We are officially heading into our 6th month of winter here in Minnesota. Yes, you heard me right… 6 months of winter!! I heard on the radio this afternoon that we got our first measurable snowfall here on November 8 and we are expected to get a few inches tomorrow night into Wednesday. I am so sick of winter! They say that Minnesota has 2 seasons – winter and road construction. Considering we’re having snow this week and the main street in our little town is closed for the next 3 weeks to install new sewer lines, I’d say that’s about right!
Other than the winter that never ends, things are going pretty well around here. I haven’t posted much because there hasn’t been much to report. We had a very nice Easter, and Leah had a fun time collecting Easter eggs around the house. I filled a few plastic eggs with Cheerios and puff snacks, and those kept her quite busy at church. She has been having a lot of fun opening and closing the eggs, so I’ve kept those out. And she looked so ridiculously cute in her little dress. Having a girl is fun just because of the adorable clothes!
In the world of physical therapy, we are concentrating our efforts on getting her to learn how to turn her wheelchair. We work on that in PT and also at home, and she’s starting to get it. Just this morning she turned around with one hand and got herself unstuck from the kitchen cupboards. We’ve also been using her stander, though not as much as we probably would should… but I think we’ll start using it more now that she really likes being in it. The stander holds her upright with straps around her feet and knees, and then it has a vest that velcro’s around her tummy. She really doesn’t like it, so don’t do the straps over her shoulders, but she still pulls at the ones across her chest. So I figured I’d try standing her up without them altogether, and she did awesome. She liked it so much more! I have to wedge her between 2 ottomans so she doesn’t tip too far forward, and she still needs some of that support, but her upper body is really strong. We’ve been playing catch with her new ball and she also loves playing with her toys while having a little more freedom with her arms and being upright.
Leah’s big girl wheelchair has been ordered, and the process will take 2-3 months for us to actually get it in our home. We customized it for what we wanted and now it has to go to our PT doctor, then to insurance to process the claim, then back to the wheelchair company to actually make the chair for her. We tested a chair for about a week and then the wheelchair company rep came out to ask what things we wanted on Leah’s chair. As far as customization goes, we decided we probably didn’t need shoulder straps, so we got a belt to go around the waist and side bumpers to help with her balance. All of these can be changed out if she needs more support or less, depending on her needs down the road. Once she gets a little older, she may not need the side bumpers, so they can easily take those off. Of course we had to pick out a fun color for the rails, and it will be a sparkly silver… subtle but still girly. While I am very excited for this, it makes it very real that this will be her mode of transportation. Back when we found out about Leah’s SB, I kept saying I could handle a physical disability… now that it’s here, it’s a little hard to see it in real life.
As far as language skills goes, she still doesn’t have any real words, though she is getting better at doing a few signs. She can say “more” and “all done” very well. She knows please, thank you, milk and eat, but she’ll only do it when prompted. She says mama, dada, na-na, baba and is starting to make lots of other sounds, but nothing is directed to anyone or anything in particular. She does have lots of different expressions and makes all sorts of noises that I think mean, “oh my gosh what is that noise??!!” when she hears and airplane or train. Then there’s the “kitty kitty kitty kitty come here right now so I can pet you” sound, and the ear-piercing screech when she doesn’t like something. She is definitely communicating with us, just not with words, though I know that it will come soon. It has to, they’re all right there on the tip of her tongue!
She is learning and changing so much. It’s really fun to try and teach her new tricks because for now, she’ll actually do what we tell her. I also love watching her work really hard, and she constantly amazes us with what she CAN do. I’m so proud of her!
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