Gigi

Charlotte talks about Gigi everyday, either asking where she is or looking at photos and telling us about Gigi.  She really bonded with Chris’ mom in April during her visit.  The cutest thing is she now points out everyone else’s Gigi.  At therapy she says Gigi over and over if anyone’s grandma brings them.  At the gym today a little boy’s grandma brought him and both Cooper and Charlotte told us about Gigi.  (This is only cute when the woman is in fact a grandmother.  It’s not so great when they randomly point to a woman who is grandmotherly looking, but may not in fact be a grandma.)

Charlotte has now taken to trying to call for Gigi.  We tell her she has to call loudly because Gigi is all the way in Colorado.  She actually tips her head back and gets louder and louder!

Race Car

On the way to the gym after pulling away from a red light we hear this in the back seat:

Charlotte:  Yeah, Yeah, go, go, go!  Go  momma’s tar (car)!  Go, go, go!  Yeah!  Woo-hoo! ::lots of fist pumps, clapping and cheering::

Cooper:  Yeah, baby, yeah, baby!

I think we’ve let them watch Handy Manny’s Big Race one too many times.  Chris said the last thing we need is for our children encouraging us to drive faster.

Toddler Bed Update

We’ve been doing toddler beds all week and it has gone surprisingly well.  I was dreading the worst with constant wake ups and sleeping through the night going away, but it’s been pretty easy.  Charlotte has been easy-peasy.  She LOVES her bed.  She likes that she can get up and read books and then go to sleep when she wants.  We’ve had no early wake up calls and no middle of the night waking.  She goes down easily for naps as well.

Cooper has take several days to get comfortable with the transition.  The first few nights took longer to put him to bed (although it got shorter each night), and then he would wake up after a couple of hours and be very confused.  Chris found him on the floor between the chair and ottoman crying I guess because he didn’t know to get back in bed?  He also had some middle of the night wakings and very early wake up calls (5 am!), combined with no napping.

He seems to be adjusted now.  He’s not waking up at night and needing our help to get back to sleep, he’s taking a nap (although he sometimes opts to sleep in the queen guest bed), and he takes the normal amount of time to get to sleep initially.  He’s still waking up about an hour early and crying to be let out (we use baby gates at their doors for safety).  So to help with the early wake up, we stole Elsha’s idea and bought toddler alarm clocks:

Monkey’s eyes open, time to get up. (Charlotte’s is green.)

Monkey’s eyes closed, time to stay asleep (Cooper’s is pink/blue).

Tonight is the first night using them.  I tried explaining the concept before bedtime, but they got upset when monkey’s eyes closed.  That and Cooper threw his on the floor when the eyes wouldn’t open and the face popped off (luckily it popped right back on), so we’ll see come morning time.

Here they are getting acquainted with their clocks.  Cooper was tucking his into bed while Charlotte was cuddling with hers.

Toddler Beds

We made the switch to toddler beds tonight (see photos on the other blog).  Chris had them watch while he took down their cribs and put up their toddler beds.  I’m so glad he insisted we get them fun beds.  We went searching on craigslist and found a car bed, a train bed, and a fire engine bed.  We thought the train and fire engine were the coolest, but we ended up buying all three.  Now we need to resell the car bed on craigslist.

They played and played on their beds for an hour or so after we put them up.  Cooper didn’t want Charlotte in his bed and kept telling her to ‘go’.  The first thing Charlotte did was pile all her stuff into her bed with her.  Then she jumped on her bed.

Charlotte did great at bedtime.  She’s not able to turn her door handle yet, so Chris did the normal routine, then told her to get in bed and gave her a few books.  She didn’t cry at all, but she did play, read books, and jump on her bed for about 45 minutes before getting quiet.  We just checked on her and she is passed out with the Sneetches laying on her chest.  So, so cute.

Cooper was another story.  We fully expected it would be more difficult with him since it always has been.  He struggles to wind down enough to fall asleep and we expect frequent wakings tonight.  He is an explorer in the middle of the night so we put a baby gate up at his door and then a second baby gate to keep the first one in place, since he has also learned how to knock over baby gates very quietly and then pick them up and move them.

It took about 45 minutes longer, with some extra nursing, rocking, singing, and reading to reassure him that the toddler bed was indeed a safe place to fall asleep.  He finally fell asleep on his own and looks oh so cute on the video monitor.  I hope they continue to sleep well and the bedtime routine gets easier with Cooper.

First Verbal Argument

We had a very busy day today.  I took the day off to make sure we could get everything done.  Chris and I had dentist appointments today for cleanings so we decided to introduce the kids to the dentist.  We had back to back appointments so Chris went first, while I stayed home and got the kids ready. 

When we got there they seemed to warm up to the office fairly quickly.  They played legos,

Brushed the legos teeth

Brushed the cow’s teeth 

Gave the cow kisses

Colored

Then they got to go back and watch the hygienist finish up my cleaning.  They picked my polish flavor (chocolate since they can say that word) and then got to feel the polisher with their fingers before it ‘tickeled’ (polished) my teeth.  They got to use ‘Mr. Thirsty’ to suck the water out of my mouth, which they wanted to do over and over.  Cooper even put it in his mouth!

Then they got to take rides up and down on the chair.  Cooper’s saying what about my teeth?

Doesn’t he look oh so excited?

Okay, all done daddy!

Then it was toy time!

Charlotte was all about reaching into the bottom of the drawer.

After nap, Charlotte had therapy and Cooper had his 2 year check up.  Everything is great, nothing to report, other than he is still a giant.  He’s 33 lbs and 37.5” tall.  They switched scales on measuring him from the baby scale to the grown up scale so the measurements probably aren’t quite consistent with previous measurements.  He also got two shots and a finger prick, both of which he said ‘ow, ow, ow’ before screaming and then crying with huge alligator tears.  He was very dramatic about his finger prick until the bandaid fell off, then he forgot all about it.

After his appointment I went to pick up Charlotte while Chris took Scout to the vet (she’s been having some itchy butt problems).  On the way home from therapy the kids were chattering away to each other.  I love listening to them talk to each other in the car.  This was how the conversation went:

Cooper:  Momma mine.

Charlotte:  No, mine momma.

Cooper:  No, no.  Momma mine.

Charlotte:  NO! NO! Mine Momma.

Cooper:  Nononono.  Mommmmmaaaaa. MINE.

Charlotte:  NO. NO. NO. MINE.  MOMMA.

Cooper:  Cackaw, peeze?

Charlotte:  No.

Cooper:  Peeze, peeze, peeze! Cackaw!

Charlotte:  No, no, no!

Cooper:  [crying, whining] CACKAW!  Mine. Peeze.

Charlotte:  NO! NO!

I’m pretty sure they had their first argument over something neither of them can actually hold and walk away with.  Me.  They argued over who I belong to…so cute.  I did wrestle a cracker from Charlotte and give one to Cooper.  He did say please.

Toddler Bed Time

Remember when Cooper fell out of his crib?  We were concerned that we would have to go to a toddler bed a little earlier than we wanted to.  Jen asked when we plan to switch to toddler beds and we decided that when they seemed ready we would.  By ready we meant they had some impulse control, could fall asleep on their own, and the crib was no longer safe.

Yesterday at nap Cooper was chattering away to himself.  We heard him whine a little and then he got quiet.  The next thing we heard was the baby gate on the stairs being knocked over.  Cooper climbed out of his crib and had a super big grin on his face that he escaped nap time!

Last night, he showed us how he did it.

I quit taking pictures here so I could help him since he seemed unsteady.  Today at nap time we watched him climb out again, except this time he went over the footboard and onto his toy box (the nightstand/toybox next to the bed).  I guess it’s time for a toddler bed, which also means we’ll probably lose nap time!

Dr. Google vs. General Practitioner

I think I’m losing faith in my general practitioner.  Although a super nice woman, there are a few things lately that I’m not sure I love.  I had to really push her to consider Charlotte having a delay.  I wish I wouldn’t have taken her advice and waited so long, but rather had Charlotte evaluated much earlier.  Then when I broke my toe last December I called and she said it’s just a broken toe and to tape it, x-rays weren’t necessary.

