A Very Busy Week and Not Much Sleep

This week we've had too many doctor/therapy appointments! It's my own fault for scheduling too many things in one week, but the upside is we don't have many appointments again for a while. In addition to our regular three weekly therapy sessions (PT, Speech and OT), we had a follow-up with ENT, Cardiology and a check up with the pediatrician.

That many appointments in and of itself is overwhelming and frustrating, but spending hours waiting for the doctors makes it even worse! On Tuesday, we waited more than an hour to even see the ENT. Then when we went to the Cardiologist on Thursday, we were there for 2 hours and never even saw the doctor! We saw a nurse, a tech to do an EKG and a tech to do an Echo and some other doctor that wasn't ours, but after two hours, I decided it was time to take Kinsey home. She was tired and I was just plain tired of being there. I told them they could have the doctor call me with the results (the firt doctor had already said everything looked good).

Anyway, the ENT said we need to do a CAT Scan in the next few months so we can tell for sure what the deal is with her ears. If they are blocked by just skin, he will be able to open up her ears at the same time that they do the surgery to repair her cleft.  If it turns out to be bone, they won't be able to fix that until she is much older (5 or 6 years). The only problem with the CAT Scan is that we have to sedate her to do it (there's no way she would stay still otherwise). It would be an outpatient procedure, but still a little scary. We haven't scheduled it yet and I think we'll wait until December or maybe even January.

Kinsey's pediatrician appointment was routine. The doctor said she is doing well. She got her flu shot and has to go back for a second dose after her first birthday. We are still dealing with the rash on her face. It seems to respond to heavy moisturizer, but then it comes back all of a sudden. For a few days we thought it was related to a fabric in her crib, but we are back to thinking it has something to do with her food. The doctor said allergy testing wouldn't necessary reveal the cause of a rash reaction, so we just need to try to figure it out on our own. She also said it's obvious that she just has sensitive skin and we're always going to have to work on that.

On another note, Kinsey is getting two more teeth! One of her top two front teeth has already cut through and you can feel and see it. The doctor said the one next to it is coming soon too. As a result, Kinsey hasn't been sleeping very well, which made all the appointments this week even more annoying.

In spite of all that, we've still had some fun this week. Here are some pictures and videos:

She will eat anything!

I mean anything!

This is her first time in the seat of a shopping cart :)

Playing with her toys in the shopping cart

She did pretty well, but I'm glad we had the pillows on the sides of her so she could lean on them.

Standing on Daddy

Look at that smile!

Video: Kinsey Standing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_hEKQxjG9Y

Beach Photos

We FINALLY got to do our beach photo shoot last weekend. For those of you who don't know, it's been rescheduled about 6 times over the last 2 months, mostly because of weather. The postive side is that Kinsey learned how to sit up on her own in those 2 months so we got some great pictures! We only have a few of the pictures so far (see below), but more to come soon.

Here's a video I took of her at the beach. I think the sun was too bright and she was squinting, but she liked it otherwise. We are going to take her back to beach to play one night this weekend (weather permitting). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7burpf1m0A

The rash on Kinsey's face keeps coming and going. We're pretty sure it's related to her food and we'll end up doing allergy testing. Otherwise, this has been a quiet week. Enjoy the photos:

Such a big girl sitting on the beach by herself!

She liked the waves! And get a load of that double chin!

I took this one - love those chubby thighs!

Happy 10 Months!

Today (Saturday) is Kinsey's 10 Month Birthday and she reached an even 17 pounds too!

Tomorrow we are (FINALLY) doing the beach photo shoot that was supposed to be 2 months ago, but kept getting postponed mostly because of weather. The good news is that she has learned to sit in those two months and we should be able to get some good pictures! Kinsey has only been to the beach once (when she was very little and it was cold) so I'm excited to see how she reacts to it. We're going to put her feet in the water too :)

The rash on her face and arms seems to be getting better. We were not able to take her off of formula last weekend because she wouldn't eat the cereal or pedialyte. So we gave her formula, but no food instead. That combined with the hydrocortisone seemed to make things better. We still went to see the Pediatric Dermatologist on Tuesday though. She said she thought it was viral, possibly related to the Croup she had recently. The rash seemed to come back a little bit when we started giving her food again, but only slightly and it looks different than her arm (which is almost completely better now). We may end up at a Pediatric Allergist if the rash on her face gets worse or continues to show up.

She really wants to sit up all the time, but still isn't completely steady. She's even trying to sit up straight when she's in her carseat. Since she's about to outgrow her carseat (for her height, not weight), we went ahead and picked out a new carseat that will grow with her up to 100 lbs. Pop-Pop bought it for her as an early birthday present. We haven't put in the car yet, but I did set it up in the living room the other day and let her sit in it. I think she likes it:

She also wants to stand up! She's good at bearing weight on her legs, but she doesn't straighten up her body all the way. She obviously doesn't stand up on her own yet, but if you're holding onto her arms, she can do it pretty well.

We're into Football season now so of course Kinsey is sporting her Gator outfits :) Here are some pictures:

I made this dress for her

The cheerleader on her outfit and the doll (from Aunt Cheri) match each other :)

That's it for this week. Here's a fun picture of Kinsey and Daddy playing and some videos too!

Videos:

Playing with her new blocks (these are helping to open her hands more):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBG8Eov7o7U

Laughing (I FINALLY got video of her most adorable laugh!):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18zip6868lU

Sitting up on her own (she falls at the end and starts to scream):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TQlZfuGBao

Go Away Rash

So the medicine the doctor gave us for the rash seemed to be working. In fact, by Tuesday it looked like it had completely healed, but then on Wednesday we started seeing little red bumps on one of her arms and both hands. Then the bumps came back on her face. It’s not as bad and doesn't look quite the same as before and it still doesn’t seem to be bothering her (although maybe that’s what has been waking her up in the night so much this week). We continued the medicine until today and even started putting it on her arms, but it just got worse so we went back to the doctor again today. Now we’re putting hydrocortisone on it and aquaphor everywhere to see if that helps. It is possible that she’s grown allergic to her soy formula, so we’re also eliminating her formula for a few days (foods we know are save with cereal added and pedialyte only for 3 days). We will see how that goes over the weekend and talk to the doctor again on Tuesday. She is also referring us to a pediatric dermatologist (yeah, Kinsey get’s yet another doctor!). Hopefully this will get better and/or we will figure out the cause soon!

Other than that it’s been a quiet week. Kinsey had Speech again this week. They watched how she eats and said she is doing well (she is eating so much better in the high chair!). We have some exercises to “wake up her mouth” before eating. We also have some new activities and noises to do with her to develop her listening skills.

Here are two pictures from this week -  Jamie tried to take her in the Bjorn on the tractor to mow the lawn. She was fine with it until he dropped the mower deck on the tractor, then she started screaming. I snapped these picture before that though: