Wonderful News!

Madison's physical therapist was very pleased with her progress this week. She's going to PT twice a month right now, and her overall strength is very good. She is a bit weak in the inner thighs, buttocks, and ankles, but all of these muscle groups are stronger than we anticipated. It's very exciting to me. :)

She isn't really interested in getting around too much. She sits, and plays, talks, and yells like crazy. But I believe, even if she didn't have SB, she wouldn't be on the move yet. She's just very laid back physically. She can sit, get into the crawling position, roll over, and almost gets into the sitting position on her own. But, she rarely does these things unless someone is working with her. She crawls backwards when she tries, which is very typical of an early crawler. She turned 9 months on the 10th, so she's a bit delayed in crawling, but not much.

She is just a sweetheart though, and we love to see her smile and giggle and talk to us. She is very kissy and cuddly too. Hannah and Abigail are starting to really enjoy her as well.

I am going to try and get some new pictures of her up on the site. We are way behind on that due to camera troubles.

Home life in general is going well. The boys are busy with school, art class, piano, and playgroup activities. Hannah is taking some horseback riding lessons. (pretty low-keyed aimed at 3-4 year-olds) She LOVES this. Abby went with us today, and was able to ride the horse a bit as well, and just threw a FIT when she had to get down.

So, we are staying busy, and enjoying the Fall. We canned about 80 quarts of grape juice this last week. A first for me, but it was worth the effort. Very good juice, thank you Grandpa Dennis!!

Also, we saw the ophthalmologist last week, and Madison doesn't have ANY issues with her eyes. I'm so happy about that. With as many issues as SB kids can have, every one we DON'T have is a huge blessing.

Thank you all for your continued prayers and interest. I'll try and keep the blog updated as needed.

Catching up....

I realized after my last post that I never posted about Madison's shunt revision. We went into the ER on the 18th, and I posted at that time about my concerns. She did have a UTI, and broke her first tooth, followed quickly by another. The following week we took her in to see the neurosurgeon for a follow-up on the ER visit. I had figured by that time that her troubles were due to the UTI, teething, and possibly my imagination. However, her head circumference had gone up 1 1/2cm since her ER visit the week before (head growth should be about 1/2-1cm a month at this age), so he decided to do an MRI right then, and it showed definite enlargement of her ventricles. So, at 5pm we were admitted to OHSU. I was not prepared to stay 2 hours from home, my mother and young son Ethan were with us, and Tim was working out of town 1 hour away from home, and 3 hours from Portland.

So, my daughter (Linda, 21) stayed with the rest of the crew at home, and my dad brought me clothes and things, picked up my mom and Ethan at 10pm or so, and I stayed in Portland with Madison. She had to fast from about 3am since they were working her into the surgery schedule, but they didn't get her in until around 4:30pm. It was a long day, but she did quite well with the fasting. We hung out together and watched Baby Einstein a whole bunch. I posted a new video that I took with my phone. I took this just minutes before they wheeled her away for surgery. She's amazingly happy for fasting over 14 hours.

So, she recovered well, and has been making great strides in her development since then. She's bearing weight really well, and getting up on all fours to try and crawl. She scoots backwards instead of forwards, but seeing her reach these milestones is simply lovely. :)

My mother-in-law Carol passed away last week, and we have been mourning her, yet praising the Lord for his tender mercies. She's in a better place for sure. She was always loving and warm and a great blessing to our family. We will miss her....

Fall is Here!

Today was the perfect Fall day.... Just beautiful. I love this time of year here in Oregon. The air is crisp and clean, and the sun is bright. The leaves are just starting to turn a bit, and acorns litter our driveway.

I have not updated in a while. Sorry! The boys are starting back to school and piano, and are doing well so far. We spent a week in a chalet at Eagle Crest with my parents, and wore them out with swimming and activities. It was nice way to start the school year. We visited the High Desert Museum, and it was fantastic! I will get some pictures up as soon as I can. (having some trouble with my camera software)

Madison is doing great since her surgery in August. Recovery was a breeze, and she is perky and adorable. Her hair is growing very fast, and you can hardly see her incision already. She is sitting perfectly, and we are trying to get her to learn how to lie down and sit up on her own. She uses all the right muscles, but isn't terribly motivated to do it if no one is encouraging her to. We also are having her stand, even though she balances (or not) on her heels, we still want to encourage her to hold her little buttocks in and hold herself erect. She's doing great with this. We go back to the physical therapist next week, so we'll get an assessment again. She gets up on all fours (crawling position) but mainly when she is MAD and crying. Basically, she is very content to sit and watch all the commotion going on around her. I can't blame her, it's pretty entertaining to watch Hannah and Abigail run around and get into things. But, so far, she's meeting her early milestones, and that is a wonderful thing to say the least.

We will be looking at braces for standing some time this fall. We also saw the urologist this week, and her renal ultrasound looked good. We go in next week for another urodynamics study, which will check her bladder pressures and how well she fills and empties the bladder. Her urologist was very optimistic about her appt though, so I'm not really worried.

So, life is going pretty well here in our household. Still working on routines and organization with all these little ones, but slowly it seems to be coming together. When I look back over the last 9 months, I feel like I've been in a bit of a haze, and I'm hoping to feel more "on top" of things as time goes on. Life just seems to run me right now, but I *think I'm getting a grip, Lord willing. :)