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Showing posts with label Birthdays. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Birthdays. Show all posts

Monday, 6 January 2014

power outages, appointments and major talks

Happy New Year!

I mentioned before that I've started a new job, lost the van in a minor accident (no injuries and just me in it), got a new job, had 4/5 of our birthdays (plus 3/4 of the grandparents) all in the last month and a half.

Love the job, its only part-time only 8-24 hours a week but it works around Matthew which is important with two two year-old  preemies who still have tons of appointments. I'm working in a portrait studio, doing something I love. 

Avery
 

Gwen

Christmas, and birthdays were busy busy busy! And the adjustment to working alongside parenting three kids is well underway, I think the adjustment to not seeing Matthew as much was harder. But now he gets to take the girls to appointments by himself too and is understanding firsthand the girls issues.

In the last 4ish days, I've lost count, we have been experiencing rolling power outages and full on power outages. Our work was without power for most of the time, but we still were there. The kids have done okay with the power being gone, Rhys is hitting the point of "why is it gone again" but he is dealing. 

School has a delayed opening until at least Wednesday, so he is excited. 

Gwen had another Speech Language appointment today, it went ahead because the hospital has power. She is booked for once a week the next four weeks. 

At the end, it was mentioned that we are gearing up as parents and all of her "team", speech language, audiology, audio visual, and itinerant teacher to get together to decide if her hearing aids are enough or if we will have to go the cochlear implant route. Its hard to keep hearing that regardless we still have to talk about it, but the reality is is Gwen getting enough language right now? I believe she is, she understands what we say to her but I also appreciate that she doesn't verbalize as much as her sister (or her brother did) 

Its going to be a tough discussion, and a tougher decision.

Sunday, 29 December 2013

Happy Holidays


2013


11:30 am on Christmas Eve we saw Santa at the mall, that gives you an indication how busy this month has been. Between me going back to work, needing to get a new van quick, birthdays, and soooo much snow we haven't stopped!

Hope everyone has a safe, wonderful, family filled holiday season and new year!


Side not look how much bigger the kids are vs. 2012 (and they are in mirror to this year)

Monday, 18 November 2013

30th birthday prep

Matthew is turning 30 this Friday. I keep thinking how crazy the girls have grown, but he his preemie #1 in this house and has changed greatly. I have seen earlier pics, but his mom isn't a fan of those so I only have copies of him nearing the end of the NICU stay.


home a week 
Nearing going home from the NICU 

going home day 

Rhys has the blue and white blanket from when he was a baby, and Avery was in the same cot as her daddy when she moved out of her incubator.  

But anyways, I am reminded how much the girls have changed and can imagine how Matthew's parents are feeling nearing this milestones. 

So now I'm planing his birthday party and looking back at how much he has grown. I am so thankful everyday for his doctors and nurses, some even took care of the girls. But without them trying to save Matthew 30 years ago, the kids wouldn't exist. 


Another wonderful pic I have is one of him and Avery's godmother (Matthew's cousin who is 3 months older then him) 

you can tell how tiny he was next to her
two of them on other side of me in 2012 he has caught up in size







Thursday, 10 October 2013

For all things there is a season

Life is busy, but would I have it any other way? Nope.

A lot has happened, and we are trying to settle into the new normal.

I went to the all day scrabooking fundraiser for the Sunshine Foundation . It was a great day, and I got 14 pages done in Gwen's book. I would take picks of them (and will later) but due to the camera incident I'm currently looking for my old SD card. During the fundraiser, I won not only the door prize but also one for making so many pages. It was great to get out for the day and just create. It was also great that I was able to do so for such a great cause and met a bunch of parents of much older NICU grads.

one cell pic of a double page layout I did



Gwen has gone back to audiology at the end of September. Her hearing is the same in the right and a little better in her left ear. They made casts for new earmolds, and we talked about her starting up speech language. After both girls going on the wait-list back in April 2012, we finally had appointment times for this week (Gwen's was supposed to be Monday & Avery's Wednesday) Both the audiologist and her AVT therapist were excited to get in touch and plan with the SL.

I also got the go ahead from them for getting Gwen's ears pierced, in fact they believe that it is the perfect time to do so, from their end. So now we just are trying to decide if we will get it done this coming weekend, or to wait until the Spring. Matthew and I have talked over the pros and cons, and both Nan's have been informed with expected results. The two main reasons why I think we might wait until Spring is because they need to stay in for so long and we have very cold winters not comfortable with earrings in, and because the girls are already at a high risk for illness why risk an infection on top of all the other bugs they will be fighting? We just want to both be well informed, but at the same time, we know that we can care for them properly and that we want them to get their ears done. I guess there is never the perfect time to do so.

Avery was to Physio and is expected to do fine, we just have to encourage her not to take both hands from people when walking. She was to speech language yesterday, and the SLT is very impressed with her vocab and her language comprehension. That is once she warmed up to the SLT. In the appointment we worked it out that her paralyzed vocal cord is in the worst position for speech. That we can't do much until she is older that we can tell her how to regulate her airflow to project her voice without straining her right vocal cord. Right now when she yells she is straining the cord. So she doesn't need to go back until March/April

Miss Ave

Avery was smiling by the end of the SLT appointment, a big victory due to her sobbing in my arms at the beginning. When asked what she thought of the appointment she said "that was some nice Mama" I jokingly said to her father it was proof that she spent the weekend down the southern shore.

