It’s been awhile since the last post, mostly because Maddie caught a cold, so things kind of stayed at a plateau for a while.  Although she showed symptoms (congestion, runny nose) for only a few days, she was kind of out of it for 2 weeks or so.  During that time, we didn’t push too many new things other than her normal therapies and just let her rest when she wanted to.  Poor girl also stopped smiling for that time period, so there are less pictures to share!  Below are a few before she got sick!

Maddie’s eating has continued to progress nicely.  She started to choke on water again when she was sick, so we didn’t try new things before she got better.  However, post-sickness (this past week), she has tried a variety of new foods and enjoyed them all!  Bill is more adventurous with Maddie (pancakes, pizza crust, crab) while Jen has been introducing some summer fruit (white peaches, mangoes, golden kiwis).  In terms of skills, we’re still working on drinking out of a cup.  We no longer have to thicken her milk when letting her drink out of the cup and she’s leaking less too!  The bottle is definitely still her preferred way, but we’ll just continue to practice.

We finally were able to add vision therapy to Maddie’s Early intervention plan and had our first vision session today!  Although Maddie was tired, she still did well and showed how much she’s improved from the time she was evaluated a few months ago.  She had visual responses to a couple of shiny things (pinwheel, balloon) as well as the led lights in her little room. Link to last post

Not from today, but below is a picture of Maddie seeing a shiny egg.  Her smile says it all!

Dad also hung a disco ball in front of her high chair, so she can practice vision during her ‘I-need-to-sit-here-and-digest-so-I-don’t-throw-up’ time after meals.

In terms of physical and occupational therapy, we’ve been working on a lot of sitting and standing.  With her new orthotics, Maddie’s getting better at bearing weight on her feet and really enjoys being in a supported upright position.

Maddie definitely has her own thoughts about her therapy sessions.  She’ll work work work and then completely give up and refuse to do anything else.  See below for her hard work and ‘that’s enough I’m going to sleep now’ pictures!

One day, we were practicing sitting and she decided to just lay down on her stomach and fall asleep.  There was nothing that would wake her and thankfully it was close to the end of the hour and the therapist just ended the session.

This is our most recent picture of her being ‘too comfortable’ in her stander and just decided to sleep on her toy…