Happy 9 Months Baby Girl! You have had such a fantastic month - constantly growing, learning, and still impressing everyone!
You are spending a lot of time each day sitting and playing at your "desk". You've started working with blocks and learning how to stack things. Your reach is getting better and better, as is your grasp. We tried working on holding crayons, and got these great crayons thinking that they would be ok if you stuck the end in your mouth...but you ended up turning it around and sticking the crayon end in your mouth so we're holding off a little on that! They're a little bit of a softer crayon so you ended up with a lot of blue in your mouth.
You are still doing SO well with eating foods - the amount that you're eating is increasing and you are handling the foods much better in your mouth. You still have a little bit of work to do with your tongue movements but there's already been a lot of improvement since our visit to the clinic a few weeks ago. We did learn that you're not too crazy about pickles. Either that or you just really weren't sure what to think about something so different than what you've been eating! (And thank you Little Big for that nice ending...)
This week has been an up and down week. You had a low grade fever all last weekend, and we thought it was just some teeth coming in....but they haven't shown up yet. You were really fussy Monday and Tuesday and just wanted to be held and cuddled (which I was perfectly happy to do!) but started developing a cough Monday night. We did a few breathing treatments over the week but it didn't seem to help any so we actually spent your 9 month birthday at the doctors office. You were almost back to yourself Thursday and Friday and spent a lot of time playing with your new toys - you mastered getting the rings off of this toy in about 15 minutes!
Anyway, it turns out your have a slight ear infection so you're back on antibiotics; and they renewed your albuterol prescription so we can add that to your breathing treatments as needed. Also, happy day, Mama got a flu shot while we were there. Joy. Not quite how we planned to spend our day, but we survived it.
You are growing up so fast I don't even know what to do! There are days when I feel like things are going so fast that you'll be off to school with your sisters tomorrow and then we have weeks like this week where you just want to be held and rocked that remind me that you're still my Baby Girl. I love you so much and am so proud of you and how hard you're working! Keep fighting and keep growing!
This is the every Monday update that I promised...and didn't do last week. I knew we had an appointment yesterday at the feeding clinic so I told myself on Monday that I would write it on Tuesday. And then we had Big Big's open house and it never happened. SO...
You've done a lot of new things in the last week - the biggest one being bench sitting! You were sitting up nice and straight on my lap one day without any support when the PT came in and she got REALLY excited... and so this is what we worked on that day:
You looked SO grown up sitting there all by yourself!!! You sat there for almost 30 minutes and didn't come close to falling! You were shifting your weight and keeping control of your balance the whole time! We put one of the portable DVD players in front of you to encourage you to reach and stretch up and it looked like you were sitting at a little computer:
The PT suggested getting you some shoes that had traction on the bottom because you were trying to pull yourself up with your hands, but the bottom of your boots are too slippery, so I found these beauties (just for you Uncle J!)
SLOW DOWN!!!
So you've had a lot of fun with your bench sitting the last few days and then yesterday the PT brought you a desk (aka: cardboard box from Costco with a cut out that your legs fit under)! Our next steps will be to work on reaching for things in front of you and COLORING!!! Time to start working on your grasp with smaller objects! Little Big is especially excited to help out with that one!
Yesterday, we went to the Therapeutic Feeding Clinic for a follow up and they were THRILLED with your progress! They went over each of the concerns from the swallow study we had at the end of June and then fed you some food (which you showed off nicely with!) and checked off all of the concerns! Your swallow is now strong and intentional; you're able to get all of the food off of the spoon by closing your lips completely; little to none of the food is coming back out of your mouth. The only concern they still had for us to work on is your tongue movement. Your tongue usually hangs out of your mouth, but you've gotten much better about keeping it in your mouth, and you're also much better and moving it up and down (which is the motion most needed for swallowing) but still need some work on the side to side movement which will help transfer food from one side to the other, control larger portions, etc. Other than that, you were a doll - you did your happy food dance, ate beautifully and behaved wonderfully as usual! After the appointment we went and visited all of your friends in the NICU. They could not believe how big you've gotten! The last time we were able to stop by was in early June so no one had seen you in about three months - now you have teeth, a mess of hair and your new chair. But you were still the same smiling baby girl they know you to be. All of the nurses that came to say hi just talked and smiled and laughed with you, but your PT and OT were there and I'm pretty sure you got an informal evaluation as they started stretching your arms, looking at your boots, playing with your hands - but they were also extremely impressed with the progress you've made at home. I had texted Dr. G to make sure she was going to be there when we came by so we got to see her and Dr. H as well :)
You have settled in to eating downstairs with us and love getting to spend time with your sisters and Daddy. You still like to help feed yourself (another thing they were impressed with) which is usually ok, but always messy! Mostly, you just like playing with the spoon or bowl, getting the food on your hands, and then trying to figure out how to get it off.
You are doing so wonderfully well! We turned your piano around today so that you could play it with your hands and have pulled out some of the other toys that you were given that you weren't quite ready for - all of that is coming in handy now! PT wants to start working on problem solving skills (finding hidden objects, stacking blocks, etc) so that will be our next fun task!
You're still not a huge fan of pictures or videos, but I did catch you going to town with the piano a few days ago with your feet. You love pulling at the toys and making them move around and make noise and got really excited about something and just got to kicking! You've also got another cute trick: for the last three days instead of shaking your head no at everything you blow raspberries at us instead (which, of course, you didn't want to do for the camera!):
Love you so much Baby Girl! Keep working hard and we'll try to keep up!
