What's Your Favorite Color Baby?

BLUE AND WHITE!

Sign-A-Palooza

As promised, here is a video of Ellis doing some more of her signs. I will try to gather more as circumstances allow. This one was pretty easy because Ellis loves "reading" me books. Some others are requiring me to hide the camera in the bushes outside or chase her around the house resulting in some Blair Witch type footage. I'm working out the bugs in this process.

This video is long (almost 9 minutes) but she was on a roll and I didn't want to stop her. In it you will see 22 signs. She also says, "no," at the end but instead of the actual sign, lately she has been defaulting to a head shake. We know what she means so we are not pressing the issue. Also, for the ASL purists out there, I should note that the last couple of months she has been using "all done" and "bye bye" interchangeably. I think she figured out both will make something or someone go away. And her sign for "bear" has always been one-handed instead of two-handed, but it's consistent and she uses it appropriately. I give her a few breaks. She's only 20 months old. :0

Click on these words if you would like to see the ASL demonstrated.

In this video Ellis says: monkey, lion, food, baby, stars, music, dog, bear, write, all done (bye bye), mouse, rabbit, car, shoes, animal, hat, horse, fish, elephant, giraffe, ball, and candy.

More to come soon!

My Spring Flower

Ellis is doing so well wearing her Passy-Muir valve that we called to update her ENT surgeon this week and ask for direction. As he evaluates her situation, we are praying that we will be moving forward at the right pace. We don't want to rush Ellis into something she's not ready for, but we don't want to lag behind either. The next step will most likely be trach capping trials but the timing will be up to her doctor. We will update when we know more.

While enjoying this great weather, Ellis has been such a good helper with my teeny attempt at gardening.



Don't worry. The flowers survived.



Ellis keeps me organized.

Blue Skies

Ellis had a good checkup this week with her eye doctor. The best news is that we can cut down the patching of her eye to two hours a day from the four hours we have been doing. This is great because she hasn't tolerated it as well the past couple of months. Sometimes it takes us all day just to get the four hours in. So even though we still have to do it, every little bit helps.
She is still doing great wearing her valve, and we plan to update her ENT soon to see what the next step will be. I am really enjoying getting outside more and more with her and using the suction machine less and less.



Self portrait



Big Laughs

We loved having company this weekend! Ellis invited over her buddies Emily and Ty, who brought with them their mom Kelly, my "oldest" BFF. Let's not say "oldest." Let's say the BFF I have known the longest. Kel and I met as babies in our church nursery! How sweet that our own babies can now play together, too. Kelly has been one of my greatest supports through our tough times with Ellis and I love her bunches! Watch this video to see how much Ellis loves them, too.

We hope they can visit again soon!!!

Also, Ellis reached another (not so) small milestone this weekend. For months I have been keeping a running list of the sign language words she knows and uses. Every time she masters a new one, I take joy in pulling up the list and adding on to it. I only count the ones she uses on her own without provocation. As of this weekend, she has 65 signs! Go baby go! I know I need to do a better job of taking video of these signs as well as all the other great things she does on a daily basis, so I'm making that my goal for this week. I hope to share some soon. By the way, number 65 is "rainbow." :)

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Ellis is making sure she doesn't get pinched today by wearing her Leprechaun hat AND carrying the green dinosaur. I might give her little pinches anyway. ;)

Baby Wildcat

Ellis says, "Happy Birthday Daddy!" For your birthday, Ellis arranged to have UK play basketball tonight and put on this funny outfit to cheer them along.

C-A-T-S...Cats, Cats, Cats!