Sofia Joy and the Watermelon and an update on the Wild Child!

How many pictures can one mama take of her kid eating watermelon? Apparently A LOT! But she's so cute! This was her first successful (non choking) time eating watermelon independently! Woot! That's an area we've worked really hard on and we're finally at a much better place! 

It's hard to believe this girl will be THREE in September! If she is anything like my other two girls, 2 years old was a walk in the park compared to 3 years old. If that's the case, please pray for us! This girl keeps us on our toes! 

I wish I could tell you what happened to her nose, but I really have no idea. She's going to be the kindergartener in stitches on picture day, I can picture it now!

She has a mind of her own, and that's an understatement! I never knew such a little person could challenge me so much, nor did I know I could ever love such a crazy little person the way I love her! I'm learning from this girl....I'm learning a lot!

Her wild emotions means she feels deeper than most....a gift, I think. 

She has a spirit that is unbreakable, even after a 30 minute tantrum she has a way of putting a smile on her face and starting over from that moment on. I'm still working on my ability to do the same (the smile part, not the tantrum, because I've got that part down)! 

Sofia is slow to warm up in new situations and she makes others earn her trust and work for her attention, but when you get a glimpse of the buried treasure inside her heart, you know you've hit the jackpot! She's still slowly crawling out of her shell.

She is opinionated....very very opinionated, about everything. Lucky for me, she is of the opinion that she has the best Mama in the world-so good in fact that she can't stand for me to be out of her sight for more than 2.5 seconds....and she lets the world know when her Mama has left the room, oh yes she does! 

She is so confident and so uncertain all at once.

But when she's confident, and with Mama or Dada by her side, and when she's good and ready, she dives in head first, full of joy!

That mischievous spark has not left her eyes! 

Neither has her stubborn streak determination.

Sofia and I could not be more different from one another and yet the Lord knew somehow we couldn't live without each other! 

Sofia's separation anxiety has gotten a bit more intense since we moved and she's still trying to figure this whole thing out! She loves her new house and the huge yard full of hills! With her sensory processing disorder, she needs lots of proprioceptive input and she's getting better about finding appropriate opportunities to meet those needs. She was pushing this very heavy car through the grass tonight after dinner! 

Just don't, for the love of all that is good in this world, don't ask her to touch shaving cream, or really even LOOK at it! 

"I will not look. I will not look. I will not look (at the teeny tiny miniscule amount of shaving cream on my tray)!"

Promise, I'm not being a mean Mama. Kids with SPD need opportunities to train their brains to process sensory input in a regulated way. Sofia is extremely tactile defensive, but little by little we make progress! Why is this important? It's important so she learns to interact with her world on a daily basis without breaking down due to sensory avoidance. Think foam soap in restrooms, think eating a messy sandwich or meal, think washing your hair, etc. There are so many daily activities that require us to interact with our environments through our tactile senses. And that is my PSA on SPD for today :) My goals with new sensory activities start very small for her. Just watching her sisters play with shaving cream was very distressing for Sofia. So that was the goal today. She smelled the shaving cream and also allowed me to help her touch a very small amount, hand over hand, for 10 seconds. 

She's really starting to babble a lot more and attempt words. She is a follower-only of other children, though, not adults ;) She will do anything her sisters do, so often if I want her to do something I use them as peer models and she will try new activities that way too! So she tries to say all the words her sisters say and lately she has started talking a lot more to us. She has a conversational tone and she clearly knows what she is saying but we haven't a clue. She just laughs and laughs! She has really been loving learning her letters lately and reading "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom." She is such a smart cookie!! 

Her curls have returned for summer! 

We've decided not to rush into preschool with this little lady, so once she turns 3 in September we'll lose our in home therapies and probably continue with some low key outpatient speech therapy and I'll work with her a lot at home where she's most comfortable. She needs a year to just be the baby and continue building trust outside of her family at her own pace. 

We love our crazy beautiful Sofia girl, or Sofi-J as we like to call her! 

Zoya-isms

Zoya is pretty funny these days with all she has to say! As her speech continues to grow, we get to understand a bit more about what she's thinking! Also, as her speech improves EVERYONE ELSE gets to hear what she's thinking..........minus the filter! She just says whatever is on her mind and truly thinks if she just adds a "please" or "sorry" nothing she says could possibly be rude if she uses her manners too....right? "Move please!" or "No singing Daddy! I don't like singing please!"  My favorite is when we tell her to do something she doesn't want to (like when it's time for bed, or time to leave something fun)...her usual response is "No thank you please." Or if she's having fun and it's time to go to school, or to go back home, she usually says, "I don't like it (school/home, etc)....I'm sorry!" She throws all the pleasantries in there hoping she can butter us up enough that we'll forget our request and give into her ways! HAHA!