Fast forward to this past Monday.  I had been having a lot of pain in my ankle so I set up an appointment.  I had googled my symptoms when my ankle began hurting and came up with a diagnosis of peroneal tendonitis (the tendon on the outside of the ankle is overused).  The doctor office switched to a new system where the doctors use laptops to take notes and she spent the entire time trying to get her notes right instead of checking me out.

Then she determined that my toe was probably still broken (I can’t bend it down and hurts if I try) and she didn’t say anything about my ankle but sent me for x-rays.  I had to call twice to get the results of my x-rays.  She told me at first I sprained my ankle but I firmly told them I had not sprained it, but it just started hurting.  They they told me it was just a strain because I was compensating since my toe still had a fracture.  She referred me to an orthopedist and recommended rest  for my ankle.

I went to the orthopedist and he asked why I didn’t have x-rays when I first broke it.  Then he said my toe has healed fine but since I broke it at the joint, the joint is no longer ‘normal’ and so I won’t ever be able to bend my toe again.  And if I try it will hurt because my toe just doesn’t bend anymore.  He assured me there was no longer a fracture.

He also diagnosed me with peroneal tendonitis in my ankle and recommended I wear a boot to keep it immobilized for 4 weeks while it heals.  So $60 and one sick day later I have the same diagnosis I found on google, and more importantly my general practitioner was wrong!  So frustrating.

And to give you and update on Charlotte’s 6 month review with the EI program…

Charlotte is doing well, but still behind in some areas.  The coordinator that we met with said she is waiting on the final report from the therapy center before creating another 6 month contract.  We expect to go to 7.5 hours a week starting in June and be in the group therapy a little more often. 

Charlotte will continue her therapy through the center until she turns 3 and then we have a transition into the school district.  They will evaluate her again and determine if she gets only 30 min of speech a week, or up to 5 hours/day, 5 days a week in preschool.

4 months is possible

From the resident stay at home dad:

Cashier:  Oh are they twins?

Chris:  No, they’re 4 months apart.

Cashier:  [Confused look on his face.]  Is that even possible?

Chris:  Yes.

Cashier:  [Really confused and surprised look on his face.]  Hm, em, okay.

Chris:  [Waits a few minutes attempting not to burst out laughing.]  One is bio and one was adopted.

Cashier:  [Relieved look on his face.]  Oh, okay.

Learning Body Parts

From the resident stay at home dad, the conversation before lunch (sitting around in diapers only)  went something like this:

Cooper:  [Twiddling his nipple.]

Daddy:  Is that your nipple Cooper?

Cooper:  [Runs over to Charlotte and points to her nipple.]

Daddy:  Yep, that’s Charlotte’s nipple.

Cooper:  [Runs over to daddy and points through his shirt.]

Daddy:  Yes Daddy has nipples too.

Cooper:  [Points to his belly button.]  Beh-beh

Daddy:  Belly button.

Cooper:  [Runs over to Charlotte and points to her belly button.] Shaw beh-beh

Daddy:  Yep, that’s Charlotte’s belly button.

Cooper:  [Runs over to daddy and points through his shirt.] Dah-ee beh-beh

Daddy:  Yes that’s daddy’s belly button.

Cooper:  [Grabs his crotch.]

Daddy:  Yes, that’s your penis.

Cooper:  [Points to daddy’s crotch.]

Daddy:  Yes, daddy has one too.

Charlotte:  [Grabs her crotch.]

Daddy:  No, Charlotte you have a vagina.

Charlotte:  Ji – Ji!

Bathtime Olympics

Usually I just feel like I have two children.  Last night I felt like I had twins.  Here was how bathtime went:

Start the water, but don’t close the drain (so the bath won’t fill up until I’m ready for it to).  Strip Cooper and put him in the bath.

Chase down Charlotte and bring her to the bathroom only to find Cooper soaking wet and naked standing outside the bathtub.  Put Charlotte down on the floor and put Cooper back in the bathtub.

Only to realize Charlotte has run off again.  Chase down Charlotte and bring her to the bathroom only to find Cooper soaking wet and naked standing outside the bathtub.  Put Charlotte down on the floor and put Cooper back in the bathtub.

Only to realize Charlotte has run off again.  Chase down Charlotte and bring her to the bathroom only to find Cooper soaking wet and naked standing outside the bathtub. 

