It's been a long time

For any of you out there reading this, I'm sorry that I haven't written in ages!  It can be difficult to keep up with life itself at times, much less trying to keep up with a blog!  However, I do have a little time to give some updates on how things are around here.

Sarah's 5 years old now and Kevin will be turning three this week.  It's amazing how time flies.  Both kids are progressing in various ways.  Overall, Sarah is becoming a little calmer and more well behaved.  Of course, I did say overall.  We still have some pretty wild times, such as this afternoon.  However, slowly but surely, I see our hard work paying off.  Sarah loves singing and can play some simple rhythms and notes on the violin.  She loves crafts, such as beading and plastic canvas.

Kevin is making good strides, too.  He's learning how to dress himself.  Of course, half of the time the clothes are on backwards or completely don't match, but he's starting to get the hang of it!   He also enjoys coloring and simple crafts.  Kevin's a real softie and tries hard to please us.

Since this blog is primarily about Kevin's speech, I will move on to that subject.  We've been in speech for 10 months now.  We still have a long ways to go, but he has made lots of progress.  When you consider that 10 months ago, the only sounds he made were "Bah" and "Dah," he's really doing well.  He often puts 3 words together, will use words to try to express himself, instead of just gestures, can pronounce all 5 vowels clearly, interacts with people using the words "Hi" and "Bye," will ask for toys or food by name, etc.  I know that many things that he says that I can understand would not be understood by others, but we're getting there.

We encourage him throughout the day to express himself.  We say words slowly and clearly for him, and try to get him to repeat.  I have to admit that we don't sit down and do his specific homework from speech therapy as much as we should.  I'm sure that would help him even more.  I feel, though, that we're moving along at a steady pace.

On a different note, we felt pity for our cat KC who was outside in the cold and wet.  So, once again, she is an inside cat.  She used to be a inside cat years ago, but was kicked outside when I was pregnant with Sarah.  This is kind of on a trial basis right now, but it's going well so far.  She's an older cat now, so she spends most of her day sleeping or pretending to sleep.  We'll see how it goes.

Talk tools

This is just a quick post to provide some information about what's new with Kevin's therapy.  The therapist has been using and recommending a variety of things to strengthen Kevin's mouth and cheek muscles.  Some of these include:  sipping applesauce through a "crazy straw," sipping through coffee stirrers (those tiny straws), bubble blowing, whistles, gumming down on popsicle sticks, etc.  

The popsicle stick was interesting.  After Kevin pursed his lips onto a popsicle stick and said "Mmmmm!" for just a minute or so, he was immediately able to pronounce words that begin with the letter M.  Amazing!  

I feel like he is definitely taking great strides forward.  Although he still tends to communicate a lot through gestures, he's a lot more open now to the idea of communicating verbally.  He's even started to try out new words spontaneously, words that we have not practiced with him.  

Occasionally he still refuses to say anything.  I'm learning tricks to help him, though.  For example, I will pull out photos of our Disney trip or a souvenir photo book and he will eagerly point out attractions that we saw and will try to name them!  After doing that for a few minutes, he kind of "warms up" and is willing to say more words.  Sometimes I'll try to get him to "warm up" before his speech therapy in order to ensure that he will have a good session with the therapist.  

It's a real joy to see my son being able to express himself to some degree with others.  I see how his little face lights up when he is able to be understood.  

Here's a blog that I came across when I first started looking into apraxia.  The little boy reminded me of Kevin, both with his speech and his appearance!  There are some videos posted of the boy's progress along with some interesting information about apraxia.  You might find it interesting to take a look at it.  

http://jenkrause.com/blog/

With time and lots of patience, we can and will overcome this Apraxia of Speech!

Prayers

I'd thought I'd share a couple of quotes from Sarah today.

One of her prayers this week:
"Jehovah God, please help me to stop screaming and please help Kevin to stop drooling."

A conversation in the car today:
Sarah:  "Mommy, does it tickle your belly when someone has a baby in their belly?"
Me:  "I guess it does sometimes, when the baby kicks."
Sarah:  "Well, tonight when I say my prayers, I'm going to ask Jehovah to put a baby in my belly so I can be a mommy."
Me:  "You have to be big to have a baby in your belly."
Sarah:  "Big?  Like 5 years old?"
Me:  "No. Big like Mommy."
Sarah:  "Oh, ok.  So when I pray tonight, I'm going to ask Jehovah if he can first of all make me big like you so that he can put a baby in my belly."

I just don't think she gets it.

It's back by popular demand!

It has been forever and a day since I've posted anything new on this blog.  However, I've had several people asking me lately about when I'd be updating it.  So, here we go!

We've been very busy lately.  Last month we had an absolutely wonderful time in Disney World!  We were gone almost two weeks, which is the longest trip that we have taken yet with the kids.  Since we drove to Florida, which was about a 16 hour drive, we expected to have some rough spots.  But, the whole trip was everything that we could have hoped for, and more!  We stayed on Disney property, which made it even more special.  

One moment that I'll always remember was when Sarah met her first princess, Belle.  It's as if she was transported to some other world.  She had stars in her eyes and was completely awestruck by being in the presence of such royalty!  It was adorable.  We were able to ride almost all of the rides and see many of the shows, since the lines were not long at all.  Sarah got a stomach bug halfway through the trip and was down and out for almost 2 days.  Because of that, we decided to stay an extra day.  

Basically, it was a top notch vacation!  We've already started talking about trying to start up a fund to go again one of these years.

