Random pictures :)

After a rough start to the morning, Claudia is off to school.  About 15 minutes before the bus got here we had quite the diaper emergency... Claudia had to go back in the tub.  UGH!  I really think that she waits for the days that I have to get her ready for something, she does not do this for Jason!  After a quick wash down and change of clothes we just barely made the bus.  I did not get to write in her notebook to her teacher like I had wanted, so I hope everything goes ok today. 

 

Now that I have a morning to myself I figured I would do a short post with some random pictures.  Enjoy!

 

Claudia is SMART!  I think with the help of her therapies, she is going to show improvements very quickly.  We know that she is very observant and she will copy something that she saw someone doing days after she saw it.  But she is also able to figure things out on her own.  See the picture below?  She put her doll in the jumper all by herself without anyone doing this before to show her.  How awesome is that?  A few minutes after the picture was taken the doll was headfirst in the jumper... lol.

 

Showing off her flexibility.

Sleeping with her knee in the air

 

She loves her slide.  She can't figure out how to get her feet over the top quite yet!  When we put her on it *the right way* she insists on holding onto us still.

 

 

Growing up so fast!

Claudia is growing up right before our eyes!

 

She started school yesterday.  She is in a classroom with 7 other children who have special needs.  There are two other children with Down syndrome in her class.  According to the teacher she is doing well, although she has been throwing toys.  We have not gotten much as far as reports go but we have been told that she loves playing outside (duh!) and enjoyed the ball pit in the gym... yep that's my girl!  The teacher says that she has been using her sign language and seems to understand when people are talking to her.  She even said that she listens to commands... not sure I believe that one!  She has been doing well on the bus and falls asleep on her way home.  Here are some pics:

Waiting for my bus!

Still waiting!

Checking to make sure I got my bag.

Ok, off I go!

 

And here is her on day two after coming home:

Zonked out!

Two Months Home

Two months ago today I picked up Jason and Claudia from the airport.  It was such a great day, to be together again and together as a legal family for the first time.  These past two months have FLOWN by.  We have done so many things, spent time with friends, visited family and gone to numerous appointments.  Claudia has come a long way and still has a long way to go.  We are impressed nearly every day with her abilities and rejoice over new skill she learns. 

I will not lie and pretend that it has been easy.  We knew from the beginning that we would have difficulties and that there would be difficult days.  Some things, such as the bonding came easier than we expected.  Other things that we expected did not happen immediately.  When we got Claudia she did not like being held at all.  Waiting in lines with her (before we got a stroller) was a nightmare.  We also did not expect some of her negative behaviors such as head banging, biting herself and hair pulling (her own and others).  Thankfully these negative behaviors (which we believe stem from her inability to adequately communicate with us, and us know knowing her well enough to know her needs) have gotten much better since we first met her.  We are working on them still and have come across a few other difficulties but overall, Claudia is doing fantastic.

Claudia starts school a week from tomorrow, I am very excited to see how well she does, however I do know that she will come home tired and cranky!  I have a feeling she will be falling asleep on the bus rides home, especially since she gets out of school right at her usual nap time.  I am anticipating several cranky days when she first starts.

Here are a few pictures from today, her 2 month home anniversary:

She will finally actually rock on her horse.
 She can do it by herself AND will stay on it for more than just one rock.

Graceful Dismount.
We still need to work on safety... she has no fear.
Claudia likes to launch herself from things.

She is trying to figure out zippers and buttons and is getting good at taking coats off.

The patch wearing is going better than we expected although she does not like when it is time to take it off.
I don't blame her!

She has been getting a lot of Mommy time :)

We love Claudia so much and are excited to see what the future holds for her, although we don't want to rush it!

Appointments galore!

It seems like we are always going to appointments lately!

This week she had to finish up her immunizations with her doctor.  It was a nurse appointment only and they got us in and out in record time.  While I appreciate that, they did not leave any time or chance for questions and did not bother showing us the way back to the waiting room.  Thankfully she is all set with her regular doctor for now.

We also went to the pediatric opthamologist this week.  Claudia's eyes are so dark that they do not dilate well and they had to give her three doses of eye drops to dilate her pupils.  We were there for almost 2 hours, mostly waiting for the drops to work.  Next tie they will just double dose her fro the beginning.  They had a really nice area for the kids to play so it was not bad waiting.  The assistants were great and the opthaologist was nice.  Claudia did not want anything to do with him and would not respond to her name when he called her.  He asked me if she had hearing problems.  Um, no, she just does not know you.  It took her a while to respond to us calling her name.  She did not get a nap in but was surprisingly well behaved.  Very talkative and goofy.  They think she will need glasses in the near future but for now we are patching her left eye for 2 hours a day to help strengthen her right eye due to her strabismus.  Hopefully this will help.  We go back in two months.  So, for now Claudia gets to wear super cool eye patches.



Not so sure about it...  And yes, it was off as soon as I turned around... ugh!

I think she KNOWS she is cute!

Claudia is doing so much better with the eye patch than I expected.  Today was day three and she did not really attempt to remove it.  I put it on her while she was napping, I felt kind of bad.  The worst part is taking it off, she does not like it and will soon be out of eye-brows! 

Claudia and I got to check out her soon-to-be preschool this week as well.  One of the students moved away and this left an opening for Claudia to attend pre-school this year.  This will be a great help to us and to her.  She will be in a very small, non-integrated, structured classroom with only 7 other children.  There are 5 adults in the room.  Claudia has qualified for physical therapy, speech therapy and occupational therapy which will all be given at the school.  She will receive two, half hour sessions of each therapy a week.  I cannot wait to see how quickly she progresses.  She starts in less than 2 weeks and will be riding the bus, this mommy is getting kind of nervous!  Claudia is sooooo tiny compared to all of the other children in her classroom.

We had our first of many CPSE meetings today.  Unfortunately I was unable to go but Jason and a good friend (who has been through this innumerable times with her family and others) were able to go.  We will be getting all of the services we wanted and Claudia qualifies for the summer school program.  We feel that we will see tremendous growth in the upcoming months.  We are so encouraged by what we have already seen.

We got her evaluation in the mail today and it was HARD for me to read.  I did not like reading about how delayed she is compared to "typical" children.  I know she is, but to see it written on paper makes it more difficult, especially since it does not take into account how far she has come in the last 3 months.  Oh well, now she will get the appropriate services.

We have had a few nice days weather-wise and have been able to take a couple of walks to the park, so I will leave you with a video of one of her favorite activities:

A new "game"

 

Claudia has made herself a new "game"...

 

 

 

 

 

Update

Sorry it has been so long since I have updated.  My final class of my nursing school started up last week and I have been super busy with it!  45 days and counting till graduation though! 

Claudia has been doing great.  Sometimes I cannot get over how smart she is.  She is copying everything WE do.  It used to be that she would want us to copy her but now she is watching us more closely.  She scratched her head after Jason scratched his the other day and she will now point telling the dog to go to bed when I do it.  She is becoming quite the sponge.  Her sign language is progressing.  This weekend we had a very proud moment at dinner where she pointed at what she wanted and signed "more" followed by "please."  We were amazed that she put them together by herself. She also knows "mama," "all done," "help," and "I love you."  When she signs "I love you" it looks like she is calling us a loser lol. 

We are seeing more and more purposeful play and slightly less throwing of her toys.  She is still throwing her sippy cup everywhere though.  She has been eating well.  She gets CRANKY if she does not get a nap in but there are still days that she does not fall asleep for her nap.  Those are usually the days that we have things to do with other people too!  Easter for example... ugh.  She can be so grumpy, but then again, I am grumpy when I am tired too! 

We have a meeting next week to discuss preschool and her therapies, hopefully she can start preschool soon and her social skills will continue to improve.  She will also receive therapy while she is in preschool.  Hopefully we will know more next week.

Here are some pics from Easter and more.  Enjoy!