Hold Charlotte in one arm and lift Cooper back in with the other.  Keep one hand on Cooper to keep him from getting out of the bath and use my other hand to undress Charlotte. 

Put Charlotte in the bath and give them each a washcloth to occupy them.  Works for half a second and they try to climb out.  I close the shower curtain.  Now they don’t want out, but they don’t want me in either!

They each pin the side of the shower curtain so now I can’t reach to wash them.  I start laughing which only encourages them.  I somehow manage to slide in and start washing Charlotte.

Cooper begins flinging his washcloth at me proceeding to soak my hair and clothes, and knock my glasses off into the bathtub.  Now I’m really laughing and so are they.  I pin him and start washing him and he rubs the sudsy soap all over my hair, face and clothes.  I couldn’t help but laugh harder and they think this is the best.game.evah!

By this time I’m a complete mess!  I rinse them off and get myself cleaned up (but still look completely disheveled).  We played peek-a-boo with the shower curtain until they both decided to climb out of the tub at the same time.  Thank goodness Chris showed up just in time to help get them into pj’s.

I still smile just thinking about it.

Speech Progress – Sentences!

Charlotte has come such a far way in speech.  It’s hard to believe that only 6 months ago she was barely babbling with consonant sounds.  Not only is she saying 2 words now, she seems to be using simple sentences to convey her thoughts. 

Her latest ‘sentences’:

No, dah-ee (no daddy, when he is tickling her)

Momma eat peeze (momma sit down and eat please)

No, Poopeh dow peeze (Cooper get out of my chair please)

She is learning everyone’s names at gym class and introduces them at the beginning of class when we go around the circle:

Bo-ee (Body)

Luhluh (Lorelei)

Tam (Sam)

She (Sherrie)

Gi (Angie)

I had no idea how much easier our lives would become once our little girl was no longer frustrated and could communicate her needs.  And now that she knows that communication is way more effective with us, she has the patience to try many different words as well as show us what she wants/needs rather than melting down when we don’t understand her the first time.  She will also answer yes or no when we ask questions so that we can understand what she needs.  And she has good manners—she says please and thank you for everything.  I am so, so proud of Charlotte!!

Although she still LOVES Handy Manny, her new favorite interest is trains or cheh-cheh as she calls them.  The show Chuggington is quite funny to her.  (We think it’s a cute show and does a great job with a play on words – the young trains in training are called ‘trainees’.  However I don’t really care for the animation and it doesn’t really grab my attention like Handy Manny did.  For me there isn’t much ‘adult’ to the show.)

Tomorrow we have her 6 month review to check on her progress and review her needs and next steps in the program.  We’ll probably have a full update and change in therapy in a month since they just did her updated evaluations.  Sometimes it feels like we aren’t making any progress until I sit down and write out these posts reminding myself that we are definitely making progress!

Mother’s Day

It was a perfect Mother’s Day for me this year.  Just like I've always imagined Mother's Day for myself.  Sleeping in and then my children greeting me with smiles and hugs when I wake up.  Flowers, jewelry and toddler art for gifts.  A low key day hanging out with my children listening to their laughter and watching them enjoy life.  Making dinner for my family (something I love doing and don’t get the option of doing very often because I have a fantastic husband who does it all week).  Perfect, just perfect.

Peroneal Tendonitis

I broke my second toe on my left foot last November trying to do the Christmas photo shoot for the kids.  I was in the middle of the P90X workout and I didn’t want to stop doing it.  So I kept going but modified the exercises to avoid putting pressure on my broken toe.  Then I stopped doing the cardio and kept with the weight training.

In February I still had a lot of pain in my toe and decided that working out was not allowing it to heal, so I stopped working out for 2 months.  In April when my toe was feeling better I decided to ease into working out slowly by doing the Couch to 5K workout.  I’ve been taking the dog with me too, because she needs to get in shape as much as I do!

I was 3 weeks in and my right outside ankle started bothering me.  At first I thought it was normal fatigue pain and I needed to stretch a little more before and after my run.  I did some extra stretching and took an extra day off between runs (I was running every other day).  By the end of the week the pain got worse, so I took 3 days off and did some icing and bought some new shoes.

