Birthday girl on the move!

Callie is now climbing stairs!!

Happy 2nd Birthday!

Happy 2nd birthday, sweet baby girl.  Baba, Owen, and I love you so much!!

Day in Fairfax

We spent most of yesterday in Fairfax, a destination 35 minutes from home with no traffic and 1 hour+ from home during rush hour.  I made the mistake of booking the first of three appointments there at 9:00 AM.  I was sweating it all they way through the rush hour commute, but am relieved to report we made it exactly on time.  Our first stop was Orthotic Solutions where Callie was scheduled to get casted for AFOs.  We recently decided to move forward with the process again since she is getting closer to walking.  She is doing a great job cruising along furniture, but still keeps her legs extended and most of the time goes up on her toes.  The AFOs will stop her toe walking and hopefully help break up her pattern of extension.  Anyway, we made it right on time only to find out they did not have any record of her appointment!  Thankfully the receptionist remembered talking to me and apologized for the mix up.  After a small wait, an orthotist got to work and made her casts.  Callie was not happy with the process, but was thankfully able to be distracted by her iPad and we made it through without too much fussing.  We ended up ordering custom DAFO 3s.  In pink, of course.  They should be ready in about 4 weeks.

We were on our way an hour and a half later, arriving perfectly on time to our next appointment at 10:30.  I scheduled a brief nurse visit at the G tube clinic to have her granulation tissue checked.  The nurse inspected it and told me I am doing a good job with the treatments.  It is getting smaller and will hopefully be gone soon.  She gave me more silver nitrate sticks and we were on our way again.

Our final appointment was right across the parking lot at Children's with Dr. Pearl, her neurologist.  Amazing, but we again arrived right on time at 11:00 (I am always late, so three on time appointments in a day is definitely a record!).  We ended up waiting a while to see him, but the wait is always worth it.  He is so great with Callie and easy to talk to.  He was very happy with her growth and development, and thrilled again that she has not had any seizures.  Our next follow-up will be in 6 months.

We were pretty tired by the time we got home in the afternoon, but happy to have these appointments behind us and glad to have accomplished them in one trip!

Adapted Tricycle

During Callie's PT session at home yesterday and we were talking about how she keeps her legs stiff in extension.  She is cruising nicely around furniture, but looks a bit like Frankenstein and does not bend well at the knees.  We were trying to think of ways to break up her extension pattern and her therapist asked if I had a tricycle that might fit her.  I remembered we bought a tiny one for Owen when he was little.  I ran down to our storage room and found it.  We put her on it, but of course she could not keep her feet on the pedals.  I joked about taping her feet to them and then thought of a great idea.  I taped her Crocs to the pedals!  We were then able to slip her feet in and out of the Crocs!  She seemed to enjoy being pushed around the house and this is a great exercise to get her to bend her legs as the pedals go around.  Isn't she looking grown up?!