Griffith finally putting mashed potatoes in his mouth.
Friday, May 18, 2007
All the news
Another good week for the boys. Allan is making real strides with his motor development. He is able to sit up without support for 3 or 4 minutes at a time and can play with his toys while doing it. He can also sit unsupported and turn his head to follow objects. It may not sound like much, but it takes a whole lot of balance to be able to do that. He likes the bouncy chair, but not quite as much as Griffith does. It is going to take him a while to develop the leg strength necessary to really get the full effect of the lights and sounds. (And he really doesn't have to jump in his to get lights and noise because his brother is acting like an Irish step dancer over in his. All of the entertainment, none of the effort. Allan knows how to make it easy on himself. ) He's sort of up-and-down on his eating, but we keep on keeping on and are going to start feeding him in his booster seat since he is doing so well with his sitting. He will get to play with his food, too, just like his brother.
We went to see the nutritionist yesterday and she took one look at Allan and said, "Well, he certainly looks well fed." I am taking that as a compliment. This time.
Griffith ate mashed potatoes last night! After weeks of trying to get him to just play with his food, he finally smashed his meaty little fists in to the pile of potatoes and dragged his toys through them. We would have been pleased enough with that since he wouldn't even get his hands dirty before, but he managed to stick about a half-teaspoonful of them in his mouth and choke them down. He was uncertain at first but our cheering seemed to spur him on. We are hoping this is the start of a trend.
Griffith, for all that he is a bit of a terror, is pretty reluctant to try new things. I took him outside to look at the garden a couple of nights ago and tried to put him down in the grass. He had only one sock on (being my children, both he and his brother take their socks of continually) and would not put his foot in the grass. He was balancing like Barishnikov, but finally set it down for a few seconds.
No big plans for the weekend. Just keeping on with more of the same. With any luck we will get some walks in, maybe a nap or two. Possibly move on to playing with/eating creamed corn.
The world is our oyster.
We went to see the nutritionist yesterday and she took one look at Allan and said, "Well, he certainly looks well fed." I am taking that as a compliment. This time.
Griffith ate mashed potatoes last night! After weeks of trying to get him to just play with his food, he finally smashed his meaty little fists in to the pile of potatoes and dragged his toys through them. We would have been pleased enough with that since he wouldn't even get his hands dirty before, but he managed to stick about a half-teaspoonful of them in his mouth and choke them down. He was uncertain at first but our cheering seemed to spur him on. We are hoping this is the start of a trend.
Griffith, for all that he is a bit of a terror, is pretty reluctant to try new things. I took him outside to look at the garden a couple of nights ago and tried to put him down in the grass. He had only one sock on (being my children, both he and his brother take their socks of continually) and would not put his foot in the grass. He was balancing like Barishnikov, but finally set it down for a few seconds.
No big plans for the weekend. Just keeping on with more of the same. With any luck we will get some walks in, maybe a nap or two. Possibly move on to playing with/eating creamed corn.
The world is our oyster.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Allan waiting for something to happen to Griff
He kept watching as his brother got wilder and wilder in the Jungle Jumperoo -- it was like he was expecting something bad to happen at any moment.
Griff and the Jungle Jumperoo
The latest addition to the overwhelming collection of toys. This is a little more advanced than the Bounce, Baby, Bounce in that you can bounce harder, higher and more to the sides.
Hanging out with Flora
Allan in the Bounce, Baby, Bounce and Griffith kicked back in the rocker. Flora says they were watching Baby Einstein, but I'm pretty sure it was Judge Judy.
Monday, May 14, 2007
Can't believe I forgot....
Griffith learned to say "Ma-ma-ma" just in time for the big holiday. It would be more heartwarming if he actually associated it with me, but I'll take what I can get. He's also working on "uh-oh" which we have a lot of occasion to use.
In an update from the annals of Cain and Abel, Griff came over and began trying to wrest the cloth book away from Allan. Allan grabbed it with both hands and his teeth and wouldn't let him have it. He's small, but he's wiry. And wily.
