Go Aggies!!!

In spirit of our big game this evening at the new and improved Texas Stadium I got Ms. Kaylie showing her school spirit! Go Aggies...Whoop!!!

Words and Weights

For the longest time I have had these on my side bar for everyone to see. I thought I would post it as a way to archive this info. More for me than anyone else.

Words She Knows (newest to oldest)

• 57) more bites...as of 06/15/09
• 56) daddy walk
• 55) food
• 54) see ya
• 53) Garret
• 52) shirt
• 51) melt
• 50) thank you
• 49) five
• 48) four
• 47) three
• 46) two
• 45) one
• 44) Jolie
• 43) eat
• 42) Dora...as of 5/07
• 43) off
• 41) sound of elephant
• 40) neigh
• 39) school...as of 4/13
• 38) ruff
• 37) roar
• 36) meow
• 35) oink
• 34) sit
• 33) Ernie
• 32) mine...as of 03/17
• 31) jacket
• 30) snack time
• 29) sock
• 28) paci..as of 03/11
• 27) I don't know
• 26) bath
• 25) no
• 24) mail
• 23) water
• 22) shoe
• 21) car
• 20) go
• 19) please
• 18) cookie
• 17) Shiner
• 16) Bailey
• 14) grandpa
• 13) grandma
• 12) diaper (1/15/09)
• 11) baby
• 10) Elmo
• 9) Up
• 8) open
• 7) help
• 6) hello
• 5) mama
• 4a) more
• 4) all done
• 3) uh oh
• 2) doggie
• 1) daddy

Kaylie's Weight

• Nov. 29, 2009 - 22 lbs. 4 oz.
• Nov. 11, 2009 - 22 lbs. 14 oz.
• October 1, 2009 - 21 lbs. 3 oz.
• Aug. 31, 2009 - 21 lbs. 3 oz., 32 in.
• August 2, 2009 - 20 lbs.
• July 13, 2009 - 20 lbs. 4 oz.
• July 1, 2009 - 20 lbs. 6 oz.
• June 10, 2009 - 19 lbs. 9.5 oz.
• May 18, 2009 - 19 lbs. 9 oz.
• April 16, 2009 - 19 lbs. 4 oz.
• April 2, 2009 - 19 lbs. 10 oz.
• March 20, 2009 - 19 lbs
• February 26, 2009 - 18 lbs. 6 oz.
• January 23, 2009 - 17 lbs. 9 oz.
• December 22, 2008 - 171bs. 14oz.
• December 1, 2008 - 18 lbs. 2 oz.
• November 17, 2008 - 17 lbs. 7 oz.
• November 10, 2008 - 16 lbs. 7 oz.
• October 21, 2008 - 16 lbs. 5 oz.
• October 3, 2008 - 15 lbs 11 oz.
• Sept. 26, 2008 - 16 lbs. 2 oz.
• Sept. 15, 2008 - 15 lbs. 11 oz.
• August 29, 2008 - 16 lbs. 1 oz.
• August 15, 2008 - 15 lbs. 10 oz.
• July 10, 2008 - 14 lbs. 5.5 oz.
• June 25, 2008 - 13 lbs. 7 oz.
• June 4, 2008 - 13 lbs. 4 oz.
• May 3, 2008 - 13 lbs. 11 oz.
• April 3, 2008 - 12 lbs. 14 oz.
• March 17, 2008 - 12 lbs. 9 oz.
• February 25, 2008 - 12 lbs.
• February 1, 2008 - 11 lbs. 4 oz.
• January 2, 2008 - 10 lbs. 2 oz.
• December 1, 2007 - 9 lbs. 6 oz.
• November 3, 2007 - 8 lbs. 9 oz.
• October 3, 2007 - 7 lbs. 9 oz.
• September 3, 2007 - 6lbs. 8 oz.
• August 23, 2007 - 6 lbs.
• July 23, 2007 - 5 lbs.
• July 7, 2007 - 4lbs. 3 oz.
• June 28, 2007 - 3 lbs. 4 oz.
• June 6, 2007 - 2 lbs. 2 oz.
• May 17, 2007 - 1 lb. 13 oz.

God is good

Everyone told me things with a preemie start to improve around the age of two. Seeing where we were both physically and mentally I was not sold on that. As of now I can say it has been 100% true for our baby girl.

