Girly Girl:-)

Thank you Nastia Liukin!!

I must preface this string of photos with a little story.
Ryan left for the race on Thursday morning. It was a typical Thursday, nothing too out of the ordinary. I expected the rest of the day and evening to continue on as uneventful as it began. I was looking forward to a nice quiet evening at home.

It went something like this:

• Fed Casha dinner



• Got Casha in the tub



• Got Casha out of the tub



• Dressed Casha in her jammies



• Read Casha a few books



• Put Casha to bed



• Went downstairs



• Fed the dog



• Let the dog out



• Poured a glass of Shiraz



• Let the dog back in



• Went upstairs to check my email

This is where my plans for an uneventful evening were completely derailed!

You see, just as I sat down and took a sip of my Shiraz I heard a very loud THUD! from Casha's room. This was followed very quickly by a loud SCREAM! from Casha's room.
I knew immediately she had fallen from her crib. I expected that I would pick her up, calm her down, and get her back into her crib. That is not what happened.

As I entered Casha's room, I noticed she wasn't getting up. I thought, "well, she's crying so she didn't knock herself out." As I scooped Casha up off the floor she cried, "arm hurt, arm hurt!" I picked her arm up from where it dangled by her side and noticed that it was doing just that, dangling. In that instant, I recognized a borken arm.

I told Casha, "It's ok sweetie, we're going to go get your arm fixed." I grabbed my purse, took a quick look inside to be sure I had my wallet, threw an extra pull up in, grabbed my keys, and we were out the door.

Before I go any further, I want to add that I had been cleaning house that afternoon. I was wearing the same "lounge around the house pants" I had been sweating in all afternoon as well as the t shirt I'd been sweating in all afternoon. I had a weird, teeny, tiny pony tail in my hair, it's too short for a pony but I had been planning to stay home!

Back to the broken arm.

Our experience in the ER was pretty typical. Walk in, register, get an ice pack, sit for a little while, listen for the name SCOTT and determine if they're really calling us or if that was someone's first name. When they do call us, we go in, see the doctor, get some x rays, determine the arm is definitely broken, get a splint made, and pay the ridiculous ER co-pay.

There was some crying during the x rays, no big deal though. I thought for sure Casha would freak out about the splint and she did cry some. However, when she started to cry she turned and looked at me. I wrapped my arms around her chest and told her, "toughen up, no crying. You're a big girl." She looked right into my eyes and said, "ok Mommy" while fighting back the tears. I have never seen a two year old fight back tears like that. It was a proud moment when I realized just how tough that little girl is.

After the splint, we were out of there pretty quickly. It didn't take the financial department long to come in to collect our co-pay and once I took care of that, we were on our way home.

Thursday night, around midnight:

Friday, during the day:

Now, let's chat about why I'm thanking Nastia Liukin.

The swelling was enough on Thursday night that the doctor chose not to cast Casha's arm and so we left with just the splint. (As you can see in the photos above.)

Yesterday (Tuesday), was our appointment with the pediatric orthopedic surgeon. He decided to go ahead with the cast yesterday, no problem. Ryan and I looked at one another with a look that said, "great!" On the road to recovery.

We chose the color of the casting material and the doctor and nurse began chatting with Casha about what they were going to be doing. The doctor asked Casha, "How'd you break your arm sweet heart?"

Casha looked him right in the face and said, "I nastics", "turn over, nastics." (translation: I was doing gymnastics while I should have been sleeping. I decided to flip over the side of my crib and see if I could stick the landing.)

I couldn't believe my ears! She just admitted that she hadn't fallen from her crib but she was flipping around on it like it was a pommel horse or something! I said to Casha, "Look at me. Did you fall down while climbing out of your crib or were you doing gymastics?" She looked me right in the eye and said, "nastics", in a very confident voice. I'm still a little shocked by this.

So, I thank you, Nastia Liukin! My daughter is never allowed to watch the olympics again and she is certainly not going to be watching X Games! :-D

The signatures on her cast are lovingly referred to as tattoos.

