Emma Jane

Annie had her baby on Friday. She smells perfect and looks like an angel. We are all in love!

Glasses

Ruby has to get glasses.

A few months ago I did an evaluation of a little girl with extreme farsightedness.  Her mom brought her without her glasses, so she was crossing her eyes and trying so hard to focus on things that were close.

Shortly thereafter we went through the process of getting Ruby assessed for her lack of walking.  When the caseworker asked me if I had any vision concerns, I paused.  Because just a few days prior to that I had noticed that when Ruby was looking at things close up, her eyes were crossing.  So, we decided to tell the pediatrician about it at her appointment last week.   I mentioned my concerns and she gave us a referral for a pediatric opthamologist.  We got in within a week.  That appointment was this morning.

I had noticed mostly the left eye crossing, but over the past few days I noticed the right.  As I look back at pictures, they both cross.  (see above?  And look at the closeup from the last post... definitely crossing).  Apparently, it's better if they are both crossing, it's less likely that there is something physically wrong with her eye.  So, today, the nice lady noticed that she was crossing both eyes, and she had to be dialated for a full exam.  She was so funny!  When she was fully dialated, she couldn't focus at all, and her eyes were crossing out of control.  She sat still enough that the Dr was able to determine that she was farsighted, not much, but enough that it's making her eyes cross, and we don't want that.  The good news was that the physical structure of the eye is just fine, which was the other possible cause of crossing.  The Dr was surprised at the amount of crossing with a slight prescription, but she's too young to really do any further testing (he mentioned bifocals!!!  Can you imagine?)  So, we wear glasses for four months then go back to get checked again.  Maybe glasses will help her walk?  We can only hope!  So, I most certianly have a special needs baby now:)  The good news is that she should grow out of the farsightedness by the time she hits kindergarten.

But she looks awfully cute in her whale spout.  And she's going to look pretty cute in her light pink baby glasses:)

Big Deal

Ruby is a special baby.  Remember that video of her scooting that was sooo funny in early october?  Well, it's not quite so funny now, especially since she's 15 1/2 months and not standing on her own.  I mean, not standing without considerable support from me, and panicking about 5 seconds in.  In mid- December, we got her evaluated by an infant educator and an early intervention physical therapist.  She is at or above age level in all areas of development.  

Except for her gross motor skills.  That's right, she is classified as "severe orthopedic delay"  She's at a 7 month level.  Ouch.  So, we started with some exercises that the assessing PT gave us, and we've had one in-home visit.  I've already seen a lot of improvement, she is starting to pull herself to stand when I have her in a stable seated position.  But this was a first.  

 I removed the crib mobile and lowered the bed at like 6 months of age, turns out, I needn't have worried about that so soon, as she didn't decide to stand up in her crib until this morning, at 15 1/2 months.  

 See how her little toes are on top of each other?  It's like she just locked her knees and by sheer force of will and arm strength she pulled herself up there.  

She was pretty proud.  And so was I.  But she was glad when I rescued her, standing up like that is hard work!!!!

First tooth

It finally happened! Sam lost his first tooth:)

Smarty pants

The other day after my run, I was putting the babies back in the car, when Max sniffed me.

Sniff sniff.

Ooh, mom, you smell STINKY!!!

Then (with a gleam in his eye) "Katie has a shower."  (aka go to aunt mara's house and use her shower so I can play with my favorite person in the world, Katie).

Oh Max, you are so smart.

And yes, it totally worked.

First Word

It always amazes me how different my children are.  I think I'm still mostly the same person, but they are so unique.  For example, Sam could have cared less about trains, and Max is totally obsessed.  Pearl was not a huge dolly player... she liked little people and stuffed animals... but at 14 months, Ruby has discovered babies.  

We walked down the doll aisle at target with Max to see if Max could find a Christmas present for her.  I have never seen that kid so exited.  She was pointing, bouncing in her seat, reaching, and saying "baby, baby."  So, since we really have no dollies at our house (though I think Santa will be bringing her one) I went ahead and let her have the $3 one.  It's head is small enough for her to grab it by the face and clonk it on the floor with her as she scoots.  She wants to take it everywhere... she got it into the bathtub last night (it was apparently too close) and it had to spend the night on the heater vent... when she woke up, she sleepily rubbed her eyes and signed "baby" at me... so we went and got baby.  

Here is video proof of her first word.  Enjoy!

Poor Ruby

Will you just look at that sweet baby?  Unfortunately for her, she had a little accident...

And ended up in a cast:(  She took a tumble all the way down the stairs, we were so lucky nothing else happened to her!  She just doesn't have enough brains yet to know that if you try to scoot down the stairs, it will hurt.  Pearl feels terrible, she had taken her upstairs while I was cooking dinner and didn't close the gate.  There will be no more unauthorized baby movement around here.

Fortunately, it was a mild fracture, in fact, the pediatritian didn't even catch it, the radiologist found it and I got a call the next day.   

I get comments a lot.  It is the cutest little cast you've ever seen, if it wasn't so sad, it'd be something to smile about.  I made sure to take pictures while it's still cute, one week later and it's pretty gross.  We're counting down the days until it's gone (she has to have it for 5 weeks.)

I think the saddest part is that she's supposed to be working on standing and crawling... but her ankle hurts too, so I haven't been pushing it, we'll meet with the PT soon and get her advice.  Other than that, it doesn't seem to be holding her back much.  She's getting good at feeding with her left hand, she does her little scoot with a CLUNK CLUNK throughout the house, and finds that she can still do important things...

like single-handedly removing all of the pea gravel from the playground (Maryann, remember how that was Sidon's favorite thing to do?) and playing with her grandpa.

How we love this sweet, good natured little girl!