In an update from the annals of Cain and Abel, Griff came over and began trying to wrest the cloth book away from Allan. Allan grabbed it with both hands and his teeth and wouldn't let him have it. He's small, but he's wiry. And wily.
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Happy Mother's Day 2007
Well our second Mother's Day is nearly over and it has been a good one. As always, my thoughtful boys managed somehow to get out and pick up some flowers. (At least this year they didn't pick them from President Todd's garden.)
Griffith decided to get an early start to the holiday and woke Mom up at 5:30 to make sure that she didn't miss a single minute of fun. What.a.Good.Boy. (He went back to sleep after a bottle, though, so there's that.) Then both boys got up a little before 7. Daddy decided that it would be kind to let Mom have a sleep-in and so the boys all adjourned downstairs. At the more civilized hour of 9, we began our day for real.
We were going to try to make it to MayFest, but first one thing and then another intervened. In the end, we decided to take a long walk at the arboretum. We came home, did some gardening, and grilled out.
Allan was having a nice leisurely soak in the sink when Griffith began to have a real go-to-pieces. There was no consoling him. I tried bringing in to the kitchen and starting the laundry. No dice. Tried to hold him and bathe Allan. Couldn't do it. (Jay was finishing up gardening in the back yard.) It finally occurred to me that we have two sinks for a reason. The boys had a great time. Allan was kicking and squirming. Griffith was splishing and splashing. It was a rousing success, but definitely required two adults working full-time to pull off.
It is all very peaceful right now. Allan is laying in my lap playing with a cloth book. His brother keeps crawling over and either taking it away or trying to take it away, despite having access to every other toy in the house. Allan is holding his own, though, and he and Griffith have engaged in some pretty fierce tug-of-wars.
Much more fun than last year.
Okay Griff is attacking. Time to stop.
Griffith decided to get an early start to the holiday and woke Mom up at 5:30 to make sure that she didn't miss a single minute of fun. What.a.Good.Boy. (He went back to sleep after a bottle, though, so there's that.) Then both boys got up a little before 7. Daddy decided that it would be kind to let Mom have a sleep-in and so the boys all adjourned downstairs. At the more civilized hour of 9, we began our day for real.
We were going to try to make it to MayFest, but first one thing and then another intervened. In the end, we decided to take a long walk at the arboretum. We came home, did some gardening, and grilled out.
Allan was having a nice leisurely soak in the sink when Griffith began to have a real go-to-pieces. There was no consoling him. I tried bringing in to the kitchen and starting the laundry. No dice. Tried to hold him and bathe Allan. Couldn't do it. (Jay was finishing up gardening in the back yard.) It finally occurred to me that we have two sinks for a reason. The boys had a great time. Allan was kicking and squirming. Griffith was splishing and splashing. It was a rousing success, but definitely required two adults working full-time to pull off.
It is all very peaceful right now. Allan is laying in my lap playing with a cloth book. His brother keeps crawling over and either taking it away or trying to take it away, despite having access to every other toy in the house. Allan is holding his own, though, and he and Griffith have engaged in some pretty fierce tug-of-wars.
Much more fun than last year.
Okay Griff is attacking. Time to stop.
Allan sitting up without any help
He can do it for about 2 or 3 minutes before he loses his balance and topples over.
Allan working on sitting up
Allan is mastering sitting up all by himself. It is easier when he has a toy to lean on.
Friday, May 11, 2007
Allan all racked out.
While Griff and dad were watering the lawn, Big Al managed to get his clothes all nasty. So we ended up like good white trash. Sitting in the porch swing with him in his diaper. He's spent the rest of the night in his underwear and socks, sleeping like an angel. Hope he makes it through the night.
Dad and Griff, watering the landscaping.
Griff and his dad spent about 30 minutes watering the new roses.
scrambled eggs
We are trying to interest Griff in food. Scrambled eggs aren't going to do the trick.
