First Day of School (Toddler/Kindergarten)

Max's 3rd Birthday!

The Beach

Alaska

Max's IEP

I'm behind on posting, as usual.

When Max turns three in August, his speech services will no longer be provided by Infant Toddler Services. They will instead be provided through our local school district. Because he has a summer birthday, they wanted to have his evaluation done and his Individual Education Plan completed before school was out for the summer so that he could immediately start services when school resumed. Great. Except they told me this about three weeks before the whole thing needed to be complete. This meant that I had to schedule and attend a hearing evaluation followed by an evaluation by the speech therapist followed by a meeting to review and approve/disapprove his IEP. If I declined his IEP we would then have to get a new one written and approved during this time as well. I'm sure this is no big deal for most people, but for me to find that time to take off of work at the last minute is difficult. But, we got it all squeezed in.

Thankfully, the speech therapist who did his evaluation and will be doing his speech therapy next year seems reasonable. I'm not sure how experienced she is with cleft affected kids and I'm not sure how big of a difference that will make. But, she at least seems pleasant and willing to learn and work with us. She also seemed receptive to some of my concerns about Max's initial IEP. She had him down for only thirty minutes a week at first. He is currently getting one hour of services. As soon as I mentioned that I'd like him to have a full hour she switched him to two thirty minute sessions/week. I think this will work even better than one one hour session. It makes me wonder if I should have asked for more time. I also questioned whether he would be getting individual vs group services and explained my concerns about group therapy for him. She seemed receptive and guaranteed at least one of the thirty minute sessions would be individual, but said that the second one would somewhat depend on how many children needed services and what their issues were. We'll see. Thankfully we do have some coverage for speech services through our insurance (20 hours/year). Once I know what the school based services are going to look like, I'll try and add some private coverage on top of that.

Max is progressing in speech, but it's been a bit slow. Not unexpected. Everyone who spends time with him notices that he is easier to understand, but I don't think an outsider would understand much of what he says. This makes his momma's heart worry about starting school in the fall, but I'm hoping it will encourage him to be even more understandable. He has a lot of sounds that he can make, but doesn't unless he has strong encouragement. I think this is what frustrates me the most. I think some of it is his two year old battle for control, but I also think that his palate is still very short and has two small fistulas so I think it is a lot of work for him to make those sounds. I'm anxious to see what the cleft team thinks when we go back in August. (Assuming I can ever get his appointment made - I've been trying for 10 days with no result.)

And now ballet

First Voice Recital

My Girl's Parent Teacher Conference

BRAG ALERT - Go no further unless you want to hear my shameless brags about Elise!

I am so proud of Miss Ellie. We went to her parent teacher conference on Thursday and got a WONDERFUL report. Most importantly she's significantly improved her listening, responsibility, and organizational skills. She's a wonderful friend. She has a great sense of humor and has been "coming out of her shell." (She takes a while to warm up to new situations.) She's really enjoying show and tell and speaking to the class. This is a something she never would have done a few months ago, and I think her voice lessons (and some maturity) are helping with this. She's also doing very well with the academics. She recognizes and can write and make sounds for all upper and lower case letters and is reading simple books. She recognizes and writes all numbers up to 25 and can count to 100 (and then some). She can do simple addition and is really enjoying it. She's even been making up her own compound addition problems. But, her favorites are still art and language.

Max's New (Old) Haircut

Max's Hair in China

Max's Haircut From This Weekend

We took Max for a haircut this weekend. We've been missing his China haircut. The one he had when we first met him. We decided since the weather is warming up we'd try to replicate it. Unfortunately we didn't bring pictures and the stylist was not familiar with Chinese haircuts. We guided her the best that we could and I don't think it turned out too badly. I think we left the front a little wide and short, but it still looks cute.

The Garden Project

It's all Grandma and Grandpa. This is a new venture for me. We'll see if I can manage to help her keep it alive.

After

Before

Ellie's creativity

We definitely have a budding artist on our hands. Ellie's mind is constantly coming up with new projects, ideas, and creations. Her are some of her latest.

The first one is her "Jane" outfit. Think Tarzan.

The second is a hula girl made from the leaves from a strawberry.

The last is her playdough creation. It's a park with flowers, bushes, a picnic setting, and a girl jumping rope. This is seriously better than I can do with playdough.

I love this girl. She keeps it interesting.

Dental update

I took both kids for their dentist visit last week.

Ellie is an old pro. She loves seeing Dr. Warden and getting her teeth cleaned. She got her first set of x-rays and her 6 year molars are set to come in soon. This means she's not far off from starting to lose her baby teeth. I can hardly believe it. That makes her seem so old. Her little pearly whites are so cute, I'll miss them.

Max did really well. He sat on my lap for the cleaning. He was a little intimidated at first, but settled right in and let them do a full cleaning. He does have one tiny superficial cavity, but we are going to wait until his next visit to have it filled. Not to shabby after being bottle fed and not having dental care for two years of his life.

Who's a handsome boy?

Easter 2010

We had a fantastic Easter this year. The kids woke up and opened their Easter baskets. No pictures since Max was in his undies. Max got some sand/dirt toys including a dump truck and two books, and Ellie got seeds/gardening supplies. She has been dreaming of planting a garden this year. She also got a couple of books including the second in the series of BOB books. (Since she READ the first set.) After Easter baskets, we dressed the kids and met my brother, sister-in-law, niece, and nephew for church and then drove to my mom and dad's. It was a gorgeous day, almost 80 degrees and sunny. We changed the kids into their play clothes and they flew kites and played with their cousins. We had a great ham lunch and then a giant Easter egg hunt. I know my kids probably had at least 50 eggs each. My sister-in-law brought the bunny from her science classroom and the kids got to play with it a bit as well. They thought that was so cool.