so good.

On last Wednesday, one of Miles’ physical therapists decided it would be best not to meet anymore for awhile. Most of these sessions are spent with her trying to get Miles to stand and play, and Miles trying (and succeeding) to get away and explore. The result is that we are making the whole standing thing a very negative experience. She doesn’t want to see Miles until he is standing a lot more.

Then, yesterday- Miles’ other physical therapist and I figured out why Miles has been so wishy-washy with pulling up to stand. Before his big cranial remodeling surgery, he was pulling up to stand a lot. Then it stopped.  We realized that we had started his dilation drops around the same time. He has recently been pulling up to stand a lot again, but last week, stopped! It was also last week that we stopped using the dilation eye drops…hmmmm. We are pretty sure that the changes in his vision are causing him to be less confident and to back track in this area It will be nice to have the surgery over with and quit messing with his eyes!

Miles continues to do great in his Speech therapy sessions.  He now has close to 50 words and is starting to put 2 word phrases together! His favorite words this week are:  “church”, “floor” and “see”. His therapist no longer wants to see him twice a week, only once.

And, finally, on Sunday we moved Miles from the “crawler” nursery at church to the “toddler” nursery.   Even though Miles is not yet “toddling”, we felt he would fit in a little better in that environment. He did very well and one of my friends even said that he made friends with another little girl and had to be closely supervised in the tent

couple new tricks. October 13, 2009

Miles has a couple new tricks! Most people might not think they are a huge deal…but we like to celebrate each new milestone!

Miles has taught himself to drink from a cup! He did this by repeatedly sneaking Greta’s cups off of her little table and finishing off whatever she had left.  We are still working on the occasional spill

In the car today, I told Miles that I loved him. He wrinkled up his eyes and smiled and made the same noise he makes when he is kissing his beloved puppy…and then I realized—he knows what “I love you” means! Kind of a big concept…

10.10.2009 October 10, 2009

Today we woke up to this-

So, we’ve been doing a lot of this-

And some of this-

And we made some of these-

They are unbelievably good and have chick-peas in the dough!

Visit my cooking blog to see this unique recipe.

a growing list. October 5, 2009

of words!!!!

up, down, bye, bath, duck, quack, eat, more, no!, Dad, night-night, car, home, shirt, shoe, T.V., all-done, phone, fork, on, ball, sit, chair, shoe, flower, uh-oh, banana, milk, door, keys, pop, play, Mom, Greta

Just 2 short months ago, Miles began speech therapy. Each word is a miracle to us!