Fall 2012

We weathered Hurricane Sandy in our area pretty well. It did not make landfall in Virginia but we certainly felt the effects from it. The wind and rain were really heavy Sunday & Monday. Katelyn slept through it all during the night and Ryan, who is a light sleeper, slept with me while Dean slept in Ryan's bed. Speaking of weather, we've all been under the weather during the past month. Ryan had it first. The congestion, coughing, runny nose. Katelyn got it next but a couple days after she started with it, she woke up and her breathing was labored so I took her in to the pediatrician. Her lungs were okay but the doctor we saw felt like she had croup. Basically, it's a viral infection that is characterized by a "barking cough" because of swelling of the vocal chords. He gave her a dose of liquid steroid and I still had some of her Albuterol inhaler from when she was sick back in the Spring so I gave her some puffs of that. She was much better within a week or so. During the week she was getting better, I started getting worse. The La-Z-Boy was my friend for several nights. I'm finally on the mend with just a slight lingering cough. My mom also had the same thing but was able to get an antibiotic from her doctor. Hopefully, Dean will be spared. Katelyn hasn't been back to the surgeon since August. Nothing has changed with her O. It's still the same size it's been for at least 6 months. She's grown and her O just grows along with her. She's getting a new protective wrap because the ones we had made for her back in early Spring don't fit her O completely since it has grown. We see the surgeon right before Thanksgiving and I don't suspect anything different will be occurring. She will probably cry like she normally does when the surgeon comes into the room so he won't be able to access the O, other than the outside. He would like to push on it to see how much of the contents would go back inside of her (for lack of better terms) but since she gets upset, he can't. So, we just wait. Maybe when she's able to fully understand what is going on and talk, she will be less likely to become upset just at the site of him. It's not that he's scary..he's one of the sweetest and funniest doctors we've met, but he's very tall and has somewhat a deep voice. Although, she cries at the pediatrician's male nurse too and he just the opposite. She's becoming such a hoot. She will sit down and read (in her own jargon) books to her bear. She loves books! So much more than Ryan did at her age. Ryan was and still is into puzzles. He was very good at puzzles at her age and could easily do a 6-9 piece puzzle without our help. Katelyn will do puzzles but it's not the first thing she reaches for when she's playing and she needs help getting the pieces in. She and Ryan love each other but definitely are like any brother & sister and need their own space. She still likes carrying purses & totes around and pretend she is going shopping. She also likes to put everyone else's shoes on. She tries to put her own shoes (and clothes) on. She also loves to dance. I can totally see her in dance class in a couple years. I can't wait!! We're having Katelyn assessed sometime this month for speech. When I made the appointment, she wasn't saying many words, probably 5 words which was right on target for her age (she was a few days from 18 months). But by 20 months she should have 20 words. We didn't want to wait that long so we went ahead and set up the appointment. I've started her on a strong Probiotic and a DHA supplement since then and within a week she had added two words and added a two word sentence back that she had stopped saying. She has about 10-12 words now and seems to be adding new words every week. She understands pretty much anything we ask her to do; go get her shoes & socks, throw something in the trash can, go upstairs, time to eat. She knows the nightly routine of bath, dinner, a little play time unless she tells us otherwise (by crying or rubbing her eyes), going upstairs and changing her dressing (which she likes to help pull off the gauze) and getting her pj's on. I still love the cuddle time and rocking her for a while before I put her in her crib. She sleeps great at night and we are so blessed for that...now she needs to pass that onto her brother! The kids had a great time at the pumpkin patch. It was nice to get out of the house for a couple hours before the bad weather rolled in. We had been stuck in the house for the past couple weekends due to us being sick so the kids were ready to run around. Katelyn picked up the smaller pumpkins and would set them down and want to sit on them. Did I mention she likes to take almost anything and make it a seat? It's quite funny. Ryan got his face painted as a pirate and played on the big play set they had set up. We took a hayride and enjoyed looking at all the animals.

Halloween turned out to be a little chilly but we just put extra layers under the kids costumes and they were fine. We went to my parents neighborhood again this year. I was in a rush to get out of the house, stop by to get dinner on the way and over to my parents house that I forgot my camera. I only had my cell phone camera which doesn't take very good pictures at night. Hopefully my dad got some good ones on his camera and I can share in the days to come. Ryan was Batman & Katelyn was a Strawberry. Ryan definitely had it down and was practically running up to the houses. After a few house, Katelyn knew what to do if people held out the basket of candy..she grabbed 2 pieces! ha, that's my girl!