The reason we were down the shore was that one of Matthew's 90 year-old Nan's passed away last week. She was much loved, and lived a great fulling life. I could only wish to be as loved and respected. Mrs Helen was waked on Sat & Sun then her funeral was Mon morning.

Mrs Helen with Rhys May 2008

Late Sun night I packed up Rhys and Gwen for the hour and a half drive home because Gwen's SL appointment was at the time that we would miss the funeral, it would have been at least a 4 month postponement to the appointment if I cancelled it. Rhys also had his school picture day on Monday. At 8:16 am Monday morning with both kids in the van, I got the call to cancel Gwen's appointment. We rushed over to Rhys' school got his pic done by 8:30 am then we headed down the shore again making it before the funeral to be there with the rest of the family. Most expensive school pic he will ever have taken.

I was glad to be there for Matthew, he did the first reading and he did really well given how emotional it was for him.

spent way too much time in the van this weekend 

Or family pics were put on the back burner which turned out to be a blessing because it was raining on the original day that we were planning on doing them. It also gives us more time to find a coat for Rhys that we like that is in his size.

Gwen's SL appointment has been rescheduled for tomorrow, so I am unsure what the plan for her is.

We also completely uncovered the wallpaper, and it looks to be in great shape. I think we might keep the green and work with it. Thankfully it is the same green in my inspiration pillow.

inspiration pillow 

wallpaper at night 

As I was typing I just got the call for Gwen's first visit with her itinerant teacher, its on the same day as our anniversary. So two home visits coming up. More reasons to make the wallpaper work for now.

And we have three birthday parties, two baby showers (on the same day) our anniversary, Thanksgiving and Halloween coming up. Who knows what else! I like to keep busy, but it would be nice if everything wasn't on the same day. We are missing out on the CHHA family Halloween fun day, because its on the baby shower day.

I also had gotten an awesome deal on a new SD card, unfortunately it took a few times using it and loosing some pics before I found out it was corrupt. I almost lost pics I took during the weekend with the family in because of the wake. I have also realized that most of the pics seem to look poorer quality from that card but that could have just been on my end ;) Thankfully Auntie Mae was able to have a look and found out that I had to re-install drivers to my computer and after much finagling we were able to fix my DSLR too. But that SD card is a write off. It is the lesser of the problems, but it sucks that my brand new card did so much damage and caused that much grief. Thanks again Auntie Mae!


Friday, 21 June 2013

Friendship & Fathers Day

A lot has been happening this week, and its made me forgetful over posting things I was planning on. So please forgive my forgetfulness.

Rhys has clued up his literacy program in school last Thursday.

He did wonderfully and has made many friends in his future kindergarten class (and his class all the way through to grade 5/6, they have an intensive French option in grade 6 for them to split then) He will be going to a small community school, so small that there are only 5 kids that live far enough away to qualify for the bus. The whole school is about 225 kids (K-6) and there are only 20 kids registered for his year. Rhys has a birthday party to go to tomorrow with his best friend from his class, and they live almost directly behind us.

"Rhys, show mommy your certificate"

How about you look this time cookie face? 

with his literacy teacher 

Rhys also has asked me to make him one of those friendship bracelets, remember those??? I told him when he is a bit bigger if he wants to know how to make them I will show him. 
in progress, in his favorite colours
I remember making a ton of these and people selling them too at school, so its a good skill to learn even for my little man. 

Rhys is also starting up soccer next week, and his team's name (if I heard her twice, because I asked her to repeat it) is Slytherin. This makes me a geeky mom very happy! Is that bad? or the fact that I keep thinking how my blond haired blue-eyed boy would look great in the uniforms if its the "right" colours???

Come on green and silver would be awesome on this boy! 

But I'm a silly mom.


Also during my forgetful time, Fathers day happened. Matthew did really well. He got a new baseball cap (he picked out and knew about), an iPhone case with the kids pic on it (he didn't know about)  and this...


"you are not suppose to make me cry on Fathers day!" 


the poem in the frame is this

Major props and thank you to my friend at Scarlett Love

A good online mommy friend at Scarlett Love did this up for me only two days before and gave me lots of choices to work with. She is awesome, and if you want some random custom chalkboard art you want you should check out her etsy or her on facebook. I know she's in vacation mode right now, but due back June 30th. 

*I'm not payed to say this, in fact she probably doesn't remember I have a blog, and she doesn't know I'm posting this*

 
Well, I think that is everything I was planning on talking about this past week yet forgot



Monday, 29 April 2013

Random news from the US and our Birthday/ Sci-Fi Weekend

So I was reading an article on a current case in the States about little Sammy Nikolayev being removed from his parents care because they wanted to get a second medical opinion. It is sad to think about anyone loosing their child because they are trying to do what is best for them.

If you want more info click here.
Sci-Fi On the Rock 7

Sci-Fi On the Rock 7 this past weekend, busy but fun with all the kiddos. I have been going since the beginning, even last year when I had to run back and forth to the hospital to BF the girls.

Sci- Fi On the Rock 1

Sci-Fi On the Rock 2 (Rhys helped with the costume)

Sci-Fi On the Rock 4 (not sure where my pic of 3 is)

Sci-Fi On the Rock 5

Sci-Fi On the Rock 6


Gwen & Avery at Sci-Fi On the Rock 7 in costume at a panel 




We had a busy weekend, Rhys' 5th birthday was a success for him. He had fun! 

some gifts and loot boxes 

all the boxes put together and stacked 

Rhys 

"It's me Mario!"

Opening gifts