Potty Training Update

I haven't worked to hard at this potty thing. If she wants to sit on it she does and once a day I put her on the potty with no pants and diaper. Today she sat on it but again...is not to sure about the feeling of cold plastic on her little bum. She stood next to it and I told her how we go pee and poop in the potty. She then proceeded to pee on the floor next to her potty.....does that count? :o)

Urgent Care Visit

We had a great day yesterday, went to story time and the park all day. 5:00 rolled around and Cassie was sitting in her highchair eating Lasagna. All of a sudden she started to get fussy and cry. I thought maybe she wanted something else to eat so told her I would get some bread and butter, she started shaking her head no and cried more. Then she tilted her head to the right and started screaming. I picked her up and tried to sooth her. She screamed so hard her face was beat red and I thought she may throw up her dinner. She kept putting her hand to her ear and I could tell she was in some extreme pain. I wanted to take her to the doctor then and there but was trying to see if I could get her to calm down because I didn't want her throwing up in the car and not being able to get to her to help. After about 15-20 min I got her to calm down, we sat in the rocking chair and read books. Then she cried and pointed to her crib to lay down. At that point Matt just got home (I had called him to let him know something may be wrong with her ear)I told him she had just went to sleep and I didn't want to wake her up to go to the doctor...if she woke up then we would go. 5 min later she woke up so off we went. She seemed better but kept pointing to her ear. We went to Urgent Care since it was after hours. In the lobby is when we noticed fluid leaking from her right ear. She does have tubes in her ears so thankfully the fluid leaking out was helping her pain. We were not thrilled with the Urgent Care doctor, he said he couldn't see a tube in her right ear but it is obviously still there because of the leaking! I then told him that I was just at the doctor 5 days ago and he saw it and commented it was hard to see. It was like I hadn't spoken. He perscribed Cassie some oral medication because he didn't see the tube, if he saw the tube he would have just given her drops. Its not fun giving meds to a 1 year old. Last night I mixed it with yogurt and she did take all of it. This morning she wasn't so cooperative but I think I got most of it down. We called her ENT today and the nurse said it sounds like her tube is still in and THEY would have just given her drops and not oral meds. Luckily we still have drops from when the tubes were put in and they said to start using those. Monday we go to see her ENT doctor and he will take a look and most likely take her off the oral meds since we are using the drops.

Anyhoo...after the ear started leaking Cass was in a much better mood. By the time we got back home it was after 8. She got a nice warm bath, some meds and down for bed at 8:30. (1 hour past normal) I was worn out from that so Matt went and got Chilis to Go. I ate and off to bed I went!! To much excitment for the day.

Dear Lord

Thank you for my little girl. She is such a blessing in my life. The hugs and kisses (aka - head butts)she gives me every day are cherised. The glint in her eye when she is teasing. Her excitiment when she sees we are going to the park.
The toys laying in every corner of our house. When she calls for "MAMA" at 6am in the morning. And yes...even when she is sassy (which is very rare). Thank you also for the trials it took to conceive and the complications that arose when she was born, all of those trials made me become closer to you and rely on you...not my own understanding. I will also never take anything for granted, I cherise every moment with her - Thank you for making me what I thought I may never be.....a Mom.
Amen

New Potty

We bought Cass a potty Saturday. I researched all of them, read reviews and found this to be the best one. They had a white one and this pink one. Matt wanted white but I liked the pink. Matt wanted white because "what happens if we were to have a boy" but really...the odds of us getting pregnant naturally are 1% and we don't know if we will do IVF again so its a very good chance Cass could be our only child so I like going all out pink on everything!!! I am enjoying having my little girl. We also put the white and pink one next to each other and Cass kept pointing at the pink so we let her make the final decision...and she chose pink - thats my girl!





We put the potty in the bathroom and she has sat on it a couple of times. I am happy with her being willing to sit on it. At one point she picked up some toilet paper and pretended she went and did her thing with the TP.

