Hi Everyone!
October
At her 1 year check up Kennedy weighed in at 19 pounds and was healthy with the exception of the muscle issues, of course. Still not big enough to turn the big girl car seat around, but that's okay. We are going to keep her rear facing for as long as we can. The pediatrician suggested we do that and I think it is better for her with the lack of neck control she has sometimes anyway.
It looks like I have two little ones since we still have the carrier in the van as well. I still use it when we got out to eat or grocery shopping. She can't sit up in a restaurant high chair or a shopping cart yet. I'm not sure what we're going to do when she outgrows the 22 pound limit on the carrier. Guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
Towards the end of October my mom came to visit for a week. Unfortunately, she fell at work the day before she left and spent most of her time laying on the couch while she was here. Looking back she probably should have postponed her trip because she was in a lot of pain while she was here. She is finally feeling a little better and was able to go back to work right before Thanksgiving. Hopefully when we go up there in 2 weeks she will be able to get on the floor and play with Kennedy since she missed out on that while she as here.
October 21st was Kennedy's first neurology appointment with the new doctor down here. We weren't very happy with her neurologist in Fort Worth so we were anxious to get a 2nd opinion. Mom was planning on going to the appointment with me since Danny was supposed to have a swim meet. Luckily, he didn't have to go to the meet after all because Mom wouldn't have been able to go with me because of her back. I'm not a fan of going to neurology appointments by myself because I am usually a wreck when we leave just thinking of all the what-ifs. Dr. Stucco ordered a bunch of tests to look at the way Kennedy processes sugar, proteins, etc. and a couple of genetics tests so we could have the results back before our genetics appointment in December. All of her "processing" tests came back normal! YEA! I'll get the the genetics tests later.
The end of October brought Kennedy and I back to Mansfield. Unfortunately, it was under sad circumstances. My good friend, Charlene, lost her battle with pancreatic cancer. Charlene was Kennedy's "Texas Grandma" and we visited her often when we were living in Mansfield. She ordered finger puppets and fun things for Kennedy to play with while she was there. She told her stories and sang to her. This was something we knew was coming, but it doesn't make it any easier to deal with. The funeral was amazing and it was great to see how many people Charlene had touched. I have no doubt there were people at the funeral that had never met Charlene in person but felt like they had because of someone else that knew her.
This is from our trip to Mansfield in September. So glad we were able to see her one last time.
Okay, enough with the sad. Kennedy was a sock monkey for Halloween. She loves her sock monkey that she got from Santa last Christmas. Danny had a swim meet on Saturday (Ghouls in the Pool Invitational) and the plan was for her to dress up as the sock monkey and sock monkey was going to wear her "my daddy's the coach" shirt. We didn't get to do that because Kennedy and I had to go to Mansfield for Charlene's funeral so we just dressed her up on Halloween night and took pictures.
November
I was so excited when Kennedy's hair was finally long enough for pigtails or piggies as my niece, Makayla, calls them.
The first part of November I signed Kennedy and I up for the Bugs class at The Little Gym. I thought it would be good for her to be around other kids her age since she doesn't go to daycare. We go once a week until the middle of January. Not sure if we will continue or not because it is so dang expensive. Maybe we'll wait until spring and sign up late and just pay the prorated rate for the rest of the semester :) Anyway, she seems to like it. She can't always do what the other kids are doing but if she can't I usually just do something similar with her that we are working on in physical therapy. She especially loves the music! It is hard work though and she usually falls asleep on the way home.
Kennedy started saying Daddy/Dada. At first it was only when she was eating Cheerios, but not she will say it without them. YEA! Still working on a clear Mommy/Momma
The middle of November Kennedy had a Speech Evaluation. I was not real happy with the Speech Therapist because she was saying things that were completly out of her speech speciality and out of line as far as I was concerned. I have talked to the director of ECI (early childhood intervention) and we are working on resolving the issue. Anyway as of now we have the ECI Developmental Specialist coming once a week and we are working on speech stuff with her. This week we are working on Ball, Baby and Dog. She doesn't say Baby but she sometimes babbles with the same inflection as we are saying baby. She's getting there!
