Mother's Day

***WARNING - loooong post :) ***

Happy Mother's Day to all those mother's who may read this. Today was a great day. I feel so grateful for the opportunity to be the mother to 2 wonderful kids - Cata and Tomas. Not only that, but I also feel blessed to have such a wonderful mother who has been a great role model for me.

So life has been busy in our household. My month of call is over which has been a relief. What that means is I am actually home once in awhile when my kids are awake this month :) Logging 75 hours a week at work makes the work-life balance a little off-balance you might say. But I have 3 more weeks before having that schedule again so I am enjoying every minute I can!

Feels like lots has happened since my last post about a month ago. We went to Chicago to see Dr. Percy, a fantastic, caring doctor who has devoted much of his time to girls with Rett Syndrome. It was a good visit. Nothing really new - just checking in and seeing that Cata is still doing well. It was nice to meet other families and girls with Rett(Brooklyn, Hannah, Lindsey and others)! It's nice to connect with others who are going through similar yet different experiences. I wish we had more time with the families. We also got to spend some time with and old friend, Viki, and her daughter which was lots of fun.

Cata has been doing great with her therapy. Unfortunately she has lost some more hand function which has been sad to see. She no longer can finger feed herself. She can occasionally pick something up with a rake grasp but not from the table, it has to be from your hand. Even then, it's not perfect. Often when she is able to pick something up it falls from her hand before she can get it to her mouth. She also no longer picks up her sippy cup to take a drink, something she was doing 4-6 weeks ago. The other hard thing to watch is she has difficulty bringing the spoon to her mouth now - she either doesn't grip it or drops it before she gets it to her mouth. I'm pushing her to regain these skills because I think she can, but it's going to take time to make up lost ground. Despite these setbacks, she has made great strides in other areas. She is interacting more with toys (as much as you can interact with a toy that you cannot pick up with your hands). She loves "playing" with toys but someone else has to be the one making the toy play. It's hard to imagine what to do with a toddler who cannot do anything with her hands, but that's what we have. It just takes 100% attention and entertainment - no such thing as independent play for her - yet. We are working on alternative ideas but that's for another post. That said she loves lots of the games she gets to play. And she especially loves being with others. She has new friends at school that she loves to socialize with. Today our great friends where over for dinner with their 3 kids. Cata just had the time of her life running around with the 2 older ones. Here are a couple of pics of Cata tonight - Cata looking on as J reads a book, running to catch J

She has been super smiley and seems to be communicating her needs/wants to us better. Or maybe (probably) we are just getting better at knowing what she has been communicating to us. There seems to be less frustration. Her love of Tomas is just growing and it's adorable to see. I can't wait to see them together when he is mobile! She goes to his pack n play or crib and just stares in at him, she stares at him waiting for his eye contact and gives him a huge smile, she walks up to his activity mat and stands over it smiling at him. She's a cutie. There have still been a couple of times when she gets frustrated or maybe overexcited and gives a loud grunt noise which scares the daylights out of little Tomas but those are few and far between now.

Speaking of Tomas, he is growing up too quickly! He is quite the little chatterbox. He spends most of his awake day cooing and carrying on. He is still an easy baby - falls asleep easily for naps and bed, takes good long naps and goes about 7 hours between feeds at night (which happens to mean a 3am feed still). He nurses well and takes the bottle well when I'm at work. When awake he's content. His newest thing is to grab his toys and hold onto them. He will grab any toy - something hanging above on his activity mat, a toy placed in his reach, something on his swing...He grabs and moves them around. Yesterday I even saw him transfer a ring from one hand to the other! He also will grab a burp cloth left near by and somehow always manages to pull it on his face - dunno why but it's cute. He still sleeps in a cosleeper next to my bed but he did take his first nap in his own crib today. Ugh, the thought of putting him there for the night - I'm not ready yet :) He is holding his head up nicely and has found a new love - his feet. He grabs them and holds onto them rolling side to side while on his back. He attempted to roll from back-to-front twice this week but I don't think they were complete rolls. Some of my favorite recent shots:

Now that spring is finally here to stay (hopefully!!) we have been able to get outdoors more and enjoy the parks and the lakes: