Exciting July

It is the last day of July, and we had a very busy and exciting month.  Now I'm in a lull before the next busy wave of activity happens.  3 weekends ago we welcomed my brother, sister-in-law, their boys and my parents to town for a few days.  They came up on Friday afternoon, and we had a pretty jam-packed 3 days.  On Saturday we went to the Mall of America to see the aquarium and then of course we had to get on a couple rides.  It was so cute seeing Leah on one of the little rides.  It was one of those little carousels that you put a dollar into, and she kept signing for "more" when it stopped.  Of course her daddy and grandpa put plenty of money to keep her happy.  The rest of the weekend we hung out, ate good food, went to the pool, took a little boat ride around the lake, and spent some fun time together.  I love having company... but I also love having my quiet house back :)

The following weekend we thought we'd have a nice relaxing time around the house, but we ended up with a sick kiddo.  I'm not sure exactly what happened, but she felt really warm on Saturday with a low-grade fever.  It was around 100 and she was acting her normal, happy self so we weren't too concerned until Sunday morning when she had a 104 fever.  That got our attention!  We talked to Dr. Marker and watched her pretty closely.  She ended up sleeping for almost the entire day and just wanted to be held.  We had to keep her home from school on Monday, and then thankfully her fever broke Sunday night and she was much better by Tuesday.  

Then this past weekend Leah and I were back to Illinois to spend some time with my family.  We did a very long weekend - Thursday night to Wednesday morning - so a total of 5 full days.  It was great!  I hadn't spent that much time back home in several years, and it was nice to be able to spend time relaxing and hanging out with my family.  Leah had a great time with her cousins.  I brought her zip-zac along with us, which was interesting bringing through the airport.  Luckily Ty was able to get it to fit perfectly on top of my roller bag, though it was dang heavy.  But it was worth it to see her keep up with the boys.  She loved watching them and chasing my mom's 2 cats... or "minn-ahhs" as she calls them (her word for meow).  So cute!  We got home this morning and I dropped her off at daycare so I could get a few things done around the house.  

We have some friends coming to town this weekend.  Our friends from North Dakota are coming down with their little boy who also has spina bifida.  He's just a few months younger than Leah, and we are so excited for them to come for a visit.  We're going to have a few other friends with SB kiddos over for dinner.  It will be nice to get others together and let our little ones play together.  

In the meantime we are in the midst of home renovations.  About a month ago we got a new roof and gutters.  Now we are working on putting on new siding and some new windows.  It's been a long and slow process.  The workers have been here late most nights and were in the house to do the trim work around the windows.  Our garage is full of equipment and until this afternoon we had a big dumpster sitting in our driveway.  It's been a long few weeks and we are very excited to have it done.  It is a project that we need to do.  Our house is old and needs these updates.  We are doing this because this is where we plan to be for a long time.  It will look great when we're done, but it will also be a place where Leah can grow up.

I'll post some pictures of our exciting weekends and home improvement projects soon.  I'm taking advantage of the rare night that Leah went to bed early.  She's been on a later schedule recently.  It's great that she's sleeping until around 7, but it means she is staying up until after 8:30, so I haven't been able to get much done in the evenings.  Check back again when I have some more time.

Happy 4th of July!

Happy Independence Day!  Last week was a goofy week with a Thursday holiday, and as much as I love having time off, I'm also looking forward to getting back to normal next week.  I only work 4 days/week and have Tuesdays off, so I was only in the office every other day.  Leah was also having a hard time sleeping so it kind of got me off-kilter.  I did work for a bit on Friday, one of the only people who was actually in the office, but I was a little bit foggy.  I forgot to bring Leah's wheelchair to school that morning, and then I got to work and had forgotten my ID badge, which also has my desk keys on it.  AAHHH!!  Here's hoping I get back on track!

We had a very fun 4th of July.  Our little town had a pancake breakfast, yummy!  Then we went to the kiddie parade.  It gets kicked off by the old-time fire truck and then all the kids ride their bikes or get pulled in a wagon.  Last year we took Leah and watched, but this year we decorated her wheelchair and let her be in the parade.  She had such a great time waving at everyone and pointing to all the kids.  Events like this are a little hard for me because it's very obvious that that she's different and I see people looking at her and watching her a little more closely.  But I also realize that she could care less, and she was so happy to be joining into the fun.  I had my 30-second pity party and then I could share in the fun and excitement of the parade. 

The parade was just a short ride around the block and then all the kids got popsicles and balloons.  Leah was a total mess!  Her hands were filthy from pushing her wheels, and so was her face after she rubbed her eyes.  Then add in the  mess from the  popsicle that she held, not by the stick, but right on it.  She had syrupy stickiness dripping down her face, on her hands and her shirt.  And she was loving every single minute of it.  It was awesome!  It was a good reminder to me to always pack wet wipes and hand sanitizer in her chair.  Thankfully the weather was absolutely beautiful and not as unbelievably hot as it was last year. 

Her wheelchair all decked out.

 

Here are a few action shots of us at the parade.  Look how much fun she was having!

You can just barely see the dirt marks on her face.  And see how she's holding her popsicle??!!  She is hilarious :)

Summertime Fun

It's finally summer!  Thank goodness because I was starting to get a little stir crazy not being able to go outside.  Leah absolutely loves being outside, whether she's sitting in her chair on the patio or rolling around on the driveway or going for a stroller ride.  Coming inside makes her shake her head NO and point back outside.  Last weekend we went to get her a water table, and her little zip-zac fits perfectly at it.  She loves sitting there, dumping water all over her lap and pushing the toys around.  We've been having fun watching her learn and explore outside.  She points to airplanes in the sky, listens to birds, watches squirrels in tree and touches the trees.  I need to figure out a way now for her to be able to roll around the grass in her chair.  She can get around the driveway but off-roading is a little more difficult.  If anyone has a brilliant idea, please let me know!

We've had some excitement already this summer.  Two weekends ago we had a pretty big storm roll through town.  Usually we are spared a lot of major damage but this storm rolled straight down our street, literally.  All of our neighbors on our street lost a tree... and not just a branch, an entire tree!  It came through very quickly on Friday evening and lasted less than an hour.  We spent much of Saturday getting out the chainsaw, cleaning up the debris and taking lots and lots of branches up to the yard waste.  We were pretty happy when our power came back on after 24 hours, especially since it was a pretty hot and muggy weekend.  

This was the tree we lost, it went right across our driveway.  We're doing some work on the house, and it fell on top of the dumpster.  Otherwise, Ty would have lost his car!

Some of the damage in the backyard.

This is the view down the street where trees toppled the power lines.  The line went across the street and our utility workers were busy getting our power back up and running.

I've also been busy working on a few pinterest-inspired projects.  Usually I just pin things but don't really do anything with them (except for a few recipes that I have tried).  My first project was to find a way to get some of Leah's artwork displayed.  She brings home a few things a week and they were starting to pile up on the counter.  We have a door between our kitchen and dining room, so I glued 2 strands of ribbon vertically over the door and then found really cute little clothespins.  Now I have a place to hang her cute works of art.  My 2nd project was to get my car organized and stocked full of things I need when I'm out and about so I don't need to lug around a diaper bag.  I got an organizer for both my and Ty's cars and stocked them with diapers/wipes, changes of clothes, hand sanitizer and sunscreen and snacks.  So far it's been nice having everything in the car, but we'll see how well we keep them filled.  Yes, those are pretty lame and I will not be venturing into a new career as a blogger! but it was fun to actually do something I've pinned.

Here is the artwork door.  I think it turned out pretty nicely!