Things to appreciate. Things to love.

Life has been crazy as usual. Jason spent the week away for work so it was just me. Luckily my dad was able to make a few trips down to help me with a few appointments. Thanks Dad!

I was surprised with how well the kids did for the entire week. Jason hasn't been away for a full week in a while so it was worrying me how their behavior would be. They both took it in stride, thank goodness!

The second he walked through the door (really) on Friday afternoon they begged him to sit and be intheir band. I had been the singer while he was away and I think they were looking for someone else to take my spot.

 We appreciate daddy being home.

Owen

The last few weeks have been going really well for him. His behavior has improved noticeably. We are still trying to figure out what it was that made things improve. I can't say we don't still have our moments. But I can say they aren't happening every 5 minutes. Crossing our fingers we are on to a new phase.

1. We love his new nickname for Olivia = Liv

2. We love that he loves school. He came home 2 weeks ago with pictures of his classmates and named 4 of them all on his own. Pretty impressive after just being in school for a few weeks.

3. We love his creativeness with his costumes.

4. Our homework with him has been really fun the last few days. Lots of acting like puppies, making tunnels and being goofy together.

Olivia

This little girl of mine is really something special. The way she is growing and learning is simply amazing to watch. I feel like she ages so much each day and my little girl is long gone. But she still likes a good cuddle with her mom and loves her blankie

1. We appreciate that she has figured out that if 1 parent says no, just ask the other one. Yes Olivia, we have caught on to you!

2. We love how she loves all things "pretty". Painted toes, painted fingers, braids in her hair.

3. We love the way you ask us to sing you songs at night before bed. You sing the first few words and then ask us to switch. You've also got your abc's down pat!

4. We appreciate your favorite phrase but would like you to choose something else. "I don't want it"

Apples

Fall. My favorite time of year. The weather has been fabulous so we took advantage of a day without plans to head to a local apple orchard. I asked Owen if he wanted to go pick apples today. His response. "No, I don't want it". Luckily we didn't abide by his request and went anyway.

It was fun.

The kids ate lots of apples.

We got out in the fresh air as a family.

 Thankfully we had some kiddos with us that could get those perfect out of reach apples.

I also asked Owen this evening if he had fun picking apples tonight. His response tonight...'YUP'.

Time to make some apple crisp with all these apples!

eyes

I finally got Owen in to see an eye doctor. It has been a few years since we were in and I knew it was long overdue. Luckily we found a great place through recommendations since our old doctor is no longer practicing in MN. We got to the appointment and Owen wanted nothing to do with the place. And then a nurse had to come out dressed in scrubs, eek! We, meaning I, had a bit of a struggle getting him off the floor and back into a room. He just kept screaming no, I don't want it, kicking and flailing his arms. Guess he thought he was in for another blood draw. Poor fella.
We got him back to a room away from all the onlookers and he finally settled down. Got his eyes dilated and we hung out for a bit while that took affect. When the doc came in it was like a totally different kid. He sat so patiently. Looked where he asked him to look. Sat still. I was amazed at how well he did.
The good news was that farsightedness has improved since we were in last and the astigmatism that he had got better as well. No glasses! Yippee.
However, a common thing with children with down syndrome is they have small tear ducts (similar to the problem with the ear canals and nasal passages). The problem is the little tears can't drain and they get clogged very easily. Owen has had this problem but we hoped as he got older they would get bigger. No dice. The doctor does recommend we get it taken care of since he is now at an age that they will no longer improve. And they say the earlier we do it the better.
Ugh. It sure would be nice to go to a doctor and not have to worry about some type of surgery for the little guy. Not sure when we will get it done. He said just keep an eye on him for a while and start keeping track of how much the teary-ness occurs. How often he is waking up with crusty eyes etc.

The adventure for next week will be a visit to the ENT to review his sleep study results and another hearing test. Wish us luck, I have a feeling we will need it!

Homework time

It is school time. Time to start seeing activities sent home from school to work on as a family. I just never would have expected homework like this....

Spend 2 minutes on all 4s.
Spend 5 minutes crawling.
Assist with dressing activity. socks, shoes, pants, shirt
Color or draw on a vertical surface.

But it is our task to try and accomplish these things every day.
And guess who assigned this? His occupational therapist (private, not school based).
I am excited for the challenge. OT is an area Owen really struggles since he is pretty low tone in some areas it makes fine motor skills VERY difficult. Did you know you can't work on your hand strength without first working on your shoulders and upper body? And it is really hard to do coloring, writing, drawing types of activities without that.

Maybe it is time to invest in some knee pads? I have a feeling I will be doing quite a bit of crawling to get Owen to participate ;)

Owen painted.

I have tried for 2.5 years to get Owen to tell me what he did in school.

Yesterday evening we were sitting on the couch and he looks at me and says "Owen painted".

He painted at school. He told me.

tears!

A buddy + A walk = A special day

I remember the first buddy walk we did. Just 5 years ago. I will admit, I was VERY nervous. Unsure what we were about to witness. Scared to see some of the older kids and adults with DS. Scared to see what our life would become. Owen wasn't even able to to sit up on his own then. We didn't have shirts. We didn't have a special meeting place. We barely set up a fundraising site (actually my sister Lisa started one for us). We were rookies.
But 4 years later, it has become an important day for us. It is gathering our friends, our families and meeting in a place where other people's friends and families are to cheer on an extra chromosome. To celebrate it. Not to feel sorry for it. To show everyone that Owen is more like everyone else than he is different.
We appreciate it when people come join us. To take time out of a beautiful Sunday to spend it with us, even if it happens to be their birthday, even if they can't walk, even if it is a 4 hour drive to spend 2 hours at the walk, even through the hassle of finding parking and bringing their kids is a lot of work.
How heartwarming. It makes us feel like we are not alone. That we are not in this journey by ourselves. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts. And to those that can't make it to the walk, you have opened up your checkbooks to give in honor of Owen, thank you. What generosity we have seen over the years.

And this year was no different.

Thank you to everyone that has put forth the effort. We appreciate you.

Owen thanks you

And Olivia Loves it!



We hope to see you next year!

More photos

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