Gotta Love the Daddy's

This is what Daddy's do when the Mommy's go out for the day.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diIB_EiFTBo&feature=related

Thanks Grandma! xoxo

????????

Is that ice cream or nuclear waste?!?

Ummmmmm...

She loves to read.

She loves the violin.

You wouldn't believe the things you can do with an empty macaroni box :-)

Our caterpillars!!

The Black Swallowtail

And, the Monarch about to Chrysalis in Casha's playhouse. She didn't quite know what to think of this. LOL

Father's Day 2008

Today, we went for a wagon ride...

And, looked totally adorable!!!

And, helped with the garden.

Happy Mother's Day from a friend

I received this from a friend and have finally gotten around to sharing it.

Happy Mother's Day By Lori Borgman


Expectant mothers waiting for a newborn's arrival say they don't care what sex the baby is. They just want to have ten fingers and ten toes. Mothers lie. Every mother wants so much more. She wants a perfectly healthy baby with a round head, rosebud lips, button nose, beautiful eyes and satin skin. She wants a baby so gorgeous that people will pity the Gerber baby for being flat-out ugly. She wants a baby that will roll over, sit up and take those first steps right on schedule. Every mother wants a baby that can see, hear, run, jump and fire neurons by the billions. She wants a kid that can smack the ball out of the park and do toe points that are the envy of the entire ballet class. Call it greed if you want, but a mother wants what a mother wants. Some mothers get babies with something more. Maybe you're one who got a baby with a condition you couldn't pronounce, a spine that didn't fuse, a missing chromosome or a palate that didn't close. The doctor's words took your breath away. It was just like the time at recess in the fourth grade when you didn't see the kick ball coming, and it knocked the wind right out of you. Some of you left the hospital with a healthy bundle, then, months, even years later, took him in for a routine visit, or scheduled him for a checkup, and crashed head first into a brick wall as you bore the brunt of devastating news. It didn't seem possible. That didn't run in your family. Could this really be happening in your lifetime? There's no such thing as a perfect body. Everybody will bear something at some time or another. Maybe the affliction will be apparent to curious eyes, or maybe it will be unseen, quietly treated with trips to the doctor, therapy or surgery. Mothers of children with disabilities live the limitations with them. Frankly, I don't know how you do it. Sometimes you mothers scare me. How you lift that kid in and out of the wheelchair twenty times a day. How you monitor tests, track medications, and serve as the gatekeeper to a hundred specialists yammering in your ear. I wonder how you endure the clichés and the platitudes, the well-intentioned souls explaining how God is at work when you've occasionally questioned if God is on strike. I even wonder how you endure schmaltzy columns like this one-saluting you, painting you as hero and saint, when you know you're ordinary. You snap, you bark, you bite. You didn't volunteer for this, you didn't jump up and down in the motherhood line yelling, "Choose me,God. Choose me! I've got what it takes." You're a woman who doesn't have time to step back and put things in perspective, so let me do it for you. From where I sit, you're way ahead of the pack. You've developed the strength of the draft horse while holding onto the delicacy of a daffodil. You have a heart that melts like chocolate in a glove box in July, counter-balanced against the stubbornness of an Ozark mule. You are the mother, advocate and protector of a child with a disability. You're a neighbor, a friend, a woman I pass at church and my sister-in-law. You're a wonder.


Lori Borgman is a syndicated columnist and author of All Stressed Upand No Place To Go, her latest humor book now available whereverbooks are sold

Casha's Processors

RIGHT EAR with snugfit and being worn in the babyworn configuration from Cochlear Americas

LEFT EAR with snugfit and being worn in the babyworn configuration from Cochlear Americas

Casha's Day At The Race Track

We've arrived and we're standing in pit lane. "I see Daddy!"

Taking Puppy for a little stroll down pit lane and through the stands.

No, no. No more photos please.

"I'm wiped out." Leaving the track after hours of glorious fun.

"zzzzzzzzz" While visions of race cars danced in her head.

I Love Samantha and AJ Too!

I Love Meghan!