Update 6-21-10

Well, we'll admit it. We've been slacking on the blogging. We actually have things that are happening in our lives, but we have just been being lazy on the writing. So, we'll use this time to put everything down that has been happening and hope that we can keep up.

Let's start with the days right after our appointments, which seems to be when our slacking ways began. We got back into town and started up Karsie's weekly appointments here. The therapists were thrilled with Karsie's development, so much so that they graduated her from OT and basically graduated her from PT as well. She is still a bit behind with PT, but she is progressing at a fast rate, and is almost to normal. She's been pretty much finished with OT goals for a while, so it was time to move on. We go in once every other week or so to PT just to check in and see how Karsie is doing.

Speaking of how Karsie is doing, here's a list of things that we are working on now:

Sippy cup - do you think we're ready to try out sippy cups? Picture. She has been really wanting to drink lately and wants to do it herself, so we tried to find one that was easy for her to get liquid from, but requires her to suck just a little bit to get the hang of it. We may have gone a bit overboard.

Crawling - she is so close to really crawling. In fact, she's doing it...just backwards. She finds herself under our couch a lot. We basically just let her drag her omphalocele on the ground like a rag doll (it's not really that bad). She's close. She still is not good at getting from laying down to sitting up, but when she does get that, she's mobile and bye bye resting for mommy and daddy.

Swimming - swimming has been a bit of a story. We signed her up for swim lessons and were a bit misled. We thought we were gettting actual lessons where they teach the kids survival techniques and how to get dunked and rolling over and such. Not that they're going to make one-year olds Michael Phelps, but basically we get in the pool and have "free time" where we just put them into the water. But, we paid for them, so we go when we can. However, Karsie has a real cool trick that she does when swimming. She turns blue. She absolutely adores the water and loves to kick (the best one at it in our opinion) and likes playing in it, but toward the end of a half hour session, she loves to turn a new color. It took us a while to remember "Hey - her organs don't have any fat or muscle around them to insulate them." So, her body keeps them warm and neglects other non essentials, like her toes and fingers and lips. We asked the doctor and he said it should be fine as long as she's happy, which most of the time she is.

Big Girl Seat- A few weeks ago we transitioned Karsie into a big-girl car seat! She likes the new one so much more as she can see out the windows now and sits up tall instead of being scrunched into the infant carrier. Karsie loves riding in the car and has her own little "me time" back there. She plays and sings and talks happily... we are very thankful for her tolerance for the car seat as we are frequent travelers!

Eating - Karsie loves food, but not a lot of it. She loves meat! Chicken and ground turkey are heavenly. She also likes cheese (who doesn't?) and is starting to enjoy goldfish crackers. We have scheduled a little snack meal for her when it's not regular meal time.

We're right smack dab in the middle of her food and medicine change. We're giving her half breast milk half formula this week. We'll be at all breast milk in a couple of weeks. We're also down to just one dose of Reglan per day (we started with 4). We thought maybe we weaned too quickly as she didn't poop for 2 days. But then she did. A lot! And then she did it again. A lot! Her body is still producing her normal poopage so it has adjusted nicely. She still takes her milk/formula through her tube, but we are happy that it is moving towards breastmilk... maybe someday we will have a freezer again!

Grandma Turner came to visit Karsie this weekend. We had a fun time with her. Karsie loves her grandparents!

Belly Sleeper- over the past few days/nights, we have often found Karsie sleeping almost on her belly. She pulls her legs under her so her bum is in the air and then sleeps kind-of on her tummy. We are both belly sleepers, so this comes as no surprise that she would be comfortable on her belly... we just figured it would be after her belly was flat. She is learning to live with what she's got!

Right now, we have a sick little Bug. She got a little cold and she's slightly under the weather. It started as a cough, which kept us up all night two nights ago, and it has turned into nasty drainage party. She has been awarded some new steroids to help with the cough and some antibiotics because she has the beginnings of an ear infection. It has been an interesting couple of nights spent playing in the freezer to get the swelling of her vocal cords down. She likes to chat with the meat.

And by the way...it's hot here. This has nothing to do with Karsie, but it needs to be said. We're hot. And it hasn't even gotten as hot as it will. Hopefully we will be on vacation when the real horribleness starts.