More Improvements From Miss Alayna!

Alayna is actually showing more signs of enjoying eating! She gets very excited and does well. She eats about 1/2 jar of fruit and 1/2 jar of veggies at dinner time. Last night she really enjoyed "chicken noodle" dinner. Mom despises the smell, but hey, she isn't the one eating it.
We continue to work with the sippy cup at dinner time. Here she has pear juice. Alayna continues to get better about not spitting it out and swallowing the juice instead. I really clap and praise her when she gets it right. I'm trying to break that habit of spitting. It has been challenging for her to get more used to drinking liquids that have not been thickened. Remember we still add some rice to her formula in her bottle and she is so used to controlling that flow. She tends to bite more on the cup than actually suck. Fortunately, this is a Nuby cup and the juice comes out pretty easily for her.
Alayna is becoming tons more mobile. She is rolling more across the room and the other day ended up wedged between her toys and the entertainment center. It was nice to see this! Even Alexis commented the other day on how much Alayna is moving to get her toys and reaching for things. Here she is playing with one of her books.

She is such a unique, delightful little girl. Her smile is so cute.
More toothy smiles. She is still working on a few more teeth, but she is pretty darn close to having a mouth full. I don't think she has many more to go.
We continue to work on particular areas including this shown above. Alayna is doing awesome with holding herself up with locked arms for at least 15 seconds or longer. Now, you've got to catch her in the right mood, but she enjoys viewing the world from a different perspective. I keep telling her that it would be more fun to play sitting up or doing this rather than being on her back all of the time.
We have done this everyday since this photo and I've noticed a huge difference in her ability to keep her balance and hold herself up for a longer amount of time. I've also watched her roll herself on the floor and try to push her head and chest up further than ever before! I love seeing that because I can't wait until she is strong enough to hold her head and chest up and use one arm to get a toy. It's these little accomplishments that keep this such a rewarding job!
Another thing I continue to work on with her is grabbing a toy and pulling it down. This particular one will pull down and then vibrate as it moves back up. She thinks that is funny. At first I was the one doing the pulling and she would hold on tight, but now she has to try to do it. It will help increase her arm strength.

Okay, I had to show you the back of her head and all of the awesome curls! I just love it and can't wait until we are helmetless. And I'm not sure when that will be yet.
Here is how she looks from the side. I've noticed a huge improvement since January when she put it on for the first time. Dana and I are very pleased with her head shape. The only thing keeping us from taking it completely off of her is one small spot in the center of the back of her head. There is still a slight "dent" and we are hoping it pops out and takes shape. I've been measuring it by using the width of my fingers and I've noticed a difference. So we are very hopefull.
Her and Douglas have a very similar shape of head. They aren't the kids with the really round heads. They have a slighter flat shape in the back.
This is back in March. It may not look like a huge difference in the photos, but the center part of the back of her head was still extremely "dented" in.

Alayna continues to make improvements in all areas including eating, mobility, sitting, and overall strength. Summer has begun and I'm now at home with all 4 kids each day. I'm enjoying being able to play with them, work with Alayna, relax (not too much though), keep up with the housework, and spend quality time at home. Our schedule is still very packed with therapy at least 3 times a week in addition to college for kids for two weeks and basketball camp this week. So in the mornings I run a taxi service!

Therapy didn't go very well this week though. Alayna is cutting teeth on the bottom now and it makes therapy miserable for her. I can't say that she enjoys therapy on a normal, happy day so this only adds to the stress of it. The therapists are constantly touching her and trying to get her to do things and she was getting extremely angry. On Monday at Comprehensive Rehab, I had never seen her so mad. She literally cried and tried to bite at her hands for nearly 65 minutes of the 80 minutes of therapy. Thank goodness she is my fourth child. If she were my first I'd probably be in tears too. But my skin seemed to get a little "thicker" with each child. I'm sure those with multiple children can relate to that comment. So, she just had to tough it out. It breaks my heart the most just realizing how these little things we take for granted are tough for Alayna and how much she has to work to figure things out. I did cancel Thursday's therapy because she was in no mood to play or work and to give her a rest. I hope next week goes better because she has 4 therapies scheduled.

Then on Wednesday, she was to go for Speech therapy for the first time at the CTC. I took Douglas along because the other two kids were in camps in the morning. Well, let me just say for the record that he never gets to go to another therapy for a very, very long time. Not only did Alayna only last about 5 minutes and then closed her eyes to go to sleep, Douglas had a meltdown. He didn't like the fact that I told him he couldn't play with the therapy toys. They have to be disinfected each time and I didn't think that was fair for our therapist to have to clean the toys for Douglas. He didn't like the fact that he had to sit by me and play with his Gameboy. So, I decided to reschedule and put everyone out of their misery. I couldn't get out of there fast enough. A couple deep breaths to the van saved all of us. And I had to cancel the Developmental Therapy that afternoon.

Alayna goes next week to speech therapy, so I'll keep you updated. It wasn't a wasted trip to the CTC though because the therapist was using a Spacesaver Highchair from Target that is absolutely perfect for Alayna and is what I've been looking for. I'll be making that purchase soon. It has a 5 point harness, reclines in numerous positions, straps to a chair, is easily transported, and the tray raises up and down too. It will be nice to have something to take into a restaurant or even families houses for her to eat, sit and play in. It is padded nicely and is comfortable and provides quite a bit of support for her trunk and head. I wanted something high enough that she wouldn't get tired holding herself up in and risk falling forward. It is a neat chair. Here is the link if you want to check it out! http://www.target.com/Fisher-Price-Space-Saver-Highchair-Swirls/dp/B000WUB9QM/qid=1213368879/ref=br_1_2/601-4226647-1955326?ie=UTF8&node=13774441&frombrowse=1&rh=&page=1

Alayna's head continues to make shapely progess! (I only wish my body did too, ha,ha) She has been wearing the STARband for about 5 months now and we're just waiting for a particular spot on the back of her head to pop out flat. I hope to get into the orthosist next week, so I'll update you on what he says later. Again, Alayna will appreciate that we made her do this when she gets older! She's been such a good sport about it the entire time.

Alayna is doing great. She continues to provide us joy and a few family members have commented to me how much satisfaction they get from making her laugh and smile or even getting her to calm down when she is upset. Grandma Diana and Auntie Annette have already figured out that singing the Itsy, Bitsy Spider usually does the trick. And both my mom and mother-in-law (Grandma Billie) have commented to me on how good Patti is with Alayna. I had a Pampered Chef party here at my house last week and they witnessed the interaction between Alayna and Patti. Remember, Patti is Alayna's babysitter. We will be forever grateful for Patti and the entire Thomas family. They've accepted Alayna into their home like she is one of the family. And I should also mention that Dana has formed a great, new friendship with Joel.