Can You Hear me Now?

Last Monday we had a BBQ at the house with 6 families in attendance and we had a great time. Jamie took everyone on a tractor ride using the flatbed trailer (that has sides) and we all sat on hay bails! Here are some pictures my friends (the photographers) took:


I LOVE this picture that Nicole took of her son Dylan sitting in the wagon with Kinsey
while Aliy's son Jayce (who is 2) tried to pull the wagon. SO cute!


Great photo Aliy took of Jamie's tractor


Tractor Ride!


Kinsey and Nicole's son Dylan in the wagon. They love each other :)

Last weekend we also took a drive up into the mountains along the Poudre River. After driving for a while, we stopped and sat by the river. Kinsey enjoyed playing in the dirt and rocks by the river:



This week Kinsey had a pretty bad allergic reaction to the dog fur and broke out in hives on her arms and face, near her eyes. So I took her back to the allergist today to retest her reaction. They tested her for dogs, cats and bunnies and she reacted to all of them! The dr. wasn't terribly concerned and just said to keep using hydrocortisone cream and gave me the dosage for Benadryl or Zytec too. The good news is that while we were there we tested her egg allergy and it was much less severe - about 1/2 as bad as last time! Still not wise for her to have eggs, but at least that's an improvement and we're moving in the right direction.

Speaking of the bunnies, here are a couple of videos of her playing with the bunnies in the yard. She was really more interested in the grass than the bunnies, but did play with them some. http://youtu.be/oyZ5NmuUkuc and http://youtu.be/P0jn13p50tY

Kinsey also had a follow-up appointment with the Audiologist today. She responded well to the test and demonstrated that she hears at normal levels wearing her hearing aid and can hear voices without it (which we of course knew already). Kinsey's hearing therapist went with us to the appointment and we discussed doing some other tests with the audiologist. I'm going to get in touch with an ENT at Children's Hospital and talk to them about doing an ABR test (one they did when Kinsey was very young, but requires her to be sedated at this point. This measures her brainwave reactions to the sounds rather than relying on her to respond). We're also going to ask for the MRI so we can see the structural makeup of her ears (you might remember we tried to do this sleep deprived when Kinsey was about a year old, but she wouldn't sleep through it so it didn't work). Anyway, she needs to be sedated for both of these procedures, so it would be great to get them both done and finally know exactly what the structure of her ears are and how much she can truly hear. I'll keep you posted on this.

Today we also crashed an all-boy birthday party for my friend Aliy's son Riley. It was a super hero theme and Aliy made all the kids super hero capes - including Kinsey who got this super cool Wonder Woman cape to wear :)



Oh, and Kinsey has weighed in twice this week at (drum roll please) . . . an even 21 lbs!!! It's amazing. It took so long to get up to 20 and now she's already at 21!

Finally, here are a few cute pictures from this week and the pictures from swimming last Friday:


Silly Girl!




At Ben & Jerry's














We are going swimming with Nicole, Hayden & Dylan again on Monday :)

Comprehension

Lately I've noticed that Kinsey is really comprehending some new things.

First, she really understands the concept behind pulling things apart that are stuck together. I guess she's understood this for a while because she's been pulling her lego blocks apart. But it was when I was watching her with the OT on Wednesday that I realized it. They were working with some toys that mesh together - putting them together and taking them apart. She was really interested in it and had to pull fairly hard to get them apart, but she was doing it.

Another thing I've noticed recently is that she understands which way is "up." I've watched her play with a toy car and turn it right side up to put the wheels on the ground to push it back and forth. I've also seen her playing with a stuffed animal and when she puts it down she deliberately puts it down so it is sitting up correctly.

