On the move

The above pictures illustrate why I haven't been able to post as much lately. Brady is on the move. No more sitting quietly at the computer while Brady plays and entertains himself. NOOO way. It's stair mania and stunt attempts that could possible lead to decapitation. That sounds a bit extreme, but for those of you that have visited our humble digs you know that with 1400 hundred stairs and each room on a different level, severing a limb is quite possible. Brady doesn't seem to mind and he is actually quite thrilled with his new found skills. He always thought cruising was just referring to fetching a lady, but now he fully understands. Its literally another step towards sweet freedom. Dig it!

At PT Brady can now walk and push his walker all by himself. Sarah stands behind him just to slow his pace a bit. It seems that once Brady revs his engine he forgets that his shakey wheels have a hard time keeping up. The progress he has made in the last 2 weeks is amazing. We are absolutely blown away by how strong he has gotten!

Thursday is ball mission part 1. Hopefully this will be a quick in and out procedure and we can come home on Thursday. Judging from the success of his last operation we have high hopes for this one.

KC baby

This is obviously an old picture, but it is one of my favorites. Brady was so tiny! Sometimes I wish he was a little squirt again...just for a moment. Like when I'm carrying 2 bags, a latte and Brady all while trying to pull the car keys from my pocket....oh and lets not forget Earl! He or she is now the size of a lemon, which somehow has already made my belly the size of a watermelon.

Odd how that happens so quickly the second time around.

Jeff and I went to a Down syndrome conference in Kansas City this past weekend. We chummed around with Ryan and Annie (Claire's parents) and had an absolutely wonderful time. The actually learning portion of the weekend was amazing and overwhelming. We have a lot of work to do with Mr. B. This is one seminar he will wish we skipped. The conference primarily focused on speech and educational strategies for children with Down syndrome. We learned that kids like Brady are visual learners and do best when things are laid out in picture perfect format. It was odd because the woman was describing multiple learning and behavioral patterns of our children and I felt like they were describing me. So if things move along on par for Brady he could end up being a retired art teacher and a stay at home Mom, all by the time he is 33. What a lucky guy.

So I left the seminar with 15 items on my to do list and an urgency to implement them all within 30 seconds of arriving home.

Spread the word to end the word is coming up on March 3rd. If you feel so inclined, take a moment to make your pledge to stop using the R word! www.r-word.org/

Testing, Testing 123

With the impending arrival of Baby #2 Jeff and I have experienced a range of emotions and questions. When we first saw the positive sign we both had a moment of excitement followed by "oh poop," thankfully that feeling only lasted for about 3.2 minutes. We quickly moved on. When we tell people the news we can see the itching desire on their faces to ask us if we are going to do any testing this time. The answer: nope! We only have a 1-2% chance of having another baby with Down syndrome. Also, I don't trust the quad screen. There are so many false positives and false negatives. The only absolute test is the amniocentesis and there is NO WAY I'm doing that test. There is a higher risk of us losing the baby than it actually having DS. Toooo risky. We have decided to go back to the parinatologist for our 18 week ultrasound. They will do as super duper cool 4-D ultrasound of Earl and check for any "abnormalities." This is what we had done with Brady. Oddly enough the results from 2 of those ultrasounds concluded that Brady didn't have DS. HA! We have chosen a different Doctor with more experience this time. If it turns out that Earl does have DS then we will roll with the punches. No doubt we will be disappointed, but we can only hope he or she will be as healthy and strong as Brady. Our greatest hope for this baby is that it is average, no more, no less. Our perspective has changed so much from the first pregnancy. I am grateful for so much more. At my 12 week ultrasound I saw 2 arms, 2 legs, hands, feet and most importantly a healthy beating heart. All things I took for granted last time around.
In reality having a baby with Down syndrome doesn't change many things. It only slows things down so we can truly appreciate every moment and in my mind that is a gift. I knew parenting would teach me a thing or two, but I had no idea the incredible impact our Brady boy would have on our lives. So bring it on Earl!!

Ballantines Day

I have lovingly renamed Valentines Day after my maiden name: Ballan. I think it has a nice ring to it.

This is Brady's holiday. He is a man of love. He throws out kisses like candy at a parade. I told him maybe he should rein in his affection and reserve it for the truly deserving. My advice was clearly ignored as we walked through Target. Every stranger was air kissed by our lover boy. Some even received the "french" version. I'm glad Claire can't read yet, or this post would be the demise of their relationship. I told Brady he can share his love with the world, but his heart better be reserved for his lady. Oh yes people, Brady and Claire are still going strong. This will definitely be the first of MANY Valentines/Ballantines for these young lovers.

Update

Sleep has returned to the Shannon household! It turns out Brady is waking up because he is starving and by starving I MEAN famished. Jeff and I feel like a couple of jerks. We initially thought he was waking up and pitching a fit because he can be a bit of a turkey, BUT it turns out Brady just wanted some turkey. You see Mr. B is 18 months old but doesn't eat like a typical year and half old. He survives primarily on pureed foods and a few bits of fruit. He has a strong adversion to chunks. This distaste limits his menu. Pureed foods aren't too rich in calories and they just burn through his system. I've tried adding fat and grinding up everything under the sun, but the boy is P-I-C-K-Y!!! I have enlisted an OT from Childrens, so hopefully they can help.

Back to waking up in the middle of the night. Now when Brady wakes up at 4:00 he slams some yogurt, does a keg stand and falls back to sleep. Today he slept until 8:00! 8:00 PEOPLE! That's like noon in a kids world.

The video is Brady working his new toy. His PT suggested that we try some new cognitive toys. I thought when she said "cognitive" we were talking about a computer or a small calculator, but it turns out cognitive toys are in the "cause and effect" arena. Brady has seemed bored lately so we thought we would up the play challenges! He thinks this toy is the cats meow. Every time cookie monster pops out Brady about passes out with excitement.

4:52 am

Sweet sleep...I wish

Brady has been rocking the house since 3:03 this morning. It is now 4:53 and we are still up. Why in the world am I blogging??? The answer: I am 8 minutes and 25 seconds into round 3 of the Ferber method (progressive waiting). I have no idea why Brady thinks the sun should rise at 3:00am. He's been pulling this stunt all week! Trust me it's getting OLD. He is a determined little turkey. It is a war of the wills.

Round 4

Maybe he thinks this is training for all those ragers he's going to attend in his later years. I think it would be wise to remind him that he is a Shannon and that's just not in our genes. We haven't made it past 9:17pm in years. We like our sleep..... I miss my sleep.

Round 5....5:07am and counting.....

18 months and 3 days

Replacing the boob with boxes

Brady's new look

Talking back already

Downward dog

I have finally stopped nursing Brady. It's been 2 days since he's hit the boob buffet. It's going pretty well for both of us. He doesn't seem to mind too much. After all this time it seems strange that we are done with this phase of our lives. Nursing has been a really positive experience and I am so grateful I was able to do it for so long. In order to distract him I replaced the boob with boxes. I opted to introduce Brady to the world of retail therapy. Since expensive jeans and cute heals aren't his thing I went for the brightly colored stackable items. I have to say he seems pretty impressed. Boys are so easy!

Baby #2 is still cooking away! We are on week 12. Brady seems unimpressed and could care less. I'm thinking he'll change his tune in about 6 months. Unless this baby comes out looking like Bill, he's is going to be pretty disappointed.