6 Months

We've had our brave Zane home for six months and today was our first post-placement visit from the social worker. It has been a whirlwind with surgery and all the doctor appointments...these past months have flown by.

I've lost track, but I think this was around our six or seventh visit from a social worker in the past five years. I remember how nervous we were the first time...cleaned all week long, stayed home from work to be physically and mentally ready for the visit -- so much stress! Ha! I barely remembered it was today and just did a bit of straightening up. Eric and Elle weren't even home from an errand when she arrived. The social worker is an intern and shared that she was adopted from South Korea, thus her interest in pursuing the field. Zane flashed his big dimples at her, but made sure to have one hand on me so as not to be grabbed up by the stranger.

Couple weeks ago we were waiting for Zane's nose swab culture to come back and as we suspected, it was positive for infection, again. To our surprise it was an entirely different infection, so he's been on treatment for that for the past ten days. Unfortunately, it is obvious that this infection or another has set in and so there were several conversations with the doctor today regarding next steps. Of course we are feeling very concerned and anxious about how all this treatment is taxing Zane and not healing him. We are praying about next steps and for His healing.

Elle is working really hard on the dance piece for her recital. She went up on the big stage with her class yesterday to run through it. It was a hoot watching them bump into each other and try to follow their teacher while waving at their mamas. She has also been working diligently on her speech. She practices her 'k' sound every day and will ask me to practice dialog with her that she has noticed she has trouble saying. The other day she asked, 'Mama, how do you say what her name is?'

So we practice and practice...
M - "Hi, what is your name?"
E - "My name is Elle. What is your name?"
M - "My name is Kate. Nice to meet you." :)

Zane continues to be an eating machine! This boy is going to eat us out of house and home! He's getting the hang of the spoon, but it frustrates him that he can't get it in as quickly and neatly as I do and he rather me do the work. So I force him and that ticks him off. Just doing my job, son!

Today was 75 and the next two days are supposed to hit 85 degrees! We've enjoyed having the windows open and playing outside. I'm sure we still have some cooler days ahead and the coldest will be Easter, I'm sure.

What?????

It's the first day of Spring and we awoke to five inches of snow - what??????? It's downright cold, so we stayed inside, but brought the snow in. Elle spooned it in and out of bowls, made mini snowmen and a snow-cake. Zane, on the other hand, grimaced at the touch of it. We also enjoyed coloring, playing Go Fish, Chutes & Ladders, The Ladybug Game (Love this game!), making and eating chocolate chip cookies, and drinking warm tea.

Randomness

Our little ballerina.

My sister and three children had stand-by tickets to fly in this week, but with Spring break and everyone wanting to get somewhere, all the flights were full. We're disappointed that we'll have to wait a few more weeks to meet our newest nephew and cousin, Samuel Ryder, and bummed he'll be another month older, but on the up side, we'll hopefully have some better weather for them.

Not knowing whether or not they would catch a flight, we prepared the rooms for the three extra kiddos and set up Zane's room as playroom central. Some of the kids' toys found their way into our room as well, and I'd forgotten the unusual placements when I tried to quietly crawl into bed after Eric had already fallen asleep. Imagine my surprise when I found myself hurled through the air, landing on the floor with a thud. It was late, dark, I was tired and Eric was half-awake now...

Eric: Kate, are you okay?
Me: (sigh) Yes....... (groan) Ouch!
Eric: What's going on?
Me: Well apparently, there's a slide over here!
Eric: (pause) Did you -- try to slide down it?

Maybe at the time I just needed a release, but for whatever reason, I roared to the point of tears for at least 5 minutes! Eric just rolled back over to sleep.

Elle is still enjoying her ballet-dance class and every week they practice their Winnie The Pooh piece for the upcoming recital. A few weeks back, the parents were invited to watch the last 15 minutes to catch a glimpse of what the girls were learning. Elle did a great job! Even with 30 extra eyes on her, she nailed a grand jeté over a green stuffed frog. It was a clunky grand jeté, but the cutest grand jeté I've ever seen! (Grand jeté - A long horizontal jump, starting from one leg and landing on the other. It is most often done forward and usually involves doing full leg splits in mid-air.)

Elle is cracking us up with her words and thoughts.... Eric announced he was taking out the trash and Elle launches in to Oscar the Grouch's "oh I love trash, anything dirty or dingy or dusty'! At the park we pointed out a man in a boat, rowing on the lake and she starts singing, 'row, row, row your boat gently down the stream...'. Cuddling in bed, I ask her if she'd like pancakes for breakfast in the morning, she says no so I suggest a shake. Again she says no so I ask her what she would like -- 'Uhhhh, frogs,' she says with a grin. Several days later, while cuddling in bed, I suggest we have shakes for breakfast in the morning and she says, 'With some worms in it!' And lately she's been melting us with her, 'I appreciate that.' Whenever we help her, serve her food or compliment her, she replies, 'I appreciate that.' Sweet, sweet girl and wonderful stories we don't want to forget.

February was Zane's month for conquering the sit-down. He had mastered pulling himself up to the side of the couch, chair or toy in December-January, but once he was up, he didn't feel confident to plop himself back to the floor. So he would whine until one of us came to lend him a finger that he felt was necessary for maneuvering down. All a process, setting the stage for our baby to turn toddler! I have not been anxious for this one bit --- I want him to crawl for as long as he wants. It will come soon enough and I want as much time to hold and cuddle him as possible before he's off and running after his sister.

So fast forward to March....There have been some moments here and there during the past few weeks where he has stood for about 2-3 seconds, but as soon as he realized what was happening, he'd fall forward into my arms. Then yesterday, something clicked, several times he stood for about 5 seconds, fully aware, and used his little legs to come down to the floor without holding onto anything. He didn't like it though, whined all the way down and crawled quickly in my arms for reassurance...my baby! ;)

It was really best that my sister didn't end up coming this week. Elle came down with a nasty cold and other yuckiness and Zane's nose infection -- red nose and all -- is back (sad sigh........). The 14 days of meds just didn't kick it! We went in for another nose swab and are waiting for cultures to come back. This time we're under the care of our primary and I feel more confident that he'll be able to dose and prescribe to get this taken care of. I'm just so sad that Zane we'll be on meds for another month. Eric and I were lamenting tonight that Zane has been mostly sick since surgery on December 8 -- it's just one little blow after another, but our little guy is a trooper and he's pushing through. I on the other hand want to sit down and cry for my baby (and I do).

The first three days on the obturator (aka 'mouthpiece') were brutal. Zane HATED us putting it in and just cried, screamed, panicked and clamped his sharp little teeth on our fingers! Finally the morning of the fourth day, Eric put Zane in his highchair and asked him to open up -- and he did. And just like that, he decided it wasn't worth the fight any longer - he's a smart one. This was such an answer to prayer and relief to this Mama who was torn up inside for his struggle.

Yesterday was a beautiful day! We went to a nearby lake and park to hike some trails, walk the water bridges, swing and slide. After getting our coats on and Zane in the Kelty carrier, we headed down to the water. When we came back up, we noticed that we had left two of our car doors wide open in the parking lot! I seriously think we have lost brain function during these past months -- I can't even begin to explain this............

Elle was feeling a little better last night, but Zane went to bed with a low-grade fever. Don't know if it's the nose infection or his molars coming in. They've been pushing their way through for the past few weeks. The right one came in first, but the left one has really been moving these past few days. They are also going to cause some problems with the obturator fitting....already have an appointment with the dentist for Monday.

Anywho, as I titled, random thoughts rattling around in my head that I don't want to forget.

Punky Brewster, aye?! ;)
Zane's first buzz.

Obturator

Zane was fitted for an obturator (dental appliance) last week and today he tried it out for the first time. He was hopping mad about us putting it in and out, but once in, he didn't even act like a foreign object was there. It didn't slow him down one bit while he ate. We didn't see any food come out of his nose at lunch, but there was some food colored saliva (green from the green beans he was eating)...hmmmm.... If you could see the obturator, you'd know that it was impossible for any food to come up through the fistula now. The obturator actually goes up into the hole...so why???? We wonder if it came from the back of the palate?? Maybe a learning curve from adjusting to the new appliance or another hole??? There are two other hole-like areas that they don't think are opened all the way to the palate. One is also covered by the obturator but the other isn't....

Then tonight at dinner, we didn't see any food or saliva out of his nose, so.... We are looking forward to seeing how things go tomorrow and thrilled that we didn't have to irrigate and suction food today.

Tomorrow we see the cleft team again for another nose swab. Hopefully we'll have good news after the weekend that the infection is gone. Zane certainly is in better spirits lately -- he just seems like he is feeling a ton better! Sweet, sweet boy!

I took these pictures of the kiddos this morning. Couldn't get them to smile at the same time, so here are both of them....

Al Pal

My dear friend, Alice, and her sweet girls came for a visit -- so much fun! We met Alice and her husband at our church before the Air Force took them far away. With their recent return to the Midwest, we are loving the opportunity to get our families together again. Alice and I sharpen and encourage one another in child training, have a shared passion for fine foods and coffee, and have a talent for making the other laugh so hard it hurts. I love her girls - they both reflect her so beautifully. It was our joy to be with them again --- looking forward to our next visit!