First Sign

Kieran did his first sign today "Daddy". I tried to get a picture but by the time I found the camera he'd had enough of signing. So here's a picture of him being happy instead.

We had an exceedingly uneventful day today with the boys taking it in turns napping which makes it very difficult to get out and do anything. I did take Callum to his swimming lesson this morning, Joe (his usual teacher) wasn't there today so he had Susan instead. Susan gave him a glowing report saying that his kicking was getting really strong, but that when he gets distracted he forgets to paddle (use his arms) and so keels over or goes under! Callum really missed Joe and kept saying "doh" (close enough to Joe, don't you think) and he pulls a really funny face when he says it.

Time for bed.

Where on earth is Bratislava??

That's where my brother is right now with his friend Tom and I don't have a clue where it is. So thanks to the power of the internet I now know that Bratislava is the capital of Slovakia which used to be part of the Czech republic. I'm sure he's enjoying all the cultural sites and drinking lots of cheap beer!

Callum and Kieran are interacting so much more now, they make faces at each other and laugh and laugh and laugh. Kieran is really getting around and get into all Callum's toys. This is prompting Callum to make good use of his latest word "MINE".

One of the lttle girls in Kieran's class at day care is called Ryan, she's a very sweet petite little girl and her and Kieran love to play together. Their latest game envolves lots of laughing and licking each others heads!!

Friday's are good because we don't have to make lunches for day care and the washing up can sit in the bowl until tomorrow. Writing that makes me realise how much kids have changed me, Friday night used to be good because we were getting ready to go out and celebrate the start of the weekend.

Welcome To Holland by Emily Perl Kingsley

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this...

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. Michelangelo's David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills... and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very, very significant loss.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.



Copyright © 1987 by Emily Perl Kingsley
All Rights Reserved

So tired...

Callum was awake, for some strange reason, from 2am 'till 4:30am this morning. Kieran woke up at 6:30 and of course this was one of the few nights that I wasn't in bed until after 11pm. I'm so tired now...

Kieran is really getting into crawling now and was actually exploring a lot last night and this morning. Time to make sure that all the childproofing is still ok.

yawn, time for more coffee.

Wednesday

Wednesday's have been busy this month. Callum has 3 different therapies, PT with Julie, Infant Stimulation with Annie and then finally Speech with Alan. Callum was not interested in PT at all today, he did enjoy waving and saying hello to everyone though. Speech was great fun though and Callum laughed nearly the whole way through. I love to hear him laugh and it's very infectious.

Mark brought Kieran home from day care in a different set of clothes, Kieran had been a good boy and done his great big pooh at day care, just like we've taught him!

They're both now sitting and watching a Baby Bumblebee vocabulary DVD, just time for a little bit of play, bath and bed.

I also went to my Weight Watchers meeting today and I'm down another 2 lbs. which is good news.

Matching Pyjamas

Matching Pyjamas
Originally uploaded by naomi.

PT on Monday

So Callum's been going to Kern & Associates for his phyiscal therapy for about a month now. He's really starting to take off with his walking, although he still crawls when he really wants to get around. The best way to get him walking seems to be by using a big ball, you roll it along just in front of him and away he goes. He's walked up to about 15 steps by himself, but his usual is still somewhere around 5.

He also had fun building with mega blocks and I swear that he said "Green" when Julie handed him the green block. I'm trying to make a concious effort to name colours at the moment just so that he gets more exposure to the words.

He had Julie and her assistant (not sure what her name was) in stitches when he found a pile of pillows and decided to pretend to be asleep, fake very dramatic snoring and all! Julie's actually now talking about what comes next after walking, we've been concentrating on walking for so long that I haven't even really though about what comes next. Apparently the next things are walking up stairs and jumping, so we're giving him another month to perfect his walking and then it's going to be stairs stairs and more stairs.

Finally

I set this up a few weeks ago, but never quite got round to posting. So now it's time to start.

We had a great time last weekend, we went to Colton's 2nd Birthday at Douglas Park in Santa Monica. Callum loved the cupcakes, although he doesn't seem too keen on frosting. The highlight on the day though was Callum playing in the water fountain, he had so much fun and of course got completley soaked.

Kieran was his usually cheerful self, he sat and watched all the big kids running around, ate some goldfish and then made a grab for the little girl sitting next to him, he seemed to find the top of her head very tasty!