About our blogger: SandKmommy
I'm Justine, mommy to Seamus and Kieran. The road through mommyhood the last 3½ years has been a rocky one with Seamus, but he has helped me grow and learn. Seamus had numerous delays as a baby and into early toddler-hood. His gross and fine motor skill delays are finally up to par with his age. Seamus has some social emotional behavior issues that we are in the process of finding an answer to. Kieran has been my easy child, after a bumpy start with weight.
My blog is a way for me to share and vent about my life with my children and the obstacles that we encounter. I'm also following in hubby's footsteps and learning photography, because of that I flood my blog from time to time with pictures that I've taken of my kids. One area I'm hoping to explore on my blog is projects that my kids and I do together.
April 8th, 2011
I can’t believe its already here. 2 years ago I was tossing and turning in my bed because I was going to have a baby in a few short hours! Baby Kieran was born via c-section on April 8th, 2009 @ 7:51am (due to being footling breach, and too risky to try a version). She weighed in at 6lbs 13ox and 19(or 19.5 I forget oops…lol)inches long. She took to breastfeeding like a champ, while I was in recovery still! We had some issues with her weight and latching after leaving the hospital but we pulled through and I’m proud to say that we nursed till she SELF weened in January of this year at 21½ months old!
Happy Birthday to my sweet, silly, goofy, lefty, dancing girly!
Read the rest of this entry »
April 5th, 2011
I was reproached by someone from Mohawk rugs last month about doing a review and giveaway on the blog. I was super excited to be given this chance, especially with moving to a new house. Kieran finally has her own room after almost 2yrs of sharing ours so we’ve been excited to decorate it and adding in the rug to review was awesome and perfect timing.
Here is some information about the nursery rugs:
-They are made with a new technology in yarn that is very soft to the touch, perfect for a baby or childs room
-Latex backing provides non skid surface for all hard surfaces or it works great to keep the rug in place on carpet
-Made from 100% Nylon. Nylon rugs are easy to take care of, they spot clean easily but you can also wash the 40″x60″ size in a front load commercial washer
-Made in the USA
We got our rug on March 18th, just 2 days after moving in (review up a little late sorry!), and I waited a couple days to open it since we were still getting things organize. The first thing I noticed before opening it was how big it looked which I was excited about. Next thing I noticed was the colors, really nice and neutral to any color scheme in a girls room (I choose a brown and pink rug). Kieran’s room right now is flowers, butterflies, and Tinkerbell and done in light purple, blue, and pink. The pink and brown striped rug we received for review works really well in her room. Read the rest of this entry »
March 18th, 2011
I’ll be MIA for about a week. We signed for the keys to the new house Tuesday, and our internet will be turned on at the new house “Sometime” on Thursday. >.< Time Warner only had a full day appointment available, so we have to sit around all day. (Luckily, my brother is staying with us since we have lots of appts. on Thursdays). I think I’ll have a nice update blog post next week with pictures of the new house too
March 12th, 2011
The main idea is to emphasize integration of the auditory and vestibular systems together. Since there is such a close connection with visual functioning, visual processing also will likely improve - particularly spatial awareness and the concept of time and space.
Sensory-processing-disorder.com
February 27th, 2011
My luck with computers sucks! In late 2008, I had this feeling that something was wrong with my computer; it just seemed wrong. Hubby kept saying it was fine, and we could wait to “fix” whatever it was until tax time (Feb 2009). Sadly, he was wrong, and it wasn’t fine; it died in late November 20008 - just died, completely fried. (I don’t think the graham crackers Seamus put in it helped matters much.) It sucked, but luckily the hard drive was still good (mother board and power supply went), so we didn’t lose anything.
