Happy Easter!!!!

Happy Easter to all!! I took these pics last night as I was getting their outfits ready for today. Chris woke up in the middle of the night with a high fever and body aches and coughing his head off, so needless to say we did not make it to church today. We had a new one all picked out, drove past it yesterday so we would know where it was this morning, but I am not brave enough to take the 2 kids bymyself so we are just hanging out at home today! Poor Chris, 2 guys at the academy have strep throat, I'm trying my best to keep the kids away from him!!! Anyhow, enjoy the funny pics.....



Cheesy Bunny!














Awww, looks so sweet!




























I had to give her baby so she would
leave the ears alone.















Oh-uh













My little flower

















Hunter said he wanted to
be flower-man!




























What in the world is on
bubba's head???

Happy World Down Syndrome Day!!!

Ella is holding a bottle of Saline nose drops as she was a little stuffy this morning when she woke up. You will notice in one of the pictures that she is trying to get the cap off. I will have you know that my little genius somehow unscrewed the top off of a big tub of Aquaphor last night (we use it nightly on her face to keep it from being chapped) and had a handful of it before I could get it from her!!! What a fun greasy mess that was, complete with a temper tantrum when I took it away from her!!!

So, today is World Down Syndrome Day, here is the explanation....

"Down Syndrome International (DSI) has officially earmarked 21 March as World Down Syndrome Day (WDSD). The date was chosen to signify the uniqueness of Down syndrome in the triplication (trisomy) of the 21st chromosome and is used synonymously with Down syndrome." http://www.worlddownsyndromeday.org/

Today was Ella's second day at the Guild School. It's pretty overwhelming, more so for me than her it seems. She is by far the youngest in her class and therefore the lowest functioning. All of the other kids (so far) can walk and have several words, they have various disabilities though some are not evident to me, maybe premature? Her teachers assure me that there is a little boy with Down syndrome in her class who is more on her level, but he has been sick. I am the only parent that stays in the class the whole time and it is just strange. I feel like I'm playing with a doll sometimes, for example they did a little Easter Egg hunt today in the gym (ya know hidden in plain site) how do you tell an 18 month old to go find eggs? I know this is all good for her though. The PT and OT are already pretty challenging for her but she does well. Speech is another story. She just does not seem to like Speech Therapy. I am so proud though, she did the "more" sign several times today, (she started sign language on Wednesday.) She is a very smart girl!! The teachers/therapists keep commenting on how non-baby like she is, they say she seems really mature for her age as compared to others in the school her age. They like that she really concentrates on things and has a long attention span. I guess it's better to be the lower functioning kid in class and have others to look up to and copy than the other way around. I do really like the school, it's going to be great for her!!!

Cutie!!!

Ella LOVES to watch the video montage of herself that I did back in December. When she hears the music start she crawls over to the computer and sits on my lap and watches. Last night she was really rocking out to the song, so I had my mom hold her and I grabbed the camera. Naturally she settled down once I got out the camera but was still cute, so I thought I would share.....

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

PS: The kids just got out of the tub and I just threw some clips in Ella's hair, that is why it is crazy!

PSS: I am aware that Ella is wearing boys pj's she went through a spell where the one pieces that were wide enough to fit her were WAY too long and the girl 2 pieces the arms and legs were too small.

All Better

Okay I'm over it, really. Today was a good day. The Guild school called and said that they are able to get Ella in starting next Wednesday, I'm so excited as she wasn't supposed to be in till mid- April! Also, we went to a Baby Fair here in town last Wednesday and I dropped my name in to a drawing for some prize, and I won!!! I don't know what all is in but they said it is valued at $100 including a $50 gift certificate to Babies-R-Us. YAY me!!! I LOVE to shop for baby stuff : ) Anyhow, here are some pics my mom was trying to take when I was getting Ella ready for a bath tonight. She has been so funny lately and making some hilarious faces..





Look how long her hair is getting











Seriously?? I'm NAKED!!










A lady today told me that the insides of Ella's eyes look like lace.










I am cute and funny!!!

Evaluations SUCK!!!

Okay, I get that they are a necessary tool, but I now officially HATE evaluations!! The guild school called yesterday and moved our appointment to today, which that part went fine. But the speech therapist, (who is very sweet!) came in and went over Ella's scores from the day before. The special ed teacher rated her cognitive skills at 13 months, Speech and language was receptive skills 13 months, expressive skills 12 months, Physical Therapist rated her gross motor skills at 10 months, OT rated her fine motor at 10 months on the Bayley scale and 14 month on the adaptive behavior subtest. Talk about a sucker punch to the gut. It caught me really off guard. 10 months old??? Really??? Ella is 18 months old, that's 8 months behind, almost half her age. Ugh. I guess I have perhaps been in denial, or have I?
None of this takes away from how amazing and wonderful I think Ella is, it just makes me think I should be working harder with her. I don't know. Just a crappy day. I do take comfort knowing that this school is not going to cut her any slack and she will be working hard. They are going to go ahead and put her into group therapy 2X a week for 2 hours a day. All though I don't really know how much group time she will have, they are recommending 45 min a week of OT, 45 min of PT a week, and speech 2 times a week, all of which she will be pulled out of group for. She will not be starting till the 2nd week of April, which sucks, she hasn't had services since Jan, so I'm not happy about that, but what can you do.
Okay, I'm not going to be down in the dumps anymore, I'm over it, or at least I'm forcing myself to be. They did say some really nice things about Ella and I KNOW that she really is doing so good, I am blessed far beyond my wildest dreams and these stupid tests don't mean anything!!!
I think since we won't be going in till April and they expressed a fair amount of concern about her hip laxity that I am going to go ahead and order the Hip Helper shorts on my own. They are only $15 and I figure it's better to get started now. Well thats it, off to bed I go!!!

Hunter's B-day and other stuff....

Yesterday was my sweet baby boy's 4th birthday! I am the mother of a 4 year old, really??? I just cannot believe how fast the time has gone by. Hunter is very smart, hilarious, and compassionate. I am a VERY lucky mommy!!!

Here we are leaving Red Robin
his favorite restaurant













Save our world!!!






























1st real baseball glove!











The BIG surprise.











Woo Hoo a train table!













Playing with Daddy












Cake time!











Obviously I made the cake.
Luckily he is 4 and doesn't really
care what it looked like. He said
he wanted chocolate cake with
sprinkles.







Enough pictures!











YAY!! May all your wishes
come true sweet boy!









Today was Ella's 2 hour evaluation at the Guild School. Talk about rough, well on me not on her. I go in there thinking she is going to blow them out of the water, which she did do WONDERFUL, but instead I am just shown all I see are the things that she is not doing. There were 4 therapists doing her evaluation, it was quite interesting. So, I learned that Ella's trunk muscles are very weak, which I was not aware of. They want her to try some different braces for her ankles, they also want to try some things for her hips which are apparently very weak, either some shorts things are straps, I'm not really sure about that, they want her to meet with an orthopedist soon. There were other little things like they set three objects in front of her and asked her to pick the ball and she would get something else, stuff like that. I don't know why it effected me the way it did. I guess I am always of the mind set that Ella is doing so good so when things are pointed out to me that she is behind in it hurts my heart a bit. Anyhow, tomorrow we are meeting with the schools pediatrician for 45 minutes then the therapists are supposed to go over Ella's scores with me and let me know the plan from there. I am very excited about her going to this school, there is SO much equipment there that they use with the kids and they are all very nice and you can tell that they love their jobs. Well, I guess I better get to bed!!!

100th POST!!!!

Wow!! 100 posts. Didn't really realize it till I hit the new post button so I don't have anything deep to say : ) Next Tuesday Ella has her 2 hour evaluation at the Spokane Guild Schools (http://www.guildschool.org/ ) I am really excited about it. She will be meeting with a team of 4 people, then the week after that she has a 45 min appointment with the pediatrician that works with the kids at the Guild. I'm kind of nervous about it, I don't know why. I hope she has a good day, I'm always worried that Ella will be tired or in one of her moods, she doesn't really like to perform on command. I always want people to see all of her tricks, so they know how smart she is, it shouldn't be that important to me but it is.

Anyhow, Monday is my sweet baby boy's 4th birthday. 4 YEARS OLD!!! I cannot believe it!!! Hunter is such a good boy and he is so sweet. He went with Chris to Walmart tonight and came running in the door and said "Mommy, we got these flowers for you for Valentine's Day!!!" Chris said they walked in Walmart and Hunter went up to the flowers and asked if he could get flowers for Mom. I don't know why the whole Valentine's Day thing came in, not like I got any on the actual day : ) But isn't that just SO sweet!!