Next up was a garage sale, which took a lot of time and effort to prepare for.  We sold so much stuff!  More than even the money, though, I feel a huge relief of having all of those items out of my life.  I find that I'm a lot less stressed when I have very little clutter.  

On to Kevin's speech, which is actually supposed to be the focus of this blog, isn't it?  We've been in speech almost 6 months now.  It's hard to believe!  He's made so much progress.  I'll give you some examples.

Earlier today, he finished his milk.  When I asked him what he wanted, he responded with 2 words, "More, please!"  It was more like "Mo, pee!", but I understood.  He can pronounce all of his vowels and can say words with 1, 2, and 3 syllables.  He's putting 2 words together and verbally identifying many objects.  I still have to prompt him by saying, "Use your words," in order to encourage him to talk and not just to point.  He can name many of his favorite characters, such as Dora, Dumbo (Buh-bo), Donald Duck (Dah-duh-duh), etc.  I can ask him if he'd prefer water, milk, or juice and then understand his answer.  When we're playing a game, he can say "my turn!" (my tuh).  The therapist seems to feel that he's progressing well.  I believe that we should have a 6 month evaluation soon and can know how far he's progressed.

Here's a video.  Be sure to check out the serious photobombing that's going on by Sarah at the beginning of the video!

That's all for now.  I'll try to update this blog a little more frequently than I have been doing.  A great big hello to all of my followers!

3 little words

I heard something today that made so much sense that I just have to share it.  Children's attention span is so short that it's often limited to the time that it takes to say three words.  Think about it.  As parents, our entire day is spent speaking in three word sentences.

Don't do that!
Don't touch that!
Don't eat that!
Stop hitting Kevin!
I said NO!
Hey! Hey! Hey!
Where are you?
Stop that NOW!
Stop kicking Sarah!
Listen to me!
Just do it!
Quit licking me!
Where's my phone?
Quit interrupting me!
Eat your food!
I mean it!

Some days feel very long because, if I'm home alone with the kids, every conversation is rapid-fire and doesn't make a lot of sense.  Sometimes people ask me why we don't speak more Spanish at the house.  I answer them by saying that, honestly, I don't have time.  I don't have the time to translate things into Spanish, since everything that I say has to be done quickly and in three words or less.

That's my life.
It's pretty weird.
Loud and frantic.
All day long.
What's yours like?

Fish Oil

  Because this is supposed to officially be a blog to track Kevin's progress, I feel as if I need to mention the newest thing that I'm trying with him.  Two days ago, I started Kevin on fish oil supplements.

  It seems like when I research apraxia of speech online, I keep coming across the idea that fish oil supplements may help.  Basically, the idea is that fish oil is something that we all should include in our diet, but don't.  Or we don't include it enough.  Fish oil contains high concentrates of Omega 3 and Omega 6.  Some foods that have high amounts of this are fish, flaxseed, almonds, broccoli, and others.

  The Omega 3s and 6s basically add a little fatty deposit on the brain connections, insulating them.  I'm honestly not too sure of how this all works, but some people swear that it has helped their kids tremendously.  Others claim that it has made little or no difference at all.  Fish oil is supposed to be good for a variety of physical and neurological conditions.

  I would like to try to include more fish oil in our diet.  However, I personally don't like fish too much!  I'm going to try to do a little bit more of it, though!  Also, I've been sprinkling flaxseed on sandwiches, etc.  But, the main thing that I'm doing is giving Kevin a fish oil supplement every day.  Apparently the taste of fish oil is pretty nasty.  What I got for him is a kid's version of fish oil.  It's supposed to have a berry flavor.  He still won't take it straight, though.  But if I put it in his apple juice, he eventually gets it all down.  I've already talked to his therapist and told her what we will be trying.  Now we just have to wait and see if it makes any difference!

A quick update

  Life is so busy.  I often wish that I had more time to do extra things, such as updating a blog!  Usually, though, I find myself just trying to keep up with what things are absolutely necessary, such as the never-ending laundry pile, potty training adventures, mountains of dishes, and trying to teach my kids right from wrong.  However, I will take a few minutes tonight to give everyone a quick update on Kevin's speech.

  We've been in speech therapy for 3 months now.  The therapist feels that we'll be in speech therapy for probably another 3-4 years.  The homework that she's sending home is getting progressively more difficult.  We've been encouraging Kevin to attempt some 2 syllable words, along with some basic two word combinations.

  He still says "Bah," "Dah," "Wah," and "Lah" a lot.  However, we're gradually seeing some other sounds and words creeping into his vocabulary.  Off and on, he will say basic words that are understandable to me and his dad.

Some examples of some of his two syllable words are:
 "Tato" when he wants to play with Mr. Potato head
 "Wahwah" for water
"Tay-Tay" for Tee-tee (we're potty training, remember?)
"Weh-Wuh" for Sarah
"Mah-meh" for Mommy and "Dah-deh" for Daddy
"Dora!"--his celebrity crush
"PahPah" for iPod
"Dahdoo" for thank you
Etc.

You can see in this video that he's getting more fluent with putting syllables together.  Before starting speech, he would only make one syllable sounds.  His therapist started with one syllable words, then two, and now we're trying 3.  Even though he can't really pronounce the words yet, repeating the words over and over is ear training.  If you listen closely to the video, you can hear differences in his vowel sounds and some variations in the consonants.

Slow and steady, steady and slow.  That's the way we always go!