3 Year Pictures

We went on Saturday and got Kristen's three year pictures done. I can't believe how much she has grown over the past year. Here are some of my favorites.

Happy Valentine's Day!

We wanted to wish everyone a Happy Valentine's Day!

Good Report

Lauren went to the eye doctor today and we got a good report. He said that since she had stage 2 ROP he usually sees nearsightedness and weak eyes at this point and because of her brain hemorrhage he will usually see other complications. He then looked at me and said "All I am going to say is AMEN"! He was also her eye doctor in the NICU and was very pleased to see how great she was doing and the lack of signs of anything being wrong because of the brain hemorrhaging. He also said her eyes look great. He didn't see any signs of nearsightedness or weak eyes. Now, she could need glasses later on down the road, but right now she is doing good. We follow up with him in 2 years.

God has truely blessed us with such a wonderful little miracle. We thank Him everyday for all the miracles he has performed in Lauren's life and He isn't finished yet. His infinite power is beyond human understanding, but with God, nothing is impossible!



But Jesus looked at them and said, "With men it is impossible, but not with God; for with God all things are possible."

Moments

I thought I would post a couple stories from this week. I have bought a preschool learning activity book for Kristen so we have started doing the activities in them. We are focusing on colors, which she already knows, but is a good review. She is practicing really hard to stay in the lines and is doing very good. I decided to start trying to teach her how to write her name. So we focused on drawing a straight line for the K. She was doodling lines all on the back of the page and then she looked up and said "I'm gonna draw a circle." I said okay, thinking she wouldn't know how. Imagine how impressed I was when she started drawing circles all over the page. I was so proud of her. I still don't know where she learned it. I took a picture of the back of her paper so we can have a picture of her first circle.




On to a funnier story. Today Lauren was in the living room playing in the floor and Kristen was eating her snack on her little couch. I was in the kitchen getting things setup to do our Valentine Day craft. Kristen came into the kitchen to see what I was doing. When she went back into the living room I heard a gasp then "Oh no my snack!" I went in to see what was going on and Lauren had apparently reached over and pulled Kristen's couch to her then gotten Kristen's bowl of potato chips and started eating them. Potato chips were everywhere. Kristen was so upset and Lauren and Degas (our dog) were very happy. I snapped a couple pictures.





This was Lauren after craft time. She didn't enjoy it at all. Kristen loved it!

ENT

Just wanted to post an update. Lauren went to go see the Ear, Nose and Throat doctor on Monday. The good thing is she doesn't have any scar tissue on her vocal chords. The bad news is that one of her vocal chords is paralyzed. While there is nothing they can do to fix it, they can do surgery and move the paralyzed vocal chord over so her other vocal chord can bounce off of it hopefully improving her quality of speech. In order to have the surgery she will need to grow and her airway will need to get bigger. The doctor said we are looking at several years before this can be done and even then they can't guarantee a normal sounding voice. This is something that Paul and I will discuss later on to see if it is something we feel will benefit Lauren or not. She will have a very soft and raspy/hoarse voice. This was Kristen first time out for a long period of time being potty trained and she did awesome!

Lauren went today and got her RSV shot and she weighs 15 lbs 5 ozs. Next week we go for her follow up eye appointment and she also has OT and speech therapy. Yesterday she was on her hands and knees in the crawling position and moved out of that into a sitting position. I was so proud of her. Hopefully she will do it for her therapist next week.

Eary Intervention - 1 Year Evaluation

Lauren had her 1 year evaluation for the occupational and speech therapy she is receiving through the county. It is hard to believe that she has been getting services for a year. As of next month they are going to stop adjusting for prematurity so right now she is considered cognitively delayed. She is progressing, so my goal is for her to be caught up by the time she starts kindergarten. On a gross and fine motor level (walking, crawling, manipulating small objects) she is functioning around 7 months. We already figured that since she isn't cruising much around the house. On a cognitive level (thinking, reasoning and problem solving) she is very scattered and her development is anywhere from 6 to 12 months. On a speech level (which includes eating) her development ranges between 9-12 months. Overall I was very pleased with this evaluation. I think Lauren is doing very well. We are going to start occupational therapy every week instead of every other week. We will continue speech therapy every other week. Both therapies go hand in hand and have proved to be very beneficial to Lauren. We set her 6 month goals and will re-evaluate her then. We praise and thank God daily for all of the progress she has made. He has definately blessed our family!

Catch Up

I can't believe it has been so long since I updated the site. We had a great Christmas. It was exhausting, but great. The girls were so tired by the end of Christmas day. It was a lot of running around crammed into two days, but I love Christmas. It was great having Lauren home this year. She enjoyed playing with the wrapping paper and eating it. They got so much stuff that our next house will definitely have to have a play room. I am already looking forward to Christmas next year.

Kristen is now potty trained! The last time I tried to potty train her it was a disaster, so I was dreading it. I put her in big girl underwear and she just went with it. By the second day she was going by herself, I didn't have to ask her. If I was busy doing something she would yell "Mommy, I'm done." It was amazing the difference. I can't remember the last time she had an accident. She like a human sponge. It is amazing the knowledge she is able to retain. She constantly amazes me. We are able to have conversations now and she is just hilarious. She is at such a fun age. Next month she will celebrate her 3rd birthday. I can't believe how fast time flies. She wants a Little Mermaid party. She helped me send out the invitations and put stickers on them.

Lauren is now eating table food. I thought we would have an issue with that, but she has done fine. This morning she ate some oatmeal and a bottle. For lunch she ate Mandarin oranges, pasta and a bottle. I am so glad she is eating table food. We had been mixing all of her milk to 26 calories. She never really drank it much during the day. I found out over Christmas that she doesn't like the taste of the milk with the increased calories. Now we give her the regular 22 calories during the day and the 26 at her feeding at night. She drinks her bottle much better. We are starting to wean her from the pacifier. She doesn't get it at all during the day, only at nap time and bedtime. I am not looking forward to taking it away completely. She is so attached to it when she sleeps. We are also going to start transitioning to a sippy cup and taking the bottle away. She continues to see the speech therapist and occupational therapist. We have her year evaluation next week. We will see what age her development is at. We are teaching her some sign language. She can sign "more" when she wants more of something. We are now trying to teach her the "all done" and "eat" sign.

Below are some pictures. Enjoy!!!