I forgot to mention I took Cassie for her first McDonalds icecream cone last Friday. Don't ask why I bought 2 cones, like I really thought she was going to eat a whole one by herself?? She took 5 licks and I had to eat my cone plus hers....hey, I couldn't let 49 cents go to waste!! Ummm, I felt pretty yucky after that and had to go for a walk afterwards.

Being Mooned! She thinks this is the funniest postion to be in

18 Month Check Up

As soon as we were called back Cassie recongized what was going to happen and the tears flowed! Poor little girl. She kept pointing at the door to leave. Too many doctors in her past!! The nurse weighed her, took her length, listened to her heart and took her temp so the nurse was not Cassies friend at that point. As I predicted Cassie is a peanut and almost not on the charts!! She is less than the 3% in weight...however she is staying on the same percentile as she was months ago. She is eating like a horse and is happy. The charts show she has dropped percentiles in weight and height and I don't know why the doctor even looks at those percentiles because they are NOT ACCURATE!!! We were force feeding the poor child so much that she was projectile vomiting!! Grrr! She was born below the 5th percentile and she is now back at that point since she is eating how much she wants to eat. For length she was between the 5-10% (30 inches) and her head was 50-75%.

Both of her tubes are still in her hears and he was happy with how she was doing with speech. I told him we have an appointment at Childrens and he said from what he sees she doesn't seem to have any problems right now. She actually did very well when he came into the room.

Cass has only had the HIB and PCV7 vaccine. We wanted to hold off on others until she was bigger. I am thinking we are going to start the DTP in 6 weeks.

Saturday we are going to Babies R Us to buy a potty for Cassie. Going to start potty training or at least introduce her to it and let her take it at her own speed. She is smart as a whip so maybe this will be easy. (KNOCK ON WOOD!!) The doctor did say around 2 is when most are ready but he has heard of 18 month olds being potty trained. I am not pushing her, I just want her to see it and if she wants to try she can...if she doesn't that is totally fine.

Now I have to call the vet and order hartguard and Advantix for my other girl!! :o)

Our week so far...

Pots are for standing in (at least according to Cassie)



I just wrote out a long post and some how it didn't post and I can't find it anywhere! So...this is going to be shorter because I am NOT re-writing everything.
A quick recap of the original post that you won't see:

We have gone to the park every day this week for 2 hours. Cassie LOVES the swings!

uh-oh Spaghetti'os!


After nap time



Tomorrow is her 18 month checkup. I am interested to see what her stats will be and how she is with the doctor. Her stranger anxiety is gone but the doctor may not be her favorite person in the whole world still. At least there are no shots.

Pic of her wavy hair and ringlets

Showing off her leggs!


Today I scheduled some appointments at Children's Hospital. We are going to be having a follow up with her ear/nose/throat doctor. He will check to see if the tubes are still in her ears and her hearing. I'm thinking this will be a smooth appointment since she has never had an ear infection and we can tell she hears without any problem. We will also have her first speech appointment. Cleft Palate kids usually need some speech therapy. It will be interesting to see what they think of where Cassie is with speech at this point.
Helping Mommy vacuum

The Sporty Look

My brother got this shirt for little Cass last year. Its still kinda big - its a 2T but it works and she will be able to wear it next year as well since she is such a peanut! Her shoes are so cute as well....they are little Skechers, I love them!

18 Months Old

Wow, a year and a half has gone by! Its hard to believe in 6 short months Cassie will be 2 years old!! I remember when she was an infant and we were dealing with her feeding tube, pulse oximeter, haberman bottle, projectile vomiting from the feeding tube and numerous appointments at Childrens - all of that is all behind us and you would never know the tough first year Cassie had...besides the 2 small scars on her tummy from the feeding tube. I am so proud of my little trooper.

Love putting her hair in a pony tail...just wish she would leave it in!