So many things are starting to fall into place both physically and mentally and problems that have caused more stress than one can imagine are starting to get answers. Knowing her history of growing and then plateauing for many months I fear saying this but we are making progress in all areas of her life and we could not be more grateful/proud of our beautiful baby girl. I wish I could say Jason and I are the reason she made such huge gains but it was all her. Way to go!

Today Kaylie received her annual review for Early Childhood intervention or ECI as I normally refer to it. We started using them when Kaylie was 5 months/2 months corrected and have been so grateful for them. They re-evaluated her today and the results were amazing.

They test 5 different areas. Here are the areas and her scores. I will show what she scored at 16 months and what she scored at today-28 months. Keep in mind they no longer correct for prematurity but it should always be kept in the back of your mind when looking at the scores because if they did some of the scores would actually be age appropriate. Current score is in bold.

FYI: If you correct the 16 mth one she would have been 13 mths
If you correct the 28 mth she would now be 25 months.

Cognitive works on gaining skills and knowledge. We were blown away by the new results. I watched her match color to color and size to size. I knew she could do picture to picture but the other two shocked me. They also gave her several objects and asked her a question..."What do you use on your hair?" She reached over and grabbed the brush. Impressive!!!

She went from being down 4 months to catching up plus adding several more months of additional skills to get her to a 31 month old. Can you tell we are proud!

- 16 mths: scored as a 12 mths old
- 28 mths: scored as a 31 mth old

Communication looks at how the express themselves and understand. We figured this would be low. Her feeding disorder actually hurts these scores.

- 16 mths: scored as 10 mth old
- 28 mths: scored as a 21 mth old

Social Emotional works on the child's interactions with others.
- 16 mths: scored as a 16 mth old
- 28 mths: scored as a 27 mth old (slightly down but still up for corrected age)

Physical works with use of hands and movements. She finally imitated drawing a circle. This was a first. She really struggles to hold a crayon so I was pleased to see this. Our next step is to work on strength of her drawings. What I mean is trying to get her to push down harder so you can see what she is doing. Right now she doesn't have enough hand strength to do that.

- 16 mths: scored as a 14 mth old
- 28 mths: scored as a 27 mth old - made up a little bit of ground

The other category is adaptive/self care. The scores on these are low but they said the test they use is not the best for evaluating this area so we did not need to take it to seriously.

I know all of this has been confusing but it basically shows how well Kaylie is doing with all of her therapy sessions. We think me being at home, all the therapy she has gotten, and having the proper nourishment have helped as well.

Other stuff:
On Tuesday we had another upper endoscopy to see if things had cleared up since her one in June. I figured if he did not see anything the first time we would be good. Prelim results look awesome. Hopefully we will know more tomorrow. I am not thinking it will be anything other than she looks great.

Kaylie and her Garret

Russ, Deanna, and baby Garrett came over on Monday night to watch the Cowboy game. This was a good time because Kaylie was able to show off her new "Go Cowboy's" skills. It was also good because now she could finally see the baby she asks to see pictures of all the time. She will repeat his name over and over until we show her a picture.

The two had a fun time with each other and hope we can see a lot more of them know that we are living closer together.

Laundry day

I was sitting at the computer listening to her play when all of a sudden she started doing her little signature laugh. I turned around and this is what I saw. She had a playing in this laundry back and thought it was the best thing ever. If only I would have know it would be such cheep entertainment.

PS...supervision was provided =)

Some things never change

As we were saying good-bye to the Stall family Fletcher ran up to Kaylie and gave her a huge hug. After looking at the picture the one below came to mind. The second one was taken in January of 2008 when they were only technically 5 months old. Kaylie was 5 months corrected and Fletch was just 5 months. Some things will never change. I can not believe they have known each other their entire lives! That is awesome. I had to take this picture from Jolie's blog so the quality is not the greatest.

Now you see me...

Now you don't!!! I have had these pictures since before our trip and I just forgot to post them. The two had so much fun playing under the Stall's sink. It definitely kept them busy for awhile.

* I know the last picture is a little blurry but I included it because I loved the looks on both of their faces. Precious!

