5 Months in 6 weeks

We had Shayna's 5th physical therapy session yesterday since her evaluation at 13-months-old.  At the evaluation, her gross motor skills we at a "solid 9-month-old's".  Yesterday, at 14-1/2-months-old, we were told she's closing in on 15-month skills.  Thanks to her physical therapy exercises, all the work her caretakers put into her, and Shayna's general enthusiasm for life, she has advanced 5 months in just 6 weeks.  She still has some core, hip and shoulder weakness that we're having to get more specific to target.  She has a crib mattress we support on a little stool next to the couch.  She has to crawl-climb the mattress ramp to get onto the couch and reach her toys that we put just out of reach.  She also has a large exercise ball which we bounce her on (to the wonderful music of Lady Gaga).  This challenges her balance and makes her work her trunk and pelvic muscles to stay up right.  Shayna loves both activities and will ask you to put the music on then goes over the her exercise ball and slaps it a few times to get your attention that she wants to bounce.  If the mattress/ramp isn't set up she'll go find it and shout and slap it to get our attention so we set it up for her.  She loves crawling up and down it on her own.  Stairs and little curbs (e.g. from playground to grass) are also strongly encouraged and a huge hit with Shayna.
Her liver numbers were stagnant last week so there were no medication changes.  Two of the numbers are in the 40s and need to be in the 30s for us to start prednisone (steroid) weaning.  EBV wasn't checked last week since it had been trending down.  We'll have it checked with tomorrow's labs.  I would imagine having to be off prednisone to be off the valcyte (antiviral) since the prednisone opens the door for the EBV.  (EBV reminder: 90%-95% of 40-year-olds have the antibodies, it causes a harsher flu when most people get it and is the cause of mono, in immunosuppressed people it can lead to lymphoma (cancer).)

Nahum and I are trucking along as usual.  I get out for bike rides with Shayna once a week with a friend who has 2 little girls and just happened to buy a bike trailer for them on the same day I got mine.  It's been a lot of fun doing little rides to parks and ponds with them; though, Shayna continues to have her reservations for the trailer.  My garden is 90% done.  I'd still like to get some strawberries in in one area.  Other than that, it's just a matter of watering, grabbing the weeds when they come up and watching things grow.  We had one of our best Virginia weekends last weekend as we had 2 sets of friends with kids over on Saturday and went to a potluck at another friend's house on Sunday.  It's the people in our life that really make it great.

Her are some pictures from our 2nd Saturday gathering. 

Here Shayna tries to get Avishi to climb the mattress with her.  The picture is from a video I just posted on youtube of them.

Avi, Jenny and Shayna play.

Sarai, Jenny and Shayna play.