We did shopping at Babies R Us this week, stopped at Daddy's work to say hi, story time at the library and play dates. It was a fun week. I have noticed a change in Cassie this week, smarter is the only word to describe it. Every day she does something different and it just amazes me in what she does and understands. I feel like I am talking to a child that is older than 18 months!

In Mommy's shoes







I was reading statistics today. Pierre Robin has an incidence ranging from 1 in 8,500to 1 in 30,000 babies being born with it. So Cassie happened to be "that 1". After a feeding tube is removed 85% of the stoma sites close up on their own...Cassie decided to be one of the 15% that needed surgery to close it. I also just happened to read that 85% of children crawl before they walk....umm..not Cassie. She decided to be part of that 15% that does things differently. You go girl! Always taking the road less taken! Ha Ha!

Braids

I put a braid in Cassies hair for the first time today, it stayed in for maybe an hour before she realized there was something in her hair and pulled it out. That girl will not keep anything in her hair! I pull it back make it look all nice and presentable...then we get in public and she pulls it out, all that hair poofs out and she looks like troll doll with that hair all over the place...ha ha!!

She is giving true kisses now, she came up to me today and gave me a big wet (yogurty) kiss right on the lips. She is so darn cute. In the bath I watched her take her hands and wash every part of her body by herself...it amazes me to no end that she is mine.

She loves giving Athena dog biscuits. If I leave the pantry door open she hightails it over there to grab the dog biscuit box, dig out a bone and give it to Athena. Athena is her new best pal because of this. When were outside Cassie will scream for her "Thena"and clap her hands. I love how she copies what I do....better be careful!!

Cooking and playing with Athena

Cassie LOVES to copy me and she is big into "cooking". For her Birthday we plan on getting her a kitchen set but in the meantime she makes do with the Dishwasher door open as her table, my pots and spoons, her spoons, her food and potatoes.

She put all her spoons neatly in the pot

Then add 1 Potato

Stir

Pour in some Gerber Graduates

Smile pretty and stir again

Mmmmm...Potato

What you don't see is the 5 other potatoes all over my floor

Such a good cook!


After cooking she spent time with Athena

Here Athena, have this bone!

"But I don't want the bone!!"

"I said....take the bone"

"Fine Ms. Bossy Pants"

New chairs

Yesterday Cassie spent the majority of the day with our neighbor girl who is 7. She came over and they played inside for awhile. The neighbor girl is so good with her! After they played inside we went back out and played on their swingset and enjoyed the nice weather....lets just say Cassie crashed after a busy day of playing.

We bought Cassie some new chairs for outside. We have one on the patio and the other one is still in the house. We may have to end up leaving it inside because she loves picking it up and moving it to different parts of the house to sit. Yesterday she moved it to the front door to sit and watch the traffic go buy and get a tan.






I also am thinking seperation anxiety is setting in...didn't we just get over stranger anxiety?!! She wouldn't go to the church nursery and has even been crying if Matt takes her from me. She has been so clingy to me and grabs my hand to pull me wherever she wants to go...she doesn't want to leave my side.She wouldn't even let Daddy put her to bed last night. I know one day she will be like "Mom, drop me off at the corner so my friends don't see you" so I am reminding myself of this and enjoying every moment of her clingyness!!

Easter

This morning we went to church, Cass got all decked out in her pretty pink dress. Church was crazy packed....there were even cops there to direct traffic and at one time people were standing in the back of the church because there was no where to sit. I "heard" it was a good sermon. Cassie decided to boycott the nursery today. She cried when I dropped her off and she was pretty worked up so I didn't leave her. We stayed out in the lobby and I tried to listen to the sermon on the TV but it wasn't working to well. Both sets of Grandparents came with us to church...it was a nice morning. Opening Easter Gifts Daddy and Cass My little girl and me The Princess Ready for church! After church Cassie took a nap and the Grandparents came over for dinner. She got 2 Easter baskets full of goodies and books. She also did a Easter Egg hunt and got the concept to put the eggs in her basket...at one point she just wanted to throw the eggs.