McDonald's host a big basketball tournament every year in Pasadena. It just so happened that some of the metroplex(Dallas/Fort Worth) teams play in it. A good friend of mine, Steph, had her team down here. Steph was the person that I first coached basketball with at Wester. I like to say she taught me everything I know :) Anyway, she had her varsity team down here so Kennedy and I were able to see all of their games for the 3 days they were here. It was a "dose of home" that I needed.
The weekend before Thanksgiving The Hubbards came to visit for a few days. While they were here we went to Kemah so the boys could go to the amusement park and to The Battleship Texas. After we got home Zander said, "this was the best day of my life" so I guess he had a pretty good time. Kennedy LOVES Lucas and when I say love I mean her face just lights up when she sees him. I told Shelly that she needed to video him talking to her and send it to me so I can play it over and over. Both boys had her giggling within minutes of walking in the door as you can see. Again, another "dose of home"
That's Zander and Danny in the back
Danny took one for the team and rode this with Zander. He's not a fan of things going around and around. Not sure why he liked the rollercoaster. Oh well.
Getting some good snuggles
Zander trying out the 'guns' on the ship
The Hubbards
That's Kennedy and I on the left. Everyone else was up about 4 levels.
Chris & Lucas checking out the equipment
We spent Thanksgiving with Danny's family in Indiana. I made sure to remember the battery charger for the camera, BUT forgot the camera :( We flew in Wednesday night and had Thanksgiving day with his mom, stepdad, sister and brother-in-law. Friday his aunts, uncles and cousins came to his mom's house for another big meal. We definitely had our fill of yummy food while we were there. Saturday we spent the day hanging out with his mom and stepdad and his sister came over to visit. We left Saturday night.
November 30th Kennedy had her follow-up eye appointment. I'm not exactly sure what these measurements mean, but zero is the best. Kennedy was at approx a 20 in September and is now at an 8, so NO GLASSES! WooooHooo! We go back in February for another check-up to make sure it is staying that way or getting even better.
December
December brought us back up to Mansfield again for Christmas Tea with Polly and Athen. This is an annual event and one of the first things that Polly said when I told her we were moving was, "You'll come back for Tea, right?" We wouldn't miss it. Kennedy was not so fond of Santa at this point. I will say that she was getting tired and we were about to leave, but it still made for some cute pictures.
While we were there we also took advantage of the weather and went to the Fort Worth Zoo. We went with Chrissy and Breck Boydstun and Courtney, Samuel and Jack Helm. The kids had a great time and it was nice to see Courtney and Chrissy!
The zoo was a little cold when we first got there.
Yesterday was finally Kennedy's genetics appointment. We were lucky to be able to get in "so soon" but it is still a long time to wait from August to December. Anyway, about those tests I mentioned earlier that neurology ordered. This is how the doctor described them to us...
The first test was like looking at a book shelf. We just want to make sure all the books are there. We are not looking for missing pages or misspellings or sentences out of order.
The second test is looking at the books. We just want to make sure all the pages are there. Again we aren't looking for misspellings or sentences that may be out of order.
All of Kennedy's books are on the shelf and all the pages are there! YEA!
They also did a test to rule out Fragile X Syndrome. It came back normal too! YEA!
Now we are doing tests to see if all the words are spelled correctly and if the words in the sentences are in the right order. They took blood yesterday and we should have the results in a couple weeks. One has to be sent to Mayo, one to Baltimore and one is being done at Texas Childrens in Houston.
That brings us to today...FINALLY! I think I have learned my lesson to not let such a long time go between blog posts.
Overall, Kennedy is going really well. She has started eating more 'real people' food. Beans, spaghetti, Spring Creek brisket, chicken & veggies and even got a Chick-fil-A french fry yesterday. She is getting stronger and stronger every day. She can sit up when she uses her hands as a tripod for several minutes, which she couldn't do at the beginning of November. She is "talking" more and more every day. She rolls a lot more to get from one place to another. AND she keeps passing every test the doctors can throw at her!
We hope everyone has a great Christmas! We will be heading to Wisconsin in less than 2 weeks! Can't wait!!!!!!