All Done

I am finally done with all of my trip posts. It took me forever but I am officially done. I know there are a lot of pictures but the beauty behind a blog is you can look at what you want and skip the rest. I posted a bunch tonight so make sure you scroll down. We hope you have enjoyed our trip to Colorado Springs. Jason, Kaylie, and I were so blessed to have gotten a chance to visit.

Heading home

We ended up coming back without daddy on Friday morning. The experience is a lot different when you are traveling with you and a baby plus the car seat etc. Thankfully I had seen Laura do it on her own before so I knew how to set everything up so I could push Kaylie, pull luggage, and backpack the car seat. Once through the ticket counters we headed to security.

Security was just as traumatic the second time as it was the first for her. She cried over losing her bear, having to take her shoes off and of course putting up her stroller. The only difference was this time the people were so grateful I followed the correct procedures with bringing on Kaylie's food and bagging all her med and placing them out for scanning that they took sympathy on me and my crying baby. Most of the time you feel so rushed. This time they brought my stroller to me, opened it up and worked on calming Kaylie down. Usually they are way to serious. They even put a bag on my stroller for me. So impressed. Definitely appreciated.

We got up at 4 am to make an 8am flight in Denver. We were exhausted. Overall, things went well. I had some major anxiety before we even left for the trip but this time it was easy. The only problems we had were take off, landings, and lack of food. During these moments she would fight, cry, and at times kick the chair. Thankfully the guys in front of me were cool and didn't mind. They helped me entertain her whenever she was upset and actually stopped her from crying making this trip a success. It also helped she discovered the tray tables and the fact that she could sit on them and/or lay across them into my arms. This made her happy making things in my world great!

Final trip home: Kaylie A+(lost a few pluses for take offs and landings), mommy A+++. I was shocked at how stress free this was for me. I thought I would fall apart. It helped that the flight attendants were wonderful. They gave her cookies, coloring books, and stopped by to chat as much as they could. It was nice to have their help!

To our baby girl...Mommy and daddy are so incredibly proud of you! You did fantastic on the plane and were so good on this trip. Mommy and daddy love you!

Friendship

Laura, Allie, and Nick, Thank you so much for a wonderful trip. We had so much fun and loved spending time with you. I promise it will not take another 3 years to get out to see you again. We alreay miss you and are looking forward to seeing yall and meeting baby Ryan soon!

Focus on Family

Focus on the Family is a Christian based organization that provides a safe place for children to play. This place is way better than any mall play area that you could find. They have so many things for kids to do. They even have puppet shows and stage performances for the kids to watcch. To top it off it is free. If you are ever in Colorado Springs it is worth visiting.

Other highlights included a plane for the kids to walk through, a movie under the stars, a jungle gym type play scape, costumes to dress up in, and a soda shop for snack time. That was the only thing you had to pay for. Walk away with two exhausted children and I would say we had one successful day!

Dance Dance Dance

Dance Dance Revolution the Chuck E Cheeses way.

Chuck E Cheeses

What do you do on a cold rainy day...Chuck E Cheeses. The girls had a blast! Kaylie actually played several of the games.

Kaylie was obsessed with this game.

For some reason she would not sit in the seat.

Sang to a Dora song..."Popping bubbles, pop, pop, pop, pop. That song never leaves my head!

We made several trips to this game.

YAY...Kaylie was impressed at mommy's skills. She was good at this game.

Growing up I rocked at skee ball. Glad to see it is staying in the family.

She was able to get the ball all the way to the top of the ramp before it came back down. I was impressed that she was able to get it that far.

Whenever the balls would get stuck in the shoot she would put her face up to the hole to see if more were coming. Not the best idea!

One of the staff members came by throwing out tickets. Kaylie was in heaven.

Kaylie and Allie

Random pictures from the week.

Kaylie can find a stroller anywhere. When she sees one it sounds like she is saying Dora. It can get confusing at times.

Allison enjoyed watching movies with Kaylie while she was eating. Good bonding time.

Red Robin burgers...yummy!!!

She is such a monkey

The girls decided it would be fun to play behind the couch. It amazed me at how easily Kaylie could get in and out of it without any problems. Her arms and legs are so incredibly strong it makes up for the fact that she is short.

One time I heard Kaylie crying...she and Allison had decided it would be fun to put their strollers back there with them. The only problem was Allison could get out and Kaylie could not. Cracked me up.