And then there's times she doesn't even bother with the pleasantries! Mila was whining up a storm and Zoya looked at her totally annoyed and said, "Mila, WHAT is your PROBLEM?" Total fast-forward to teenage years!

She's also starting to use phrases that she hears often, such as, "Just wait one second please!" (guilty, and she's giving it right back to me now!). The other day I asked her if she liked her dinner and she said, "It's not too bad." HA, well thank you! She is constantly telling her sisters, "Great Job!" for anything and everything they do (so sweet!) The other one I'm hearing a lot of lately is, "Let's try it" or "Well, we can try it." I tell her this all the time when she doesn't want to try something new, or if she tells me she doesn't have to go potty. I'll say, "Well, let's try." The only problem is, our conversation usually goes something like this:

Zoya: Mama! Play with babies!

Me: Sorry sweetie, it's time for bed. 

Zoya: Let's try it! Yah, try it babies! 

or

Zoya: Go eat! Tables and chairs (asking to eat at a restaurant)

Me: Not tonight, we have to get home and eat with Daddy and Mila and Sofia!

Zoya: Yah, let's try it tables and chairs, okay, just try it!

I must say she really does try pretty hard to get what she wants! She's also trying to bargain now too! The other night it was time for bed and she said, "Watch Marmaduke Mama!" And I told her it was too late to start a long movie and so she said, "Ipad! 5 minutes!" I admit, I gave into that one! She is very sly with her bargaining skills too! Shawn told her it was time for bed one time and she said, "Watch football with Daddy!" as she batted her long eyelashes. How do you say no to THAT?! Last night I put Mila and Sofia to bed and had planned to let Zoya stay up a little later (but she didn't know that). She clearly thought she was going to have to go to bed next, as usual, so she said, "Do work with Mama?" She ASKED to "do work" (sight words, reading, math-whatever we're working on as goals) and yes, I also gave in to that request HAHA! 

(We call this her "Ukrainian Babushka Face")

Yesterday morning she asked for a popsicle for breakfast. She had gotten use to getting to eat whatever she wanted whenever after her recent tonsil/adenoidectomy. I told her no popsicles for breakfast, but if she had a good day at school she could have one when she got home. I said to her, "You need to stay in your spot at circle time and not run all around the room!" (which I had heard was a problem recently) She got really big eyes and I said, "Yup! Mama knows about that!!" She said, "Oooooooo, Mama's watching!" I laughed out loud...but what do ya know, she had a GREAT day! On the way to the car after school I told her that I was so proud of her for having such an awesome day at school. She climbed in her carseat and said, "No bad choices!" I said, "You're right! You made really good choices today! I'm SO proud of you!" Then she grinned from ear to ear so proud of herself and that's when I saw yellow paint all over her lips and teeth!!! I said, "Did you eat paint at school today?" She looked down and said, "Oh yah! Okay, bad choice!" BUSTED! 

How did I get so lucky to be Mama to this perfect child?! She's funny, and silly, and confident and speaks her mind in a way I wish I could! I love her contagious zest for life and her amazing free spirit! And just to prove to you how much I'm learning from my sweet girl....I'd normally not post a picture of myself in foils, but when I look at these pictures I see just how much zest and fun and pure happiness she has brought to MY life! To those of you who say SHE is the lucky one to have me for a mama, you couldn't be more wrong! I, without a doubt, am far luckier to have her in my life than she is to have me in hers! 

Update: Mila

I'm going to blog about each of the girls separately starting with Miss Mila, ONLY because I have the funniest video ever of her from last night and I want to share it! She keeps us laughing and is definitely the class clown in the family! I grabbed my phone real quick while we were eating dinner last night as I watched this unfold......

(I think blogger is having a problem with videos, working on getting them to play!)

Most kids feed the food they don't want to the dog....Mila's learned she's not allowed to do that so I guess she thought she'd try feeding it to Sofia ;) Apparently Mila didn't like her dinner, or maybe she just wanted to share with Sofia! Either way, she knew she was caught in the act, but tried to smooth it over! 

You can see how she tries to get out of trouble by being funny as well! How could I possible not laugh?

She has all of a sudden decided she is ready to walk like her sisters! She is consistently taking 5-6 steps from her chair or from a standing position and is getting closer to starting to take 7-10 steps more consistently! She is able to push to standing from the middle of the floor and take 3-4 steps now and she's learning to put her arms out to catch herself when she falls instead of diving face first!!! We are SO very proud of her. After hearing some specialists say she may never walk without the use of a walker, you can imagine how excited we are as we experience every single step with her! I can just hear her saying, "Oh ya? that's what you think? I'll show YOU!" We're still using her walker for long distances because she tires VERY quickly. Her goal right now is to build up endurance. With such low muscle tone it really takes a lot out of her to even take those 7-10 steps, or to walk in her walker for a few minutes. 