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
They called yesterday afternoon to schedule Big Al's heart cath. We are on for Tuesday the 29th. It should be an outpatient procedure. They will put a wire in through the femoral artery and thread it up in to his heart and measure the pressures, etc. They will also inject dye and take pictures of how his heart is working and that should show them where the problem is. Once they have that information, they will probably consult with the folks at the University of Michigan and we may be roadtripping.
In the meanwhile, every one is doing well. Flora has been satisfied that the boys aren't going to catch cold (it has been 80 degrees all week!) and they have spent a fair amount of time out on the porch watching the world go by. They both enjoy all of the trucks that stop at the store down the street -- bread, milk, beer -- as well as the people walking their dogs. Would that it were always so easy to entertain them.
In the meanwhile, every one is doing well. Flora has been satisfied that the boys aren't going to catch cold (it has been 80 degrees all week!) and they have spent a fair amount of time out on the porch watching the world go by. They both enjoy all of the trucks that stop at the store down the street -- bread, milk, beer -- as well as the people walking their dogs. Would that it were always so easy to entertain them.
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Griff and his first riding toy
Thanks, Heather, just what we need -- a faster, more mobile Griffith.
Griff helping Dad
I'm pretty sure that his "assistance" made the project take twice as long, but how's a fella to learn?
Griffith in his high chair
He still won't put food in his mouth so we are learning to play with it instead.
Monday, May 07, 2007
Allan had his follow up ultrasound on his heart today. The hole is still there and the doctor is still pretty sure that it is an AP window. She wants to have a heart cath done to have a clearer idea of what is going on, though. So we are waiting to hear back about how soon that can be scheduled. In the meantime, we keep on keeping on.
Left the camera at home so no new pictures until later.
Left the camera at home so no new pictures until later.
Thursday, May 03, 2007
Big Al had physical therapy this morning and Miss Julie is very pleased with him. He's really getting close to being able to sit all by himself. The goal is for him to sit unassisted for five minutes by July, but he is on pace to beat that. First, he used his new sit-to-stand giraffe to practice and did a great job. Then Julie (who is a hard taskmaster) made him sit on the floor with just his Boppy around his bottom. He was pretty sure that he didn't like it. He frowned quite a bit and kept giving her the hairy eyeball, but, once she got out the toys and distracted him, he did great and was able to sit up without any real support for several minutes. Every once in a while, though, he gets tired or overbalanced (he has a rather large melon) and he topples over like a felled tree.
Griffith was almost unable to contain himself throughout this whole session. First, Julie came in a started talking to Allan so Griff had to keep yelling "hey! hey!" until she came over and talked to him. Then, once Julie started working with Allan, it was all that Flora and I could do to keep Griff from crawling in the middle of everything. No toy or person was going to distract him from whatever it was that his brother was doing. No toy is more interesting than the one my brother has. Nothing is more fun than taking it away from him.
Griffith was almost unable to contain himself throughout this whole session. First, Julie came in a started talking to Allan so Griff had to keep yelling "hey! hey!" until she came over and talked to him. Then, once Julie started working with Allan, it was all that Flora and I could do to keep Griff from crawling in the middle of everything. No toy or person was going to distract him from whatever it was that his brother was doing. No toy is more interesting than the one my brother has. Nothing is more fun than taking it away from him.
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
The boys are doing great. They have really been enjoying the good weather. Flora has even ventured out on the front porch with them so that they can watch the trucks going by. This is good for hours of entertainment.
