Thursday, January 22, 2009

Sofia Update

It has been a smooth transition the past two weeks with Michael going to preschool...he seems to really like it and his teacher reports that he has adjusted very well and is making new friends!! He loves playing with other kids...it can be quite funny to listen in on the conversations 3 year olds have!!! And Sofia and I love having a bit of alone time every week as well :)

Both the kids have stayed healthy the past few weeks....I am soooo glad too since so many other kids around us seem to be getting sick!! Plus we have our family ski trip to Colorado at the end of the month and I hope the kids stay healthy.

Sofia has had a good couple of weeks...she continues to grow stronger and overall just more interested in everything around her. Her speech therapist had not seen her in a few weeks b/c of holidays and scheduling issues, so when she saw her she seemed really pleased on the improvement she could see. Sometimes it is so hard to focus on what Sofia can do when there is so much concern over what she can't. Sofia has become much more vocal (and she lets me know it!!) and more expressive, but no mama's or dada's yet. Now she loves to mimic blowing raspberries and trying to clap her hands....and she is great at using her blanket to play peek-a-boo now...these are new for her is just the past two weeks. She also just learned how to hold her bottle all on her own!!! Except now she likes to just play with the bottle at times and bite the nipple and she gives herself a milk bath!! And she is getting in so many teeth now!!

Sofia still doesn't care for her physical therapy much....Sofia has mixed issues with low and high muscle tone now and she tends to kick in her high tone during certain aspects of her physical therapy, which makes it difficult to get her to do the positioning we want her in. So is has become a challenge to figure out what tricks work for her. She was demonstrating her new crazy little pose yesterday for the therapist where she is sitting and slouches back and tries to pick up her feet and holds that pose...we think she wants to lay down so she can use her feet to play with a toy, but is learning that she shouldn't just fall backwards...it looked like it was giving her quite an abdominal workout :) She is spending more time playing on her tummy on her own, so we love that!! And she just discovered how great the doorway jumper is...about a week ago I put her in like I occasionally do, and she just took off jumping!!! Now she cries and whines when she sees it b/c she wants to jump :) Love it!!

We just started Sofia on Prevacid for reflux...I was becoming suspicious that she may be having a problem. So far she is tolerating it well and has not spit up since we started. I am curious to see if any of Sofia's sensory issues with her mouth improve with this medicine. If she does have silent reflux like I suspect, it may be a contributing factor.

Sofia will be 17-months old tomorrow, but of course still has pretty significant delays. Upcoming appts include a follow-up with Neurology, which may or may not result in a repeat MRI and/or EEG. Sofia has her 6 month followup eval for her current therapy services next month. I am going to get her started with more physical therapy and speech through the Children's Hospital. She has an appt with Genetics in March....I think this may be the appt that could possibly bring us closely to a diagnosis. It will probably involve a lot of blood work and possibly a muscle biopsy. Then we have Rehab Medicine and Developmental followups in April. She will most likely get fitted with some sort of foot/leg bracing once her physical therapist feels it is appropriate. We don't want to push Sofia to hard towards walking yet since learning how to crawl is a very important skill, but they also feel that she might not end up so much of a crawler. I would love to see her walk by the time she is 2, but since she isn't crawling yet, I don't know how realistic that is. It seems to be taking Sofia 2-3 times longer than typically kids to learn skills.

Of course I have to post just some oh so cute pictures and video of my sweet angel and her piercing blue eyes!!!










Thursday, January 8, 2009

Sofia loves her peas!!!

We are getting into our new routine with the start of the new year....Michael started preschool on Tuesday....he will be going on Tues and Thur from 9 am to 11:30 am. He seems to like it!! It was so cute watching him today go in and hang up his coat and bag with a little direction from another student. He kicked and screamed on Tuesday because he did not want to leave (he used to do that at daycare also), but today there were just a few tears since I had chocolate hershey kisses ready!!!

Well, I decided I would just have to go with the mess to let Sofia explore foods on her own a bit more...as you can see by the pictures below she loves to paint with peas!!! Her hands did make it to her mouth at times and she seemed surprised that it was food on them. She also did great with fairly big pieces of liverwurst (it was and still is a favorite of Michael's)....she gladly eats the big chunks off a spoon, but doesn't like it when you try to put it in her mouth with your fingers. She doesn't like her mouth messed with. It doesn't help that she is still teething like crazy!!!

We are still working on encouraging longer stretches of tummy time and working on weight bearing on her knees and arms...those arms!!! I can tell she is getting stronger in her arms, but she is still so weak in her arms. She gets so mad at me (and her therapist) when we don't let her roll onto her back. She loves to roll to go exploring...lately she has taken a real liking to the tile floor...and she always seems to want Michael's toys....

