Belly laugh

Nothing much new, just some pictures from some happy days around the house.  

Charlie's physical therapist got promoted and so we were assigned a new one.  We love her.  She is so creative.  Within minutes of stepping in our door, Charlie was rolling over oatmeal containers (to help him get the hang of pushing up on both his knees and his arms).  

Here is Charlie practicing sitting on our couch.  The play gym helps orient him up (so he's not just diving to suck on his feet) and the couch helps him stay steady (and provides a soft landing should he fall).

Lucy and I planted some seeds in pots.  We picked seeds out in the morning and I told her she had to wait until dinner to plant them.  She updated me on what time it was every 5 minutes for the rest of the day.

 Here are the completed pots: delphinium, basil, tomatoes, parsley and zinnias.  Oh, and this is what our backyard looks like at the moment.  The owners are doing some major renovations including flattening the backyard, and replacing the deck.  

 This is another physical therapy gem.  Charlie, who cannot sit up on his own, can sit up in this round laundry basket.  You can even hang toys from the holes with links-- genius!

For the first 10 minutes he was in there, all he did was peek out of the holes.

Here is Lucy faithfully watering her plants with a watering can we made out of a milk carton.  Lucy decorated it with buttons and told me that the designs were caterpillars.

Another unrelated Lucy funny.  Lucy has a new response to me telling her no.  The conversation goes something like this.

Lucy: Mommy, I want a cookie.

Me: Well, you can have one after dinner.

Lucy: Oh, honey, I want a cookie because it's just fine!

Everything is "Oh, honey, it's just fine!"  I'm not really sure how she put all of this together. 

I went to check my e-mail this morning and when I looked down this was happening.

And finally, a video just taken that can only be described as "it's a sibling thing."  I have no idea why Charlie finds Lucy so funny, but I'm so glad he does.

http://youtu.be/4rTW7bnvHR8

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter!  I am sad to report that I failed to get pictures of the kids in their Easter finery.  It's because we were running late to the Easter Vigil.  I know, it's kind of ridiculous that we were running late to a service that started at 8pm, but that's what happens sometimes.

So, here we are Sunday morning, after having attended a beautiful liturgy at the vigil, we slept in on Sunday.  Then we had our usual Sunday waffles, but extra-special for Easter-- sausage, eggs, strawberries, whipped cream, ice cream, sprinkles, chocolate chips, etc.  Quite a feast.

 Poor Charlie got a shiner in the night.  Sometimes he just starts rubbing his eyes like crazy and then one of them will start swelling.  I'm still trying to figure out what this is about.  But, in the morning, Charlie woke up looking like he had been in a bar fight.

Lucy really wanted to go to the park for Easter, so we did.

Charlie trying out the swings for the first time.

 I know that's a lot of pictures of Charlie, but I just can't help myself.  He's just so dang cute.  

After that, we visited with our friends a little bit, and Lucy and her friend T ran around holding hands and giggling for an hour.  

Then we had Easter dinner with a group of our friends.  Afterwards, the musically inclined broke out the instruments.  You can see Lucy holding her ukulele below, and when she got bored with that, she banged a plastic spoon on a book.  

Now seems like a good time to share two bits of news.  If you haven't heard already, James has been accepted to the PhD program at the JPII Institute!  He was offered a full scholarship as well as a generous stipend, and we have decided that he will continue on.  We're very excited about this opportunity, as well as the likelihood that we will be staying in one place for a while (the program is five years).  Of course, we wish that one place was closer to family, but we hope that someday we will be able to move closer.  So now, James is finishing up his master's, we are looking for a new place to live here, and we're really looking forward to visiting home this summer.

The other news is that after undergoing a sedated hearing test, we recently found out that Charlie has moderate hearing loss in both ears.  We're sad to hear this news, of course, as this was the last of the big medical issues related to Smith Magenis Syndrome that we had to check out.  I am grateful though, that at least for the moment, this is Charlie's only medical issue, and that we have found it out now rather than later. I somehow had a feeling that this test would turn something up, even though we have not really noticed Charlie's hearing loss (Lucy only has to touch one of her toys and it seems that Charlie wakes).  I don't know much at the moment, besides that Charlie will be receiving hearing aids and an audiologist assured me that he will likely be able to hear very well with them.  We have an appointment in a month  to get the process started.  Thanks for all of your prayers, and for all of your support through both good and bad news.  God bless you all in this Easter season!

Two visits and a whole lot of mishaps

In March, my friend Nina came for a visit.  She is my best friend from high school, a truly beautiful and amazing person.  The summer after James and I got married, she entered a religious order in Florida.  A few days before Charlie was born, she discerned out and returned to live in St. Louis where she now works as a DRE.  So, in the past four years, we have not seen each other for more than a few hours (two very random visits, but both were very short).  I can't say how excited I was when she told me she was coming to visit.  It was a great week: so much catching up, so much remembering.  Unfortunately, there were also a couple of mishaps-- our computer broke, James was studying for his second round of comprehensive exams, Lucy got very sick, then Lucy got Nina sick too.  But, I think we were so happy to be spending time with each other, that we didn't even really care.  Not even when we were driving Lucy to the pediatrician and she was puking in the backseat the whole way there while Nina patiently held a bucket for her.  Have I mentioned how awesome Nina is?

Anyway, in all of the chaos, we had one little tourist-y adventure downtown.  We walked past the cherry blossoms, and then visited the Museum of Natural History.  

This is our mutual friend Rebecca.  Now try to follow this craziness: Rebecca was roommates with our friend Fitz in college at Marquette.  Then Nina and Rebecca randomly studied abroad together in Rome.  Then Rebecca moved to DC.  The world really is a small place.  Rebecca came over and we had a girls night, which was neither wild nor crazy due to all of the sickness going around. 

The day Nina left, James took the last of his comprehensive exams and we went to a party with his classmates to celebrate.  Sadly, the celebration did not last long for us.  While rough-housing with a friend of ours Lucy hurt her arm and refused to move it.  Now, if Lucy has to get hurt, there could not have been a better place for it to happen.  In attendance at the party were two nurses (one was even a pediatric nurse), and the hospital was literally across the street.  At the ER, they took x-rays, determined that there was at least no large breaks, and decided she had nursemaid's elbow (which she had a year and a half ago, coincidentally we had the same Dr. at the ER).  After popping her elbow back in to place, Lucy was still pretty miserable and could not even hold a popsicle (although she did try, very pathetically).  She refused to move it for days, and still complained that it hurt for days after that, but after a visit to both the pediatrician and the orthopedist, we were reassured that it was just ligament damage and would heal in time.  And it did. Thank God!

Later that week, my mom came to visit.  We had a very nice, low-key visit, mostly just playing with the kids.

Caeli

On St. Patrick's Day, James had his first round of comprehensive exams for his master's program-- basically essay exams on the past 5 semesters of the program.  Afterwards, the students who are in the first year of the program (and will not have to take their test until next year) held a party.  One student comes from a very Irish family.  She said every year they have a great party, a caeli, for St. Patrick's Day.  Since she could not make it back home, she wanted to bring the party to us.  They cooked a feast of shepherd's pie, scones, soda bread, etc, and then she taught us some traditional Irish dances.  It was a truly beautiful day outside, and someone soon made the excellent call that the only thing better than prancing around doing an Irish dance, would be doing so on the beautiful green lawn outside.

 Lucy was in her glory: people, outside, dancing, flowers.