As you can see, wrestling is a source of some fun in our household. Griffith, being mobile, would seem to have the advantage, but Allan is stronger than you would think. In addition, he's wily. Griff just barrels right on and doesn't even try to be slick. If he wants something that Allan has (and if Allan has something, Griffith wants it), then he heads right for it and grabs it. If he wants to stick his hand in Allan's face, he does it. No subterfuge there. Allan, on the other hand, will see Griffith heading in his general direction and start to wail. If you weren't watching, you would be certain that Griffith had done something rude to him. I guess it is the equivalent of the early warning system: Allan wants to make sure that there is an intervention before something dire happens. Or he just wants to get his brother in to trouble. So you can see why Griff would go ahead and whack him when he has the chance. Odds are he's going to get in trouble for it anyway so he might as well get his licks in while he has a chance.
As you can see, wrestling is a source of some fun in our household. Griffith, being mobile, would seem to have the advantage, but Allan is stronger than you would think. In addition, he's wily. Griff just barrels right on and doesn't even try to be slick. If he wants something that Allan has (and if Allan has something, Griffith wants it), then he heads right for it and grabs it. If he wants to stick his hand in Allan's face, he does it. No subterfuge there. Allan, on the other hand, will see Griffith heading in his general direction and start to wail. If you weren't watching, you would be certain that Griffith had done something rude to him. I guess it is the equivalent of the early warning system: Allan wants to make sure that there is an intervention before something dire happens. Or he just wants to get his brother in to trouble. So you can see why Griff would go ahead and whack him when he has the chance. Odds are he's going to get in trouble for it anyway so he might as well get his licks in while he has a chance.
Monday, April 30, 2007
Ready to roll
Griffith and Allan, ready to lead the walk. Griff loved his Mardi Gras beads. Allan, a little less interested.
Sunday, April 29, 2007
Hip, hip, hooray!
The boys did it ! (With a lot of help from a lot of you.) Big Al and Grif made their goal of raising $5000 for the March of Dimes -- they beat it actually. And on Saturday they led the walk. Well, sort of, anyway. The Sam's Club team (corporate bullies!) actually cut in front of us, but the boys were the lead in theory. We had lots of good company -- Dick, Steph and Bailey (who claimed to be worn out from the walk despite having ridden piggy-back nearly all the way!), Jennifer, Greg, Jim & Montell, Michele, Lee & Katie, Gretchen, Andy & Caroline (who were misled about how far the walk was by Jay but soldiered on anyway). There will be pictures but I left the card reader at work.
The weather turned out to be perfect and the boys were absolute angels for the whole walk. They got to see their buddy Dr. Joe (actually Griffith is still very skeptical of Dr. Joe who fixed his hernia. And he has every reason to be, really. Dr. Joe would rip off Griff's diaper and begin poking on his privates every time he came in the nursery and Griff has a long memory.) Allan is a little more forgiving and doesn't seem to bear any ill will toward Dr. Joe for putting in his peg. Or maybe he's just biding his time. Hard to tell with Allan. He's inscrutable.
Allan decided early on in the walk that this would be the perfect time and place for a nap and crashed. He slept the entire time. Not his brother, though. Griffith was beside himself. He's so nosy and such a flirt -- he didn't close his eyes for a minute. After it was all over we went to lunch and had burgers. By the time we got home, Allan was all charged up and Griffith was running on fumes. Allan spent all afternoon talking to his dad. Griffith spent most of the afternoon napping with his momma (I picked well that time.)
Griffith has mastered walking along furniture, but hasn't graduated to walking across open ground yet. I had my first real display of jealousy/sibling rivalry today. Both boys were hungry and I was sitting on the floor with Allan on my left leg, feeding him. Griffith was laying on my right leg drinking his bottle when he decided that this really just wasn't good enough. He crawled up on my right thigh, sat down and planted his right hand in Allan's chest and began pushing with all his might. Great. Cain meet Abel. We got it worked out for the moment, but I doubt this is the last time something like this is going to happen.
Allan is continuing to make good progress with his physical therapy and speech therapy. He has graduated to eating small curd cottage cheese. He doesn't seem to like it much (I don't either) but it gives him practice with chewing. So there's that.