Tom is starting to work at the VA Emergency Room this weekend....he is going to do a few shifts a month to keep up his internal medicine skills and earn some extra income so I can continue to stay home with the kids. Plus, I would love to add in some more therapy sessions for Sofia.








Saturday, January 3, 2009

Up to date!!!

I got all my postings done from our trip to Florida.......so you if go all the way down to the posting that is titled Happy New Year, the postings above are all from our Christmas vacation!!! I hope you enjoy them!! I will post again next week, most likely on Wed, unless something exciting really happens. The only new Sofia thing is that I decided yesterday that I was not going to hold her bottle for her anymore....I knew she was capable of doing it...and well she is holding it all her own!! I lay her down and pop it in her mouth and make her grab on and I walk away!! She got the hint :)

Natalie

Christmas Day

Opening presents from Santa....Michael opened most of Sofia's for her...she seemed to enjoy watching him do it though!!! Michael was so excited when he woke up and realized Santa had come....he promptly woke all us and was ready to open presents!!!





Sofia loves her pacifer....watch and see!!!


One of Michael's favorite gifts was his Polar Express Train!!!



Testing out his new train!!



Christmas is always a day of incredible amounts of food at the Lupoli house!!!! You have to wear your stretchy pants to make it through the day!!!! Below is just an example of one of the many antipasti plates that was part of the first course (unless you count the appetizers before we sat the table as the first course). The food just kept coming out!!!


The boys always love to pose for a picture with their cigars :)

We finished out the evening (after of course coffee and many choices of desserts) with some games of wii bowling, boxing, and baseball.....it was pretty fun watching most of the family play for the first time!!





Here are a couple more pictures of my cuties.....Sofia with her new Cabbage Patch kid and Michael got to open up a tool bench set when we got home to Kansas.

My cuties on Christmas Eve

I love that Sofia is strong enough now to sit up on her own without falling over!!! It makes picture taking so much more fun!!!





Visit to Princess

We took the kids to visit my sister-in-law's horse Princess...she has had Princess for about 20 years!! Michael was a bit nervous and didn't want to sit on her back or touch her face, but Sofia was brave enough to touch her face and we put her up on her back. It made me think more about possibly doing what is called "hippotherapy" with Sofia as she gets older....it is therapy on horseback to work on balance. Michael got a bit braver and was willing to help with some horse chores :)






Friday, January 2, 2009

St Augustine

We spent a cold afternoon/evening in St. Augustine....it was hot just the day before!!! Crazy North Florida winter weather!! In all our past visits to St. Augustine we never went to the lighthouse...I think Tom was hoping to see a ghost!!! Then we made our usual trip to St. George Street and ate at the Columbia...this is when Sofia surprised us for the first time with how great she did sitting up in the restaurant highchair for well over an hour!!!

Lighthouse

At the top


Checking out an old fashion cannon

It was cold!!!

Sofia & Michael


I just had to post this oh so cute picture of Sofia on her daddy's lap!!!!!!! I love this picture of her!!


Grandpop put up his Christmas train and village again this year and Michael loved it!! He learned how to operate it it and would spend a good couple of hours playing with it at a time!!! We have a video as well:

Disney World

One of the first events on our Christmas vacation to Florida was to visit Magic Kingdom....we went on Saturday, Dec 18th....and it was a hot day and very crowded!!! We knew it would be pretty crowded, but didn't think it would be so hot! Sofia held up really well considering how hot is was...she always tended to not tolerate the heat well. She was a little unsure of the rides we went on, but she seemed to take it all in without any tears!! Michael did great!!! Even with the long lines. He was pretty quiet when we were on the ride, but seem excited about them afterwards. He wasn't into visiting any of the characters. I think his favorite areas were the ones where he got to explore and run more. He does now claim that Cinderella's castle is King Michael's castle!!


I'm in Disney World!!
Sleepy Sofia waiting for Peter Pan ride with Grandpop


Playing in ToonTown

Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse
Waiting to ride on Dumbo

King Michael's Castle (i.e. Cinderella's Castle)

Happy New Year

We've been back from Florida now for almost a week....the kids and I brought colds back to Kansas...lots of snotty noses :)

We had a great time in Florida and I have lots of pictures to post...so I am going to go divide them up into a few posts.

Sofia adjusted very well during the trip...it was nice to see her so interactive with everyone...we also learned she does great sitting up in a restaurant highchair without her high chair cover...she loved it and was constantly trying to pull stuff off the table....we didn't expect that and when we at at the Columbia in St Augustine, if a matter of seconds she had Tom's bread plate and it went flying on the floor!!! The waitress may not have liked it, but we loved it!!!

Keep reading the above posts!!!

Natalie