On Strike

Megan has decided to go on strike from standing up.  It doesn't matter what I entice her with, what I try to do she will not get into standing on her own.  She hasn't done it since last Wednesday when she had such a stellar day. 

Glasses and Patches

Megan is doing amazing with her glasses now.  She still messes with them and takes them off but unless she gets them completely off her of head she can fix them on her own now.  She goes through phases where she leaves them alone for an hour or more and then times when she is constantly touching them.

Every afternoon I put a patch on Megan's left eye to help strengthen her right eye.  She wears the patch for 1-2 hours.  She is doing so great with it.  After the first day she isn't even messing with it - she just ignores it.  I think it is different than before because she can actually see out of her right eye - it isn't turned in and having to work extra hard to see. 

1 tooth down, 7 to go

Megan has been working on cutting her canine teeth for a couple of weeks.  The one on her bottom left has been pushing up and going back down for several days.  A few days ago the top two started doing the same thing.  One day you can see them under the surface and the next they are gone.  This morning the tooth on the bottom right broke through - there had not been any activity with it, it just appeared. 

Hopefully the other three will come in and they will all get going soon. 

Repeat behavior

Megan got herself into standing 4 times today.  Twice she did the whole process by herself, once she got onto her knees but she was too close so I had to pull her back a little bit and once I put her on her knees. 

Finally showing off for her therapist

Megan finally got into standing all by herself twice today during her session with Mandy.  This is the first time Mandy has seen her do it by herself and she was very excited. 

Pictures and hands

We have had a baby picture (6 weeks old) of Megan up on the wall in the living room for several months.  Recently Megan started noticing it and would point at it a lot.  Last week I took it down because I am finally decorating my living room.  In its place I put up some photos of Megan and Samuel from June.  She noticed them immediately and started pointing at herself in the pictures. 

A few weeks ago Megan started doing something that is adorable right now, but will have to be addressed in the future.  It is something that she learned by herself.  If she has something on her face, water, milk, food, etc she will use the back of her hand to wipe it off. 

Post-surgery follow-up

Today was Megan's follow-up with the eye doctor.  He said he was very pleased with the alignment of her eyes and that they looked good.  Our instructions are to put a patch on her left eye for 1-2 hours a day and keep her glasses on her as much as possible and he will see her again in 6 months. 

Eye Surgery - UPDATED

I woke Megan up at 4:30 am this morning.  We were in the car and on our way at 4:45 am.  We arrived at the hospital at 5:30 am and waited for our turn to check-in.  After check-in and hanging out in the waiting room we were finally taken back to a room to get Megan ready.  It was 7:15 before they took her from us to get her into the OR and Megan was exceptional.  She played and sang and hung out the entire time even though she was very tired and VERY hungry - she kept making the sign for eat. 

They asked us if we wanted them to give Megan some medicine to keep her calm - basically it would knock her out/make her loopy.  We said no thanks - we didn't want to give her more meds than absolutely necessary.  When it was time the nurse picked her up and they walked out of the room and she was as happy as could be. 

Around 7:40 Dr. Board came into the waiting room and told us that Megan did amazing.  He said that the surgery was easy and without any complications.  He corrected the muscle on the inside of each eye and said that she hardly bled at all.  He gave us instructions for the next few days and then gave us his cell phone number in case we needed something before Monday. 

About 30 minutes later we were called back to the recovery room - Megan was awake when I walked in and she was bundled up in blankets leaning on her new pink pillow.   She was unhappy off/on in recovery because every time we would calm her down they would do something else to her like remove her IV.  

Once in the car she was a happy girl and ready to go home.  Unfortunately on the way home she coughed and threw-up.  She did this 3 times although she held it in the first time.  She has never thrown up before so she was a little freaked out by it, but just telling her she was okay made her fine.   We have been home about 20+ minutes and she has been hanging out in daddy's lap (after we cleaned her up and changed her of course).

UPDATE:
Megan took a nap this morning for about 1.5 hours.  She woke up happy, just like normal and played for 40 minutes before we got her up.  She just ate quite a few cheerios and drank some water - she would have eaten a cup of cheerios if I let her but I want to make sure she handles what she has eaten before we load up that tummy.  If you didn't look at her eyes you would never know what she went through this morning.

Megan was fine with her cheerios so after 20 minutes we went for it.  She ate a PB&J and some pears - she was so very happy.  She did great the rest of the day and ate so much for dinner that I cut her off to keep her from being too full.  Before bed we had to pull down her bottom eye lid and line with an ointment - Megan just laid still and let us do it like it was no big deal.  She is an amazing little girl.

What a morning!

By 9:00 am this morning Megan had gotten into standing by herself more times that she had combined before today.  She was getting right up and then going back and forth and back and forth between the two tables.  She would go over, turn on a toy and then go back to the other table.  I didn't even have to do anything to get her moving - it was so exciting. 

When it was time for Will to leave Megan was standing at the ottoman.  I reached out and she grabbed my hands and took 2-3 steps to get to me and then took 5-6 to get from me to where Will was standing.  She has taken 2-3 steps with me holding her hands to get to me a couple of times but has NEVER taken a step away from me to get to something else. 

After a little while Megan was tired of standing up so I put her on her bench to sing with her.  When she is there we work on her leaning down to pick up toys off of the floor.  She has always bent down with her head up trying to stay as upright as possible while she is doing it.  This morning she bent so far down she touched her head to the floor.  The next time she put her hand on the floor, along with her head and then picked her rear up off of the bench so she was standing with her head on the floor.  She repeated this 2 or 3 times.  A couple of minutes later she decided she wanted to play with something on the other side of the bench so she turned, picking her legs up and making her way to the other side.  She has never event attempted this before today - she just reaches in the direction she wants and grunts until she gets help.   She moved back and forth from side to side several times. 

I put an eye patch on her this morning for the first time in several days and this time she left it alone.  It didn't come off until I took it off. 

What an amazing start to our day today. 

Tuna salad

A few months ago a good friend of mine (mother of 4) asked if I had ever given Megan tuna fish. I hadn't and wasn't really sure she would go for it. My friend said that her kids wouldn't eat it.

Well tonight Will suggested it for dinner. I told him we could try but that she might not go for it.   I really have no reason to doubt that she would eat it - she eats everything we give her except goldfish crackers. 

Megan not only ate it, she devoured it with joy!  She loved it. 

Lots of new skills

Over the past couple of weeks Megan has started doing several new things. She is doing the motions to "Head, Shoulders, Knees & Toes" - it is so cute because she will point with one finger.

She has a few songs on her music table that I do the "signs" for when she plays them. She has started trying to do the signs with me. She is mostly just waving her arms around, but she gets so excited and does it right along with me.

Yesterday she started doing peek-a-boo herself which I find amazing since we don't play that game with her. She covers up her eyes with her hands and then waits for you to say "peek-a-boo" and then she reveals.

She is going amazing with her standing, getting into standing and moving. Today for the first time since we put her in the new, bigger shoes and her inserts she got into standing completely by herself. I have to keep her from going too fast - she just wants to jump right up and falls over in the process. She is also changing her mind halfway up and deciding to stand up at the table instead of the ottoman which is at a 90 degree angle so I have to catch her.