Fast forward to the end of January 2010, and we buy me a new computer. (Yeah, DH and I “fought” over his desktop like a bunch of kids after school for over a year. lol.) We stupidly went with HP even though we knew better. We knew they had issues with their power cords breaking and such. We got one of the newest models out at the time and paid just over $800 after taxes for it. It did pretty well until around November 2010, then the battery started having issues, and I’d have to keep it plugged in all the time or it would die. Then we had to pawn it for a month in early January 2011 due to having to pay off a lawsuit from old medical bills. We got the computer back early this month, and it “seemed” to be ok. But it didn’t last long.
The warranty went up on January 29th, 2011, and exactly 2 weeks later the hard drive completely failed and died out of nowhere. We had no warning, and I had a 500gb hard drive more then half full with digital scrapbooking stuff and pictures. Luckily, most of my pictures were uploaded to Facebook or Photobucket, so I didn’t lose too many. Most of the pictures I lost were from the last 2 months, which sucks, but at least it wasn’t all of Kieran’s first birthday pictures (most but not all are gone). Read the rest of this entry »
February 18th, 2011
We are finally moving! When we moved into this place in August 2008 we signed a 6month lease, and our plan was to move in Feb. 2009…well we found out a few days after we signed the lease that I was pregnant with Kieran and moving just 2 months prior to her being born probably wasn’t a good idea. We decided to wait till Feb. 2010 to move, but it didn’t work out right. Since November I’ve been watching Craigslist trying to find a place for us to move once February came. We had 3 different places in mind at the beginning of this month, each with pro’s and con’s and we couldn’t decide which one. Once we finally decided and went to apply the people said that they had other apps and we had to wait, so we went with our second choice, same thing happened. After that we thought we wouldn’t find anything, it was already 1.5weeks into Feb, and we had told our landlord we’d be moved out by Feb. 21st.
As I was looking through some rental companies around here I found one place that was similar looking outside as the current place we live. I had hubby call the rental place to see about it (and it was only 2 blocks up the road from us), but they mentioned that they had another place that was slighty bigger, and only $50/mo more. The place they mentioned was a duplex, rather then the triplex we called on, and is newer built. They had A side open but were holding it for someone who applied already. We got to go look at A side, because its the exact same as B side and B side would be the side we would get if we decided we liked it, just had to wait for the current tenants to move out. We really liked the place, a 3bd 2.5ba (opposed to our 2bd 1ba) with a fenced back yard (we have no fenced yard now and are on a fairly busy street), and the other nice thing is that its only $125 more then we pay now. One thing I realllllllly didn’t like is that its the same exact layout as our current place. The front door opens to the living room then the kitchen straight back, you cannot see from the kitchen to the living room, I really wanted an open kitchen, and the laundry is in the kitchen again. All 3 beds are upstairs, along with 2 baths (one in the master one for the kids). We decided to go with this place because it had more pro’s then con’s. We put our deposit down on it on Friday the 11th, but we can’t move till March 19th (haha lucky me on my birthday! >.<). The current tenants move out Feb. 28th but then the rental company has a 2 week period for inspection and cleaning/fixing things. So we’ll have another month to move, luckily our current landlord is nice about waiting. So next month I’ll probably be MIA for 2 weeks while we move and wait for Time Warner to come and hook up internet at the new place
February 2nd, 2011
Today we went to the ENT, Kieran’s speech is behind (Average is 3-50+ words, Kieran has just over 10). We were worried that her hearing was the reason for her speech. Turns out we were right her hearing is the reason for her speech issues. When the did the first test to see how her ear drum reacts it wasn’t good, her left ear hardly had a reaction at all, a tiny one at the end of the the flat line, the right had a slightly better one but still not good. And the hearing in her left ear wasn’t good either (they didn’t test her right?!) He said she was hearing at 30 decibels and they wanted it at 15 or higher (said the lower the # the more they could hear the softer and quieter sounds) so not terribly bad but he was worried about her ear drum not reacting like it should.
