In addition to the craziness of school, Logan's schedule of therapies kept afternoons pretty occupied. Back in August, I was talking about him getting started with occupational and speech therapy. We are well underway with those. His speech therapist visits him at daycare every Wednesday morning. It's great that she is able to do that, but I feel we miss out on what she is doing with him and then don't know how to help him at home. We have Logan's annual IFSP meeting (Individual Family Service Plan...like an IEP) next month so I am hoping we will be able to do more speech visits at home in the future. I have to take Logan to occupational therapy on Wednesday afternoons. We have to hustle to get there for our 4:00 appointment, but I won't complain...at least we can get an afternoon appt.! And physical therapy rotates each week between daycare and home visits. So, needless to say, life has been busy. Oh yeah, I also thought it would be a good idea to throw in a little ALTA tennis on Wed. and Sundays...you know in my spare time. Well, about midway through October when I thought I was going to have a mini-meltdown, I quit the team. I hated to do it, but I just had to. There was only so much time in a week to devote to school, family, my sanity, etc.
But, I see the light at the end of the tunnel now. Ever since I finished my grad school work, I feel like a new person. The heavy weight that has been on my shoulders for three years has finally lifted, and boy does it feel good! I know I'm happy to be finished, but there may be one person who is even happier, and that would be....OLIN. I've been getting this damn degree since we got married in 2008. God bless him. He kept encouraging me throughout the whole thing and supported me in any way he could. If you're reading this, Olin, thank you. You are the best!
So, let me get to the most important Arnold. What is Logan doing now? Well, he's still the sweetest, happiest kid on this whole planet. His smile still brightens up any room and his laugh just melts your heart. He is so much more aware of what is going on around him. He is also more aware of who people are. He definitely knows me and Olin, and now I'm pretty sure he knows both sets of grandparents. I'm convinced that he says "MaMa" to me on occasion. What a great feeling to hear that! Logan's also a man on the move now. One of his most exciting accomplishments has been to transition back to sitting when he falls or loses his balance. We had been working on this for some time in therapy, and to finally see him reach his goal was pretty awesome.
At the beginning of November, my sister and her boys came visit. Logan was just in awe of those two. He thought Jack hung the moon. And Jack didn't mind being the apple of Logan's eye either : ) Logan watched every move those boys made, and I guess it made him want to get in on the action. So one morning he was just sitting on the floor in the den next to these ottoman cubes that my mom was using as her temporary coffee table. These ottoman cubes were the ones where the top cushion actually doubles as a tray. You turn it over and it's a hard surface. Well, Logan all of the sudden reached out for the cube, got a good grip on the ledge that the tray provided, and pulled himself to a kneeling position. Again, we'd been working on this with Sherri, but he still needed assistance. Not on this day, and never again. In that one instant, it became his new trick. Needless to say, we "borrowed" one of ZuZu's cubes and brought it to our house so that he could continue to practice pulling up. When I showed Sherri, she was excited, but she wasn't going to let us stop there and bask in the glory for too long (she never does, which is a good thing I suppose....we have to keep moving forward!). So, she showed me how to help him pull one leg under his bottom and support him to a standing position. It's sort of hard to explain, but she had a really specific way that she wanted us to assist him to standing. So, we have been practicing kneeling to standing for most of November. Repetition, repetition, repetition. He has to have it.
Soooo, today while we were watching football with the Arnold clan, Logan decided to show off. He did the whole routine. He was sitting next to the ottoman, grabbed it and pulled to kneeling. Then he got one leg under him (without help) and pulled up to STANDING! It's like a dream come true. I know it's not walking or crawling, but this is huge! He's also starting to understand how to adjust his feet if he starts to lose balance or wants to get closer to something. He knows he's done something awesome too because he'll stand straight up and give out a little yell and a big smile. I will try to get a good video of him performing his new moves tomorrow. It's been a great day though... a great few days in fact. Lots of food and family and relaxation. It's been a nice getaway from school for sure.
I know I've missed lots of other events in the last four months...like Logan being a part of Corrigan Care's Special Gallery of Children (the picture in the blue polo is from his "photo shoot"), a month of sickness in October that we finally figured out was from teething, picking out the perfect pumpkin and being Hairy Dawg for Halloween. I promise to do better in the coming months. It's good reflection for me and makes me realize how far we've come. It's hard to believe it's almost time to start planning another birthday party. How time flies!
Logan got a kick out of rolling the pumpkin off the haystack!
Logan loves his electric toothbrush!
