Moving Forward: Sept 12

We had a little liver excitement last month with high numbers the Monday after my last post (9/12) that prompted a flurry of activity in preparation for a liver biopsy incase they didn’t come down by Thursday. Luckily, they did begin to trend down. However, I was also able to get a biopsy schedule in Roanoke the following week so we wouldn’t have had to drive to Pittsburgh. While we didn’t have to use it, I now know that it can be done in Roanoke and how to make that happen. Her numbers have continued to come down in the following weeks so I’m hopeful we won’t have to make use of that knowledge this year. I also learned to trust my Ima-instincts a bit better again as Shayna had seemed sick to me without having runny nose, fever, etc and fighting a bug can easily make her liver numbers spike. While my observations were written off, I believe I was right as she started acting normal again the Wednesday after the spike and the numbers started coming down on their own.

School continues to go well for Shayna. She always talks about the kids there, can name them all, and point out their parents. She’s taught the other girls how to run then fling themselves to the ground in a pretend fall ensuring that she always comes home covered in dirt from head to toe. (We have to empty her shoes of sand everyday before getting in the car.) I’m glad she plays hard and enjoys herself but I do worry a little that she’ll actually hurt herself one day. Her favorite friends seem to be ZZ and Elijah. It’s fun to hear from the teachers about her activities. She seems to be as much a leader as she is a loner. One minute she’ll be in the thick of things instigating the game they play then she’ll casually drift out by herself to watch some other group play or sit in the sand box for a bit. I hope she can hold onto both talents as she gets older.

I found a 12” girls bike at a yard sale 2 weeks ago (along with a tag-along, baby bike seat attachment, mini-bouncy castle, a little tikes car, and a peddle-less push bike). The closest thing to a bike/trike Shayna’s ever ridden in a little Radio Flier, steerable scooter so peddling was something she’d only seen others do. I introduced the bike to her last week and on day two she’d gotten the hang of it already. She now goes in circles in the garage without needing any help. Here’s a video from day two.

Elijah’s been working on a few things too. He tripled the number of teeth in his mouth in a week. On Tuesday September 20 he got the front left two teeth and on Friday the top right two popped in. We went through a week last week with the least amount of drooling and hand chewing I’ve seen in months; however, he’s started back at it this week and I think I can feel two more lumps on the bottom. Poor baby.

On a happier note, Elijah can now crawl to any room in the house. He’s even disappeared on me a few times. I’ll put him down in the living room and the next thing I know there’s no baby to be seen as he’s gone around the corner into the guest bedroom or something. He can even get across the slippery wood floor to look for food scraps under the table or high chair. (He’ll do this right after I feed him sometimes as if it just needed some “seasoning” to be acceptable.) There’s a nice video of the crawling progression on my youtube site mrsarava (plus a few other newish ones of the kids).

Elijah also LOVES to walk while holding my hands. Every time I go to set him down, he goes stiff as a board and grabs for my hands. He can go from one end of the house to the other like that now; though it takes like 5 minutes. He’s nowhere near being able to walk on his own but that doesn’t keep him from trying. Last week he was pulling himself to standing at the couch, would turn around and let go with both hands only to collapse to the floor each time before he could even get his food raised. It was pretty cute.