Like we thought he brought up tubes. Kieran’s only had 3 ear infections since September so that wasn’t the worry, he said normally kids like that with fluid on their ears he would just recheck in 6 weeks when the weather warms up. What he was worried about is the fact that its affecting her hearing and her speech, because of that he’s going to put tubes in. He said we’ll do the tubes then a few weeks later we will check her hearing again to see if it helps. He said this kind of hearing loss is normally reversible, in 5% (I think it was) of patients it isn’t.
We are waiting on authorization from insurance but once thats in we are scheduled for the surgery on the 17th of Feb. He was also sort of worried about her tonsils and adenoids, they were larger then they should be, he said medium, so not as large as Seamus’ were but he wants to watch that too. He also said they will possibly take out the adenoids if the tubes alone don’t help the draining (The left ear was really full, the right a little)
January 28th, 2011
Sorry for the lack of posts since December. Seamus had a break from school, for the winter holidays and it hit us really hard. We had a lot of break downs and behavioral issues. We ended up stopping the brushing technique because it became too much of a fight. Some times he would asked to be brushed others I had to make him. Our OT said that it would cause him to regress on some behaviors but only for 2 weeks, after a month of it we couldn’t take it any more. So now we’re back to square 1 trying to find something else, hopefully the listening therapy but he doesn’t like wearing the headphones so I’m not sure.
Other news about Seamus, we had a follow up at the Eye Specialist a few weeks ago, where we thought we would get to stop doing the dilating drops, but nope. The eye doctor (a new one, the main one in the office, since the old one left)didn’t see enough of an improvement to let us stop. He has to continue the drops till April, then we will see the specialist again and decide from there whether or not to do the surgery on his eye.
Miss Kieran started Speech back in December. Her’s is pretty delayed, only saying around 10 words and most are the same word just slightly said different. She sees the same speech therapist Seamus does so that’s nice. Early Headstart has been Read the rest of this entry »
December 20th, 2010
I have these little snow men that were my Nana’s, and since I have all of her things, I found them when I went through the garage. I’ve had them on my entertainment center, but I decided to stick them in their home… Yep, their home, the lovely North Idaho snow of course!
One thing that prompted me to take this picture is that my friend Trish is having a photo contest on her blog. I know this photo isn’t too fun or exciting, but having my Nana’s snowmen, and having a picture of them, makes me feel a little better as we get ready to celebrate Christmas. This is the 2nd Christmas without Nana, and it’s getting harder as it gets closer. I’m glad I have these snowmen.
The contest on Tutus & Sneakers is for a $20 GC to My Four Hens Photography. I love taking pictures but sometimes get frustrated getting good and neat edits. I love the look of the My Four Hens actions; they would be awesome to have when we do my brother’s Senior pictures this spring/summer.
December 13th, 2010
Today at OT, we talked about listening therapy again, something that we’ve planned to start for the last 2 months but one thing or another prevented it. Seamus has tried the headphones and cd player a few times at OT, but he doesn’t like them and always takes them off, complaining they hurt his head, or it’s too loud, or he doesn’t like the music (part of his sensory issues). We think the listening therapy will help Seamus progress and relax, but his OT brought up a different therapy/technique to try first.
Our OT brought up the Brushing Technique and asked if I had heard of it, which I hadn’t. She explained it to me - basically, it should help calm him down and give him the sensory input that he needs. She wants us to try this before we go on to the listening therapy; right now she doesn’t think he would do the LT because of how he acts with the music and headphones.
She gave me a run down of what to do. I thought Seamus would freak out when she was first explaining it to me. You use a surgical brush to brush down their extremities and back, and I thought it would be a pokey and hard brush. The brush is actually fairly soft and doesn’t hurt. (She showed me on me, then on Seamus, how to do it). I have to brush down his arms first, applying pressure to give him the deep sensory input he needs, then his back, and last his legs. After I’m done brushing, I have to do his joint compression, which is pushing all his joints in his extremities together 10x’s each joint (shoulder, elbow, wrist, hips, knees and feet).
I was amazed when she showed Seamus and I. Read the rest of this entry »
