Our day...

Once a week, we take Ashley and Hope to the chiropractor.  Dr. Dan has been involved with our girls for a very long time.  When Ashley was younger, we would take her every day to be adjusted (it was the only way to get her to stop seizing and fall asleep).  For a while, we even took her twice a day.  There is no cracking or manipulation.  The adjustments help the girls relax (especially Ashley) and keep their bowel movements regular.  You can see Ashley and Hope on the tables below.

Mira had her 2 month check up today (and needles).  She's 13lbs, 4oz and 2 feet tall.  She falls in the 95th percentile for both height and weight.  Yup, I have big babies!

Check out Brodie, dancing with Mira...

Sleepy at school...

Well, we are still trying to get Ashley comfortable and we do have more calm moments.  The last two afternoons, Ashley has gone to sleep in her kidkart while waiting for the bus.  We get a note home every afternoon about Ashley's school day, which informs us that she has been very sleepy at school.  The good thing is that she is sleeping really well at night, and I have no intention of giving that up.  She's having some very intense seizures now.  She gets very red in the face, holds her breath and gets this look of panic on her face.  I don't like it!

Mira is eating and sleeping well.  We'll be going in for her 2 month check-up on Friday, so I'll know her weight then.  No, I have not had her weighed since the two week appt, and I don't own a scale.  All I know is that she is nice and pudgy!

Hope still sleeps all morning.  She's getting too long for the couch (which is her permanent spot), so we're going to have to do something about the sitting room.  The girls take up all the couches when they're all home and we end up sitting on the floor!

Daddy's home

After a week trip for work, Alex returned home just in time to start shovelling snow.  Yeah for me!  We're trying to keep the driveway 'super-clean' to facilitate wheelchair mobility to and from the bus. 

We spent the weekend watching Brodie play hockey, cuddling the girls and shoveling snow.  Brodie has had a lot of fun outside making snow forts.  When awake, Mira spends her time eating and smiling.  Hope enjoys life with little half smiles while drooling on the couch.  Ashley has moments of soft smiles which are interupted by seizures followed by extremely upset crying.  Basically, nothing new, but we're happy to have Alex home.

Rehab Centre for Children

We just got back from an appointment at RCC.  Lauren helped me today and we managed to get Brodie out the door by 8:45am, pack up the three girls, two strollers and one wheelchair into the van, get a coffee at Starbucks and arrive at RCC in time to get everyone unloaded and into the building by 9:30am.  We're getting very good at this!

Ashley was fitted for her new wheelchair while we were there and they used the molding device to create a mold of her back.   This allowed them to form a piece of foam for the new wheelchair that will fit her twisted spine and hopefully provide a comfortable sitting position for her.  It will take a couple months before we get the wheelchair, but the process is started and I'm happy.  Ashley has outgrown the KidKart and Hope is using it.  While we were there, they also adjusted Ashley's Convaid Stroller so that the seat base is now longer.  Ashley really needs to stop growing!

Of course, I forgot my camera, so there are no pics!  Oh well.  We've increased Ashley's Clonazepam twice in the last 10 days.  This made for a nice morning, despite the four major seizures that Ashley had while we were at RCC.  I've concluded that Ashley is not in a very stable state right now, which makes sense because Hope is rather stable and the girls always seem to take turns.

The same...

Everything is about the same.  Mira is doing great and Brodie is enjoying her as much as we are.  Ashley has good moments and a lot of crying moments, so we're still increasing meds, hoping to find the right balance.  She's definitely doing better, because we have more good moments, and more quiet cuddles.

Smiles and Crying

We're lucky to have Mira's smiles to offset Ashley's crying.  We increased Ashley's Risperidone last night, which should have given her a good nights sleep.  She was awake and crying by 7am unfortunately.  This morning she alternated between seizures and very upset crying.  I kept her home from school yesterday because she was so upset.  I sent her today, but I'm not sure if she'll do well.  They have a little room with an excercise mat where they can help her stretch and get some quiet, if needed.

Sleep!

We are definitely getting more sleep now!  Mira is six weeks old now!  She's only waking up once a night, and during the day she's eating a lot and having good naps.  Mira and I saw our chiropractor a couple times this past week, following the little car accident (we were rear-ended), and we're both fine.  I don't have any neck pain or head-aches anymore.

 Hope is doing about the same.  We can get these sweet little smiles from her when we sing to her and play with her hands, but she's mostly sleeping and still has a lot of seizures.

 Ashley is doing fairly well.  I'm getting some very positive comments from her teacher and EA about school.  She still starts crying around 5 or 6pm every day and it appears that she's not sleeping through the night anymore, so we'll be looking at another med increase soon.

 Brodie has a couple hockey games this weekend, and now is telling me that hockey is great.  He scored three goals in the game yesterday (according to him), so I guess this makes hockey a lot more fun.  He wasn't too excited about the practices, but now that the games have started, it's all good.  Katie was lucky to see Brodie's game yesterday.

Friday

It is Friday and we were happy to welcome Alex home after a week away for a work trip.  We were lucky to have Katie, my cousin, here helping us for the week.  We had so much fun working together, and accomplished a lot too (although I've been told not to tell everyone about all the cooking, laundry and cleaning she finished while here...te he).  It was a great week, and we're thrilled to have Alex home.

Teeth...

Ashley lost her two front teeth this weekend, and then lost another top tooth.  Brodie is telling everyone how unfair it is that Ashley has lost more teeth than him!  You can see Ashley in the photo below having her hair washed...

Now we'll have to get used to Ashley's new look.  She had a good sleep last night and went to school very happy.  She's still crying very hard each evening. 

Halloween

Halloween had some added fun this year.  I've never spent money on a baby costume before and this year I did.  Wow, was it ever fun to dress Mira up in her little butterfly costume (which we found on sale of course).  She was so cute and squishy and cuddly.  Too fun!

 Brodie was a storm trooper (Star Wars again).  This is the first year that he got really excited about running to each house.  It was fun to see.

 We carved some pumpkins that we had left from Grandma and Grandpa.

Ashley and Hope didn't get to join in the fun this year.  We have been given a little extra "out-of-home" respite and they were gone for the weekend.  This made it easy to get out and see some friends.  Ashley and Hope had a good Halloween at their respite home.  Ashley had some excitement.  She lost her two front teeth while she's away.  So, she'll look different when I go pick her up.

Alex started a new job last week and today I drove him to the airport for a work trip to Canmore for the week.  On our way to the airport we were rear-ended, and now I have a head-ache!  It was just a minor little bump because we were stuck in traffic, but still rather annoying.  My neck stiffened up and I got a headache immediately, so I took myself and Mira to the chiropractor.  Mira was all strapped in her carseat, so hopefully she wasn't jolted too badly.  The other driver was probably on his cell-phone, because traffic was barely moving and all the sudden we felt/heard a big bang.  Sillyness!  Mira started crying immediately, and I let out a yell from the surprise of it.  Then the neck stiffens and the headache started.  Here we go again, I thought to myself.  Alex was rubbing his neck too, so I'll have to call him tonight and see how he feels.