20 Months Old!

Jordan got to celebrate her 20 month old birthday by meeting a brand new baby. Her name is Charley and Jordan was skeptical of the experience. She patted her very gently, but was more interested in babbling and talking to Charley's family. Either way, it was so awesome to hold a little baby in my arms. No... I'm not interested in having another. I swear. Little Charley was exactly the same weight Jordan was when she was born. But she felt hearty and sweet. What fun. I like to dabble in the experience of being around new babies, but I'm content in the experience of visiting newborns, not creating ones.

Jordan had OT today. We had time for me to see her ability to turn pages of books with her prosthetic. Of course it's the cardboard books... But she's getting pretty dang good at it. It makes me proud. Maybe we'll get around to getting some video of that. By the way, prosthetic or no prosthetic, she's getting sturdier on her feet. Jordan is running, regaining balance faster and trying to jump. Now THAT I have to get video of! Development is so sweet.

Jordan went to a big-deal meeting with me tonight. I found out she's very good at saying "apple." More like "app-pull." Very sweet. The words are flowing. As the words grow, her needs grow. She's starting to learn how to try and delay bed time. I'll sit down and read her a bedtime story. And right before I'm done with the story, she's already grabbing for another book and begging for me to read it: "Boh! Boh!" (That's how she says book) The good news is when I stand firm and wrap up the book reading, she melts into my shoulder when I turn off the light and start singing a lullaby. That little melt makes being a mommy so sweet.

In the last month, Jordan turned into a little girl. She's independent (especially when she wants to walk into the parking lot on her own... I swear she'll hold my hand ANYWHERE except in a parking lot). She still grabs onto my leg and desperately wants to be with me no matter what. Independent when she wants to be. And a spark. My gosh she is such a spark. I think that little picture tells it all. She is SO alive.

Teeth talk

Miss Jordan had her first dentist appointment today. Very exciting stuff. She did a pretty good job and the dentist said Jordan's teeth are getting closer to coming in. She's 20 months old tomorrow! 20 months! It's due time she gets those teeth don't you think?

She was exhausted when we got to school... But she only slept for 40 minutes.

So by the time we got home, she was a wreck and I still had to cook dinner. She was in FULL meltdown. I held as strong as I could to not run out of the house screaming. But I kept it together.

That picture is officially my first photo to post from my new phone. I finally got the iPhone. I'm LOVING it. I'm also more connected to my world than ever before. It's so damned easy to read email, respond to voicemail, text messages... All of it. It's nerdy. But it's awesome.

BTW, I noticed blogger is offering the chance to upload video directly into blogs. So I had to give it a try. Here's Jordan being a monkey during our vacation.

Busy couple of months

Jordan is about to spend a lot of time in Texas. Next month she and I are going to the Dallas area to spend time with my aunt and uncle. I'm SUPER excited about that. And now it's pretty clear that we need to plan a new trip to Houston for Jordan to upgrade her prosthetic.

We're looking for a way to get Jordan to purposefully trigger her hand to open and close. Hopefully we can move the sensor somewhere that will work. I look forward to seeing if we can get her to use it even more. Her teachers say they've seen Jordan use her arm more to steady herself and do little things here and there. I love watching her try to turn the pages of books. It's all pretty cool.

Look what Jordan just did!

She's finding new and cool ways to use her prosthetic!

Didn't I used to have little babies?

I'm kind of missing babies... Jordan is very much a little girl. Cameron is a Kindergartener. How did this happen?

Wow. What a mess

My sweet sandy girl
Originally uploaded by NerdyMom

Yeah. We played in the water this weekend. Jordan is still wary of our water sprinkler... But she got wet enough to let the sand REALY stick to her hair and skin.

I fell on the ground laughing and then ran inside to find the camera.

SO funny.

Now getting all of this sand off was absolutely no fun. But you know, it was worth it. She was happy and messy.

Little developments every day

We're moving into a stage where milestones creep up very organically. It's natural and slow and amazing when you realize she just did something "grown up."

As we walked into school the last three days, Jordan grabbed the railing and walked up the stairs all by herself. Cam and I were so excited. She's getting braver by the moment. The steps at school are a little smaller than the normal kind... Which I am so happy she has easier steps to practice on. I was a little nostalgic about not being able to grab her other hand to help just in case she needed it. I'll get over it.

So the whole family went to school yesterday to meet Cam's new teacher. Jordan LOVED walking up and down the hallway of the school. She LOVED saying hi to people. She LOVED upsetting her brother by no going where he told her to go. She LOVED checking out the classroom and trying to grab paper that she should grab. It drove her brother nutty. Randy and I just tried to make sure she didn't grab something that would cause danger to herself of the classroom.

I'm kind of looking forward to taking the kids on the walk to school every morning. It's a little exercise, a little family (except Daddy will have to go to work before we head out to school) time, a little outside time. It will take work time out of my morning, but I think that's probably a good thing.

