Ice and Wheels

Adina tried out the ice and quickly realized the carpet was a lot easier than the skates on ice!! Most of her time was on her butt! Either way we had lots of fun! She held onto a chair and pushed it along slowly. She fell and said, Mommy, what do you say?" I had no clue!! She said, "Mooommm, when you fall you just get up and try again and keep movin forward!! That's what you said in the car!" Glad some things stick I guess. We will try again soon, we are supposed to have some 34 degree days! HEAT WAVE!! Might need to bust out the shorts and sandals.
We went in Tuesday for Oliver's 8 hour appointment with the Assistive Technology guys and they are absolutely amazing and filled with talent! They start with the base of the chair, look at Oliver, and start cutting out the cushions, back rest, head rest, foot rest, and straps. It is made perfectly for Oliver's little body. The chair is supposed to last about 5 years depending on his growth. Basically, every time he grows out of a clothing size, we go into Gillette again and they will change the size of the chair ("Grow the chair" in assistive tech terms). Luckily we are close to Gillette. We picked up the chair today so we could bring Adina. She was really excited too! Oliver did great on his first ride and seemed to love being able to hold his head up with all of the support offered by the chair. We were so proud on his first test drive that it brought tears to my eyes! Way to go Oliver!!


Ice skating or butt skating? Both were fun!


The chair before the first sit. There were many changes made from larger or smaller cushions, wedges, and on and on. Like I said, these guys are great!


The first test! Oliver didn't scream, I was holding my breath the whole time I think. He was such a little trooper all day.


First drive! We were so excited! Even the tray was cut out and assembled while we were there. The wood and cushion will all be covered.


Adina helps the staff with the straps, a proud big sister.


Figuring out the straps and we are outta here!


Wheelchair home and all finished. I never knew it was such a process but appreciate everything Gillette did/does for us!

Baby

We had the ultrasound yesterday with the high risk OB docs. So far everything looks great! She asked what we should look at first and I said, "Corpus Callosum!!" That is the part of the brain that Oliver happens to be missing. We looked and there it was, I was so excited I asked for a picture of it! The two staff in the room were laughing, apparently I am the first who has asked for this picture. We got a lot of images of the brain, we could not see the whole head, so we can't rule out that all of the Corpus Callosum is there. We will have another ultrasound in 8 weeks to measure head growth and check on the brain. We are cautiously optimistic! Chances are we will do an MRI of baby after birth to rule everything out. We could do an MRI while baby is still inside of me(crazy!), but there is no guarantee that baby would stay still, we have become pros at patiently waiting so we will just do that.
Oliver had his hearing tested today at Children's hospital. He responded to very loud sounds but not to the softer sound. It could be that he is not developmentally at a stage to turn to all sounds yet or he could have some partial deafness. The audiologist was rolling with laughter at Oliver. He would fuss and as soon as she would make a silly sound he would get the little Oli giggles. They were playing off each other and it was a blast. Small little things that I most likely would have taken for granted with Adina. Oliver is always teaching me something! There are other tests we could have done but with Oliver's sensory issues of people touching his head we could not do them. We will do a test called a Brainstem Auditory Evoked Response test. He will be sedated and they will monitor if the sound reaches his brainstem with the help of electrodes. It will be good to know this info. We know that he hears, just not sure to what level.
Last bit of news, again Oliver was denied for nursing/respite care. Again, like the last zillion, we will appeal until we get a good reason!
Hope everybody is staying warm!! Gotta love Minnesota winter, or I guess pretend to.

Now introducing baby Klawiter Number three! Better pictures to come! (In about 20 weeks=)