She is starting to "talk" more. We're using a "total communication" approach with her, which means we are teaching signs, spoken words, and using PECS (a separate blog post coming about that). She calls appropriately for mama and dada, says "more," makes dog, duck, cow, and cat noises, says "beep beep" for car, and has a word approximation for "help." She's starting to initiate her own play activities more frequently and calling for us to help her with a toy when needed. She's starting to use more and more signs. Her favorite lately seems to be "go" when we stop during our walks or stop at a red light! I walked into her room and saw her signing all the words to one of her favorite signing time songs (it was playing on CD)...when I asked her to show me she refused! That is how she earned the nickname "Ninjabean" from my friend Jo! She's able to feed herself a small meal with a fork and is doing pretty well with her spoon too (it's just REALLY REALLY messy!!!). 

Her new favorite game for the past few weeks is to pop up in her crib as I'm getting her room ready for bedtime. She pops right up after I lay her down, throws out her binky and just LAUGHS hysterically! I run over and tickle her and she burries her face in the pillow, repeat (as many times as I allow haha). She has the girliest laugh and most high pitch scream I've ever heard, too! I just love her little personality. 

She gives THE BEST hugs and snuggles too, every single time I hold her. It doesn't get any better than a hug from this sweet chunky love! Speaking of chunky.....Mila is nowhere on the down syndrome growth charts, and it toward the top of the typical charts these days! She is 31 pounds and 36 inches (which puts her only 6 pounds and 6 inches under her FIVE year old sister!) Can you believe our tiny 7 pound baby girl is now at the other end of the charts? I love her fat baby legs, but as she's moving more I can already start to see her slimming down and losing some of that baby fat......good news is she has a lot left to go :) 

We were sad to find out her eye surgery was not successful :( They did muscle surgery to try and help her from "posturing" which I posted about before. Basically she tips her head way back to get her nystagmus to stop so she can see clearly. This is her "null point." The surgery attempted to change her null point so that her head posture was in a more natural position. We were informed that about 25% of kids need a second surgery to completely correct the problem but were also told we'd most likely see a ton of improvement after just one surgery. At first we thought we saw some improvement because she wasn't posturing as much to watch TV, then we realized she wasn't doing that because she couldn't see much-she was having some swelling due to an allergic reaction from the ointment :( So she has another appointment in a couple of months to discuss a second surgery :( 

 Waiting for surgery....

These were apparently the smallest socks they had and she HAD to wear them they said, okay then! I guess they double as pants! 

Clowning around! 

 Not so fun! 

Poor dolly babe....this was, to date, her easiest surgery....figures it didn't work LOL! 

And if you notice Mila rockin' some cool purple headphones and mama's old school iPod, it's an attempt to meet her auditory sensory seeking and decrease her whining.....first quiet Target trip with Mila..... :) 

We've been busy with lots of therapies. We're in the final "6 months until she's 3 and ages out of early intervention" stretch and have added and increased some of her therapies to really give her as much as we can during these last 6 months. When she turns 3 the only way she will get services is if we enroll her in preschool. Having a March birthday, we're not sure we'll send her that late in the school year....we always have the option of outpatient therapies through our insurance, as well, but the in home therapies are just so nice! I'm going to be taking her and Sofia to a mommy and me dance class once a week and I think they're going to love it! 

Here's a picture of Mila with Uncle Bub and his AWESOME SHIRT! My friend took this picture of Mila pouting on the playground and Bub had it made into a shirt...so funny! Equally as awesome is Mila picking her nose in this photo. 

And clearly Daddy has been letting them watch WWF...well okay, he was at work when this pictures was taken, and I might have encouraged their craziness by laughing right along with them.....Sofia has no idea what's about to hit her hahaha!

(when you can stand from the middle of the couch, it must be counted as "therapy" and so I couldn't tell her to behave and stop jumping on the couch! P.S. no babies were harmed)

I continually look back on our journey to Mila and on how the Lord filled us in at the very last minute with details about her health and needs and just how sick she was. I know, for a fact, had we known that before meeting her, we'd have run the other way. Oh it breaks my heart thinking of life without her....I'm so thankful the Lord knows our hearts best and that His plans are better than anything we could ever imagine! Having been through all of her surgeries, sleepless nights, health scares, wondering if she'd even LIVE, well all that has bonded us to this beautiful child in ways that most people can't understand, unless they've lived it. I find myself trying to imagine preschool and letting her go a little more as she grows up, and I just can't imagine. Even though she's our middle child, she'll always be my baby....

Up next.....an overdue Sofia update......she IS turning TWO in less than a week, ya know! OH MY!