Next step for the girl's feet

So we're moving forward with helping Jordan's foot issues. We met with Jordan's physical therapist this evening. She's pretty sure an orthotic device called a UCBL will help. It's a shoe insert that may help keep Jordan from curling her feet and help her hold them on the ground properly. The hard part: She thinks Jordan may have to wear it for quite a long time. The good news: We can start wearing different types of shoes -- probably wide, but I'm not too worried about that.

Jordan is babbling to me as if I know what she's talking about. I have a gut feeling that we're not far off from all out sentences with her demands. I'm certain her first sentence will be asking/demanding me to do something -- probably involving food or her brother.

Back home

There's nothing like the hug you can get from a child when you've been away. Jordan was so happy to see me when I got home. Her hugs are strong. Her smooches are sweet. The down side of returning is watching her cry as I dropped her off at school. It's the first time she's done that in months.

But it's good to be home and I don't see myself leaving town for a while. That's kind of nice (except for the nasty wind storm that rolled through our town last night and we still don't have power in the 100 degree weather).

Fat Bat Cat Sat

I'm still out of town but for consecutive days... When I talk to Jordan she starts babbling in a very Dr. Seuss-like way.

"Hi Jordan. I miss you."

"Fat Bat Cat Sat Bat Fah."

"Wow. That's great. Then what happened?"

"Fat Cat Sat Mat Bat Fah."

"That's amazing. I can't wait to see you."

It's killer. She's going to be HUGE by the time I get home tomorrow.

Off again

I'm on my way out of town again... This time I'm leaving the rest of the family at home. Well, I'm leaving the girl and Randy. Cam is off on vacation at his grandparents' house. I'm trying to get ready to leave in the morning... For some reason I got all mopey when I put the baby to bed tonight. I'll miss her a bunch.

She's getting stronger willed by the day. Today it took us 20 minutes to leave school... She just didn't want to walk into the parking lot. I'm trying to give her the independence to go to the car on her own (until the parking lot -- she has to hold my hand there -- usually against her will). It's a slow process.

I also made a big move... Jordan moved out of the high chair and into a Svan chair. It's a cool adjustable chair that will grow with Jordan (who is stuck at 23 pounds 4 ounces by the way).

Okay... One more thing. I was reading BethGo's recent post and it reminded me of something that happened today and I didn't know how to handle it. A little girl (who I say hi to and I'm very polite to her little sister and parents at our school) walked by Jordan and told her dad: "She's scary. Just like Grandma." He walks by and just keeps talking about Jordan without acknowledging our existence or even stopping and working with me to show this little girl why Jordan isn't scary. Jordan was wearing her prosthetic at the time and was being particularly cute at the moment in my opinion. But it made me so mad... Stop, take the time to show your child that my daughter isn't scary. She's sweet and that prosthetic HELPS her. It gives her balance, it offers stability. It's also clunky at times and a challenge. But it's offering Jordan strength and options and helps her solve problems in ways that this little girl has never encountered. And DANG it. When she's in the area, don't ignore us. Talk to us. DANG it. I should have just interrupted the conversation, but I had Jordan on a short flight of stairs and I was trying to convince her to come down so we could get to the car. Should I stop everything just so this little girl will learn something about my daughter? I just don't know. But walking by us and continuing the conversation without our involvement just seemed strange.

Okay. Rant is over.

Torn between little girl and baby

When we were at the summer Helping Hands event near Boston, we met a really cool family I've talked to a number of times online. Their daughter is a month older than Jordan and missing her right arm below the elbow... She seems SO much older than Jordan physically. And I thought about it and I've been thinking about it since then. Jordan is so small and cute and a bit delayed physically -- But emotionally, she's right on track. And to me, that's a little confusing. She's so certain about her abilities and opinions... It makes me wonder if I'm getting in the way at all in her development. I watch her at school - she follows commands and does a lot of great things on her own: gets her chair to the table on her own, puts cups and plates in the bin after she's done. She follows directions from me at home, but I have to stop and think and make sure I'm not doing anything for her that might be causing any delays.

Since we got home, I'm making sure she goes up and down the stairs on her own. I'm trying not to carry Jordan around. She's a fantastic communicator so I know when she wants something. She's emotional and demanding. It's all very typical 2 year old stuff (and she just turned 19 months old). SO I'm not concerned. But I hope I'm not delaying her in her physical growth. I'm not hearing any concerns from the therapists, but it's still something that's been on my mind lately.

Kids Jordan's age can run... Jordan's getting there. She can walk fast. Kids Jordan's age can jump. When I bounce Jordan like jumping, she LOVES it... But she doesn't have the balance to jump yet. Here's my big crazy mommy concern. If she's missing things physically at a young age, does that hurt her cognitive development? I know it's nutty, but Cam had even more words and knew colors at this age. I know that wasn't normal. But is all of the extra effort to meet physical milestones going to delay Jordan's potential cognitively? Is there anything I can do to prevent that? Once again. I don't want to be a crazy mommy, but the crazy mommy in my gut worries.

I'm silly. I know it. But I guess this is why I have a blog - I can throw these thoughts out there instead of leaving them in my brain.