She also really understands putting clothes and shoes on. She can't quite do it herself, but she tries! She will pull her socks off all the time, then try to put them back on. Sometimes she puts them on her hands instead. I've seen her try to put her shoes on before too. Which reminds me - here's the video that wouldn't load last week of her putting a toy on her foot http://youtu.be/-nJbr9okSqs And here's a video of Kinsey trying to put my shoes on her feet: http://youtu.be/RWcT8AqEzfE

Kinsey is really excited about the new bunnies - too excited! We brought them in the house a couple of times this week in a contained area. At first we kept Kinsey outside so she could see them, but then we put her in with them. She really wants to play with them, but she's too rough. I guess since Bailey lets her tug on his legs and ears, she thinks that's ok, but the bunnies are pretty fragile and really lightweight (especially compared to Bailey!) so when she grabs them she drags them across the floor! Poor bunnies. We are trying to teach her to be gentle. Here are some videos and pictures http://youtu.be/UNR-OnwFtgI and http://youtu.be/-Aww8hJbNko





Well, we tried Horse Therapy again today and she hated it. She was excited to see the horse and spent some time petting him before she got on and she was fine up until he started walking. We tried several different things, even had her ride with the instructor, but she cried every time. So that's it for that. Maybe we'll try again next Spring.

We also went swimming today with my friend Nicole and her boys Hayden and Dylan and Kinsey had a great time! We were in the pool for almost 2 hours! I bought Kinsey a new float and she liked that, she also liked sitting in the shallow water on the step, but also enjoyed me holding her and doing some of the same exercises from swimming class. No idea why she cried those last few times at class, but I'm relieved to know she doesn't flat out hate the pool. We're looking forward to another pool playdate soon! And as usual, Nicole took a bunch of pictures - I'll share them after I get them next week.

Finally, we had a meeting this week to adjust Kinsey's therapy plan and all the changes I wanted were approved. So, moving forward Kinsey will get PT twice a week and Hearing will be one 90-minute session a week (or we'll change it to 2 sessions if that's too long at once for Kinsey). I'm looking forward to seeing how that helps, especially with PT stuff.

Therapy Changes Ahead

As I mentioned before (I think), Kinsey is getting better at cruising around furniture and she really wants to do it all the time. She really only cruises to her right. The PT watched her for a bit and thinks she is putting most of her weight on her left leg so that's why it's easier for her to go to the right moving the right foot first. We're working on some things to help with weight shifting.  Here's a video of her cruising the waiting area at Bonefish from Mother's Day: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwGgt23ioFk

Unfortunately, she's still pretty unsteady on her feet which is a bad mix with her wanting to walk all the time. She'll hardly let you hold her anymore because she wants to get down all the time. She was cruising around the chairs at Dairy Queen the other night and had a pretty bad fall - she's got some big bruises on her face :( It's so hard that she wants to walk, but isn't steady enough to do it and I hate it when she gets hurt.

Along those lines, I'm working with the early intervention program to increase Kinsey's PT to twice a week. I (and the PT) think she would benefit from that since we have so much to work on that an hour a week just isn't enough. Also because every time something changes (like the new braces) or Kinsey gets sick, we have such major setbacks. Kinsey was standing on her own for 2-3 minutes before we changed the braces and now she hardly does it at all and walking is not as good either. The program is designed for once a week for the therapists to teach me to do things in between their visits, but that's not working. Kinsey's PT is willing and able to come twice a week, so we just have to get the program to agree to that. We're also working on increasing hearing to twice a week. We kind of have that now, but with two different people and I don't feel like that's working since neither knows what the other is doing. One of the ladies does a great job with Kinsey and I'd like to have her come twice a week - again she is willing and able, so we'll see.

We did cancel the Nutritionist who was coming monthly. While she had good suggestions, it didn't seem like anything we did made a difference in Kinsey's weight and it was just an added stress for me to have her come weigh her every month. I have a scale and can weigh her whenever I want and she gave me copies of the growth charts so I can keep track myself. Speaking of which, Kinsey is back up to 20 lbs again (I think it was 20 lbs 9 oz the other day).