It was feeling a lot better with walking, stretching and icing so I went for my last run on Friday.  The first half went really well, but the second half I starting having some pain so slowed down.  I ended up limping home and now my ankle is swollen, a little misshapen and I can barely walk.

My friend who runs marathons thinks it could be a lot of things:  running with the dog affects my balance and gait, the broken toe my not be fully healed and I am favoring my right side, running with the wrong shoes could have affected my gait.  I went to the chiropractor on Friday and they think my gait is likely off due to the broken left toe, which is now causing pain in my right angle.  I have a follow up appointment on Tuesday with them.  I have a doctor appointment tomorrow and I’ll probably have to get x-rays on both feet.  Dr. Google says I have peroneal tendonitis and to prevent permanent injury I need to stop running for 2 weeks, immobilize it with an ace bandage, and do regiment of icing and ibuprofen.

Why can’t my body just work with me??

Overflow Favorites

I take a LOT of photos.  And as I am going through attempting to delete (and not wanting to), I find some super cute photos that I’ve never posted either here or the photo blog.  Every post on the photo blog would be super, super long if I really posted every photo I loved.  I also would fall behind on it because of the amount of time it takes to edit, watermark and organize all of them.  I also try to reserve the photo blog for more technically correct photos that really capture a memory of that day instead of just my children being super adorable (not that I’m biased or anything.)

Instead I will post the overflow favorites here.

Cooper jumping on the bed

Height difference playing with the lights (they were both standing on the same diaper box).

I had to wake Cooper up from nap one day, so I did it with the camera.

Chris has learned to do Charlotte’s hair, in pigtails even!  Of course most days she won’t let him, so that’s way she always looks like tarzan.

Just being super cute.

American Idol 2024

Cooper and Charlotte LOVE American Idol.  LOVE it.  Cooper’s favorite singers are Casey and Crystal (especially when they play the guitar).  Charlotte LOVES Casey…swoons over him, to the point the Chris gives her the side eye since she’s only two and all.

Guess what we’ve noticed lately?  They are using the brooms/mops as their microphone stands and singing!  It’s oh. so. cute.  Now I need to figure out how to get it on video (which I haven’t taken any of lately despite my fancy DSLR camera having the capability) and get some photos.

American Idol 2024 contestants?  (If only Cooper wasn’t doomed with poor singing genes from both Chris and I, who are tone deaf.)

More therapy

Charlotte has been making a lot of good progress, however she is still behind in all areas.  Her therapists are concerned about her slow progress physically as well as socially.  She still doesn’t use any kind of self safety precautions, and her arms and hands, although stronger, remain fairly weak.  Socially she plays independently and if she does seek interaction with others, it’s always with adults.  For her age, she should be seeking out other children and wanting to play with them.

At home, she sometimes will seek Cooper out to play with him, but it’s usually Cooper who initiates play.  She had a little friend at the gym, but she mostly followed her around, rather than trying to play with her.  The little girl also has quit coming to the free play.  She is starting to learn other children’s names at gym class, so I think that’s a really good start.  She also interacted very well with Maile when she was here, but again it was Maile initiating the play.

Charlotte receives 2 hours of speech, 30 min of physical therapy, and 2.5 hours of social/emotional/behavioral therapy every week (for a total of 5 hours).  They just increased her physical therapy from 30 min to 1 hour and took some time away from her behavioral therapy to do so.  Now they would like to increase her total therapy to 7.5 hours because they are more concerned with her lack of social interaction with her peers.  They are able to see it more clearly now that she has group therapy for part of her behavioral therapy.

We feel a little overwhelmed with additional therapy, since it feels a little like our whole week is spent in therapy for Charlotte.  We’re concerned that Cooper isn’t getting enough time to ‘be a kid’ with the running back and forth for Charlotte.  It’s so hard to balance the needs of both the kids!

I don’t usually talk about the adoption on this blog, mostly because I often forget that one of my children was adopted.  We’re just a family now.  There are also a lot of complexities given the nature of a kinship adoption, so I would rather not talk about personal family issues in a public forum.  Today we got news that Charlotte will have a younger birth sister born in early to mid June, as my sister is pregnant again.  It is unclear what will happen with the baby, but we hope that we can have a niece/aunt/uncle relationship with her and that Charlotte will be able to have a connection to her birth sibling.