Pictures and More Pictures

Mia at swim therapy with Ms. Kristi. We just found out today that she is leaving as her husband's job has switched locations. We are sad and we'll miss her! She has a very neat relationship with Mia.

Do I fit mama? 

At Lisa's brother's house. Their daughter's pig. Calvin and the dog are checking out the pigs.

MARE!

At Lisa's friend Amy's father's house. Is that too many possessives? He has some land outside of town and has cherry trees, so each spring there is a cherry festival. The kids really enjoyed themselves and Mia asks if we can go back all the time. Calvin and Amy's daughter Grace. So much fun!

Making Milestones

I am pleased that Mia is gaining weight again. Today she weighed in at 29 pounds! Praise God, that is such an accomplishment for us. Calvin also is gaining some more weight and he is now at 24 pounds. They both are definitely getting taller, it's nice to see the number getting bigger on the scale also. :)

Is it summer yet?!

It feels like summer, or at least like we are real close. We've had a busy week playing with cousin Joy and just having fun. Today the Mops (Mother's of Pre-Schoolers) group from our church had a play date at the park. They got a bounce house and the kids had a blast. I asked Calvin if he wanted to go in the bounce house, of which he replied, "no, no, no...", but then when he got closer and saw what it really was you couldn't keep him out. He thought it was great. And Joy had so much fun bouncing too. This past weekend we went to my brother's house in Palmdale. Their kids do 4H and raise pigs and sheep, so we went up there to see our very own petting zoo. They had just gotten their pigs that day and the sheep are pretty fresh too. Mia and Calvin really enjoyed being able to pet the animals and be up close with them. Calvin especially loved communicating with the pigs...he can make a really good pig noise. Lot's of fun things, we like fun!

Decisions, Decisions

So, we've been processing through Mia's school options for next year. We are in a slightly unique situation because California law is changing the date that kids will enter kindergarten by slowly pushing the age cut off of 5 to September 1st. This year, kids have to be 5 by November 1st to qualify for Kindergarten, although many parents recognize that their kids aren't ready and make the decision on their own to keep them back another year. Mia's birthday is in October, so she is a candidate for Kindergarten. When talking with her teacher and the special education administrators, their recommendation was to put her in a mild to moderate delayed Kindergarten class for several good reasons. Mia is definitely smart enough to handle general ed Kindergarten academically, but physically she is definitely not ready. So being in the mild to moderate class, the teacher would be able to work on some of her limitations with her in a smaller class size setting. So, last Friday I had the opportunity to visit the class that they thought was best suited for Mia. The teacher is wonderful, the class size is around 14, but after visiting and talking with the teacher, I had a few concerns. First, our district is going to full day Kindergarten this fall, so Mia would be in class from 8-2, approximately. That is a huge chunk of time when we are trying to also work into our day quite a few therapy visits. And after talking with the teacher, she told me the class goals for the year, which Mia has already mastered almost all of them. She is a smart cookie, Praise God! (Let me remind you that she was supposed to have no higher cognitive function. Thank you Lord for your amazing healing power.) As we are processing through all of this information and what is best for Mia, it made a lot of sense for us to keep her home next year and to look into a private preschool for at most 2 mornings a week. This would give us more time for therapy and more time for me to work with Mia in the areas that she is coming up short. And of course, I love the idea of spending more time with my babies, they grow up way too fast and it goes by way too quickly. So, now we are looking at some preschool options and trying to figure out what would work for Mia. :)

LA

I took Mia to LA yesterday for an appointment with her opthomologist. He's happy with how her eyes look and her vision has slightly improved since last time, which is great news. His only concern is that she tilts her head up a little bit to focus her eyes and he thought he could address and correct that with a very minimal surgery. It wouldn't completely correct her eye turn, but it would help her to be inline when looking straight out. He said it isn't something we need to do immediately, but it is available if we decide to do that. One more thing to think about and pray about regarding her vision. Our thought is to give her a good 6 months to a year in vision therapy and see if that makes any difference in her eye turn. Since Grandma stayed home with Calvin, Mia and I got to enjoy lunch and some girl time on our trip. That was nice and fun. And of course Calvin got lots of Grandma time and she took him "outside"...his favorite place in the world, so he was a very happy camper.