Allan's heart rate had been unusually high for week or two and so we had an ultrasound on his heart last week and the cardiologist thinks that he has an A-P window. Basically it is a hole between the aorta and pulmonary artery. This is a rare (of course it is -- it is Allan, after all) congenital heart defect which allows blood to shunt from the aorta to the pulmonary artery. It means that some of his oxygenated blood ends up going back in to the pulmonary artery where there is unoxygenated blood. This may help explain some of his respiratory issues and why he is still on a fair amount of oxygen. They are giving him a high daily dose of Lasix for 2 weeks to dry him out and we will have another ultrasound to see if the hole is still there (there is a small possibility that it might close). If it is still there, then they will do a heart cath, just like Uncle Mark had, to assess the amount of shunting and the pressures in his heart. They will send all of the test results to the Wizard of Oz of Pediatric Cardiovascular Surgery at the University of Michigan. Then they will decide if this is something that we need to have surgically repaired right now. He's doing fine. His physical condition is really no different than it was two weeks ago (except his heart rate is back down). We are just hanging out and waiting to see what develops. Allan is apparently bound and determined to continue to see the world via one doctor at a time.
The weather turned out to be perfect and the boys were absolute angels for the whole walk. They got to see their buddy Dr. Joe (actually Griffith is still very skeptical of Dr. Joe who fixed his hernia. And he has every reason to be, really. Dr. Joe would rip off Griff's diaper and begin poking on his privates every time he came in the nursery and Griff has a long memory.) Allan is a little more forgiving and doesn't seem to bear any ill will toward Dr. Joe for putting in his peg. Or maybe he's just biding his time. Hard to tell with Allan. He's inscrutable.
Allan decided early on in the walk that this would be the perfect time and place for a nap and crashed. He slept the entire time. Not his brother, though. Griffith was beside himself. He's so nosy and such a flirt -- he didn't close his eyes for a minute. After it was all over we went to lunch and had burgers. By the time we got home, Allan was all charged up and Griffith was running on fumes. Allan spent all afternoon talking to his dad. Griffith spent most of the afternoon napping with his momma (I picked well that time.)
Griffith has mastered walking along furniture, but hasn't graduated to walking across open ground yet. I had my first real display of jealousy/sibling rivalry today. Both boys were hungry and I was sitting on the floor with Allan on my left leg, feeding him. Griffith was laying on my right leg drinking his bottle when he decided that this really just wasn't good enough. He crawled up on my right thigh, sat down and planted his right hand in Allan's chest and began pushing with all his might. Great. Cain meet Abel. We got it worked out for the moment, but I doubt this is the last time something like this is going to happen.
Allan is continuing to make good progress with his physical therapy and speech therapy. He has graduated to eating small curd cottage cheese. He doesn't seem to like it much (I don't either) but it gives him practice with chewing. So there's that.
Allan's heart rate had been unusually high for week or two and so we had an ultrasound on his heart last week and the cardiologist thinks that he has an A-P window. Basically it is a hole between the aorta and pulmonary artery. This is a rare (of course it is -- it is Allan, after all) congenital heart defect which allows blood to shunt from the aorta to the pulmonary artery. It means that some of his oxygenated blood ends up going back in to the pulmonary artery where there is unoxygenated blood. This may help explain some of his respiratory issues and why he is still on a fair amount of oxygen. They are giving him a high daily dose of Lasix for 2 weeks to dry him out and we will have another ultrasound to see if the hole is still there (there is a small possibility that it might close). If it is still there, then they will do a heart cath, just like Uncle Mark had, to assess the amount of shunting and the pressures in his heart. They will send all of the test results to the Wizard of Oz of Pediatric Cardiovascular Surgery at the University of Michigan. Then they will decide if this is something that we need to have surgically repaired right now. He's doing fine. His physical condition is really no different than it was two weeks ago (except his heart rate is back down). We are just hanging out and waiting to see what develops. Allan is apparently bound and determined to continue to see the world via one doctor at a time.
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