The weather has been beautiful here this week - we went straight from Winter to Summer. Kinsey and I spent some time outside and played in her pool this week:








We went for our first official horse therapy appointment today (last week was an evaluation) and she hated it this time. She did the same thing with swimming - loved it the first time, but hated it after that. I don't get it. She's willing to try everything once, but that's it I guess. We're going back next Friday to try again, but if that doesn't go well that will be it for a while. I hope today was just a fluke and she likes it again next week.

It's beginning to look like a real farm around here - we are now the proud owners of 2 bunnies! The friend of mine we borrowed the bunny from for Kinsey's Easter pictures decided to get rid of their bunnies and we decided to take them :) We got their hutch and everything with them so they're all set up in the backyard and feel right at home (I don't think they even know they're in a different place since they're in the same hutch). They're both girls, just like the pigs (Jamie is seriously outnumbered around here now - he's just got his trusty buddy Bailey!) Anyway, we just picked them up tonight so we haven't had any time to play with them yet, but here are some pictures.






(Bailey is trying to harass the bunnies!)

Here's a video of Kinsey being silly in the bathtub putting a toy on her foot: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fY7VzmUVEjU

And here's a picture of Kinsey being silly with my shoes - she puts them on her arms like a purse the scoots around the house with them:

Kinsey is 2 1/2!!!

Today (Friday) was Kinsey's 1/2 birthday so she's now 2 1/2! We had a great day today with fabulous weather and lots of fun. Jamie took the day off and we went to the Zoo. Kinsey made friends with a monkey, got really excited when we watched an elephant get hosed down, got "pounced on" by a big cat (thank heavens for the thick glass between us - he really walked directly to her and jumped at the glass!), saw the sea lions swimming, and of course enjoyed watching all the other kids too. Here's a video of Kinsey playing some drums with Jamie: http://youtu.be/eGt8M-oFAgs








Then we came home and Kinsey had half a cake for her half birthday. We let her have the cake and she was pretty unsure about it at first, but then started digging in. She doesn't like when things stick to her fingers so she kept trying to get the icing off her hands. She was pretty funny! http://youtu.be/HZklcPf4ayk











In other news, we've had a busy, busy week! We went for an evaluation for the horse therapy this week and that went really well. They are in the middle of a 5-week course right now, so we're going to do the remaining 2 weeks of that, then we'll start a new 5-week course in June if Kinsey still likes it. It's 30 minutes of riding with one person walking the horse and another person walking alongside providing Kinsey with support. She did a great job holding onto the saddle and maintaining her balance. We had a little trouble getting the riding helmet to fit her, so we're going to try her bike helmet next time. They work on PT and OT things with her on the horse so I think it will be really good for her. http://youtu.be/odisKqAMQx4





Kinsey's been super talkative most of the week and been doing "the" with her tongue a lot lately. I even captured it on video: http://youtu.be/tgKLVM7bPY8

One of our neighbors recently got 10 cows and I love seeing them roam around. One night this week we went over to visit them:



This is just a funny picture of Kinsey sucking on both of her thumbs at once!

The week before last, Kinsey's PT finally got her to stand on her own again, for the first time since she got her new splints. She's still unsure about it, but is getting more comfortable and has even let go of my hand a couple of times to stand up on her own.

The week before last we also discovered that Kinsey understands the concept of walking up stairs! I was working with her on it a while back by helping her bend her knee and pick up her foot to step up the stairs, but I haven't been working on it for a while. Then one day I was helping her walk around and we got to a step and she picked her foot up on her own! She does it all the time now - not perfect, but she does it! I've been meaning to get it on video, but haven't yet.

Last Friday we had 1/2 birthday pictures taken with our friend and photographer Nicole. She did such a wonderful job with these photos I couldn't possibly pick a favorite! We are so lucky to have met Nicole, and not just for the pictures, she's also a great friend! Here are a bunch of the pics from our session: