Sunday, August 30, 2009

Catching up on some pics

Addy has started to love shopping. Can you tell by the pic?



Addy has started walking with canes at therapy. They are two very basic canes that she holds and uses as walking sticks. Her PT has been very impressed that she hasn't needed much help with patterning or physical help. When school begins again next week, her PT through early intervention is planning on working with her using forearm crutches. We are excited about that.



Addy has loved helping around the house lately. She will help me wash dishes, start the dishwasher and do the laundry. Hopefully that will transfer over to chores in the near future.



We visited another splash park with Cousin Reese and Aunt Colleen. During the previous splash park adventure, Addy was a little timid of the water. When she would get into the middle with lots of spray, she would start crying and I would have to rescue her. Well, by this splash park she has gotten over the timidness of the sprayers. She was all over the place and seemed to migrate toward the areas with more water.


Sunday, August 23, 2009

Camping again

We headed out for camping again this weekend. This time with the Benders. Steph and Marty have a little girl, Kaya, who is just a few months older than Addy. The girls were like two peas in a pod. It was monkey see, monkey do all weekend with each of them taking turns on being the leader. Both girls had similar interests and enjoyed playing with each other. By the end of the weekend they wanted to take each other home to be their "sister". The weather was not great, so we couldn't do our plan of swimming and hanging out at the beach, but we still had fun just hanging out and playing in our long pants and long shirts. Thanks Benders for a fun weekend!













Thursday, August 20, 2009

The Wiggles

We took Addy to The Wiggles show on Friday night. The Wiggles seem to be number one on her list lately. I think it's because they sing and dance and boy does she like to do both of those. We had floor tickets at the Palace. We arrived early as it can be difficult sometimes going to those kind of events. You never quite know what the seating arrangements will be like and it's too far to carry her so we have to bring a stroller. We got seated on the floor and we decided since we were on an end seat that Addy could utilize her walker to stand and dance as that is typically what most of the kids do at these shows. So Aaron ran back to the car to get the walker. The security crew quickly approached us and I thought for sure they were going to tell us that she couldn't use the walker....fire hazard to be in the aisle way, blah, blah. blah. But, much to our surprise, they removed the end chair to make room for her walker. How nice was that! Then before we knew it they were back again telling us that they were keeping an eye out on the front row and any empty seats once the show started would be ours. Even nicer!

So the show began....Addy was in awe of seeing these guys that she watches on TV actually be there in real life and before we knew it we were being shuffled to the front row. Talk about saucers for eyes. The look on Addy's face was priceless and watching her dance with her walker the entire show was even more priceless. Every time I tried to pick her up and put her on my lap, she wasn't having it. At the end of the show, we had several people walk up to us including security personnel and tell us that they couldn't even watch the show because they were to busy watching Addy dance. Nothing like stealing the show from The Wiggles. You go girl!




Ice Cream....Yum!!!


Sunday, August 16, 2009

Splash Park

We had tried to go to the Splash Park in Grand Rapids earlier in the summer, but the weather did not cooperate with us. We tried again this past Thursday and the weather was beautiful. Grandma Kris came with us and we met Steph and Kaya there. Addy and Kaya had a great time. We started in the Splash Park area and eventually meandered down to the beach. Addy decided to take her walker into the water. We had never done that before, but she was determined. It worked out well and allowed her to be independent wading into the water. Fun, fun, fun!











Wednesday, August 12, 2009

I'm a big kid now!

Lots of changes for Addy lately. This past weekend we changed her crib into a bed. I was a little nervous how she would do with it. We really could have left her in the crib for sometime to come since she physically is unable to climb out of it, but we thought with the potty training and a couple of other things, we would keep moving in the "big girl" direction. Well, things worked out well. Addy loves it, constantly talks about it and has had no issues sleeping in her new bed.





The potty training has taken a huge step forward. She is now telling us from time to time that she has to go and is holding it much longer than before. She still has an occasional accident, but for the most part she has been staying dry all day. I thought this day would never come so it feels like such an accomplishment. I even thought about giving up and trying again later, but I'm glad I stuck with it.

Addy is also now completely independent with eating utensils. We had a hard time getting her to do everything on her own. As soon as meal time would start, she would ask for help and begin crying because the spoon and fork were difficult for her. She no longer asks for help and has mastered the utensil use!

We are still having some issues with her braces. She does well with them when she is weight bearing, but as soon as the weight bearing stops, she's complaining that they hurt. We have had them modified twice, but I still don't think we have the issue fixed completely.

So, lots of changes lately. Addy is just growing up so fast. Great changes to see, but makes me sad to see her getting so big so fast.





Sunday, August 2, 2009

Let the potty training begin......wait, I mean end!

I knew that my goal this summer was to get Addison potty trained. I potty train students in my classroom all the time, so I had a good idea of how to begin thankfully. Before summer began, we went to the store and picked out a Dora potty chair. Can I just tell you that potty's definitely are not made the way they used to be. These days you basically get a round piece of plastic and your lucky if the hole if big enough for your butt to sit on. I was worried about the potty having enough support for Addison. The Dora potty actually had the tallest back of all of them, believe it or not! I just knew that was going to be the one she would pick.

Once home, it wasn't the greatest potty in the world. Since she can't stand by herself, she needs something supportive enough that can take her weight for leaning and pulling down pants. This one definitely did not fit that bill. We used it anyway, just to acclimate her to sitting on a potty.


Then as the school year came to an end, I decided to bring home an adaptive potty chair from school. This one was wonderful. It actually has arms that she can stand at to get her pants down and after a while she figured out how to turn around and get herself on the potty. Much better.


So, summer was here and we began. We went and bought Dora underwear along with some pull-ups for those out and about times. It took about two days for her to catch on to the concept of peeing on the potty. From there we started using underwear at home and pull-ups away from home. Yes, she had accident after accident, sometimes we got lazy and just used the pull-ups, but you could tell that the pull-ups had the same concept to her as diapers. This went on for about a month and then I had to take a two week class which meant that Addy had to return to daycare. I was so worried that with going back to daycare that the little bit of potty training I had instilled would be lost. I was actually surprised and they followed through with putting her on the potty. She had several days of being dry all day.

I vowed that after the 2 weeks at daycare, we would start with underwear only, even when out and about. I can't seem to get her to tell me when she needs to use the bathroom:( We are still having occasional accidents, but if I stay on top of her I can usually get her to stay dry all day. She's still not telling me when she needs to go and I am hoping that this will come with time. Even when wearing underwear, she doesn't seemed phased by having accidents. Darn it....I was hoping that she would hate the wet feeling.

I even went out and then bought a toilet seat ring thinking that if she got to go through the process of flushing and watching that might entice her some more. The potty ring is harder for her physically, the only benefit is that we can actually use it in the bathroom. we have 2 very small bathrooms, so have had to set the other potty seats outside of the bathroom.


I am noticing that when I ask her if she needs to go, she will always tell me "no". I have figured out that it's because the potty routine is very difficult for her physically. It's a lot of work for not just her, but me as well. By the end of the day I feel exhausted. If we are home, I have found it much easier to leave her bottomless so we aren't dealing with the pants every time. I guess we will just keep plugging along and hope that the verbalization issue comes in time.