A new way to walk

You know how sometimes you just have a gut feeling about something and you need to follow up on it, well that is how Sophie has ended up with the Kidwalk in our living room.

Sophie has been using a gait trainer called a Pony Walker since she was 2 1/2 years old.  She knew just what to do the first time she was placed in it, she blew us all away and showed us that she was ready to roll, no hesitation.

Sophie's first time in the Pony Walker...

Sophie is growing out of her pony walker more and more each day.  We were thinking about getting the next size up, but I had seen the Kidwalk being used by children on some other blogs I read and I was sure that it would be a great fit for Sophie.

Nobody at our therapy centre had really heard of it and they didn't have any there to try out.  So I contacted our supplier to see if there was any way we could get our hands on one to trial.  It was a bit of a wait with only two for trialing in Canada.

But it is here, and we love it.  Sophie seems to be adapting to it quickly.

 Don't mind her crazy outfit ;)

The Kidwalk keeps her quite upright compared to the pony walker.  She is taking actual walking steps as we move her slightly forward while she learns how to move in it herself.  In the pony walker Sophie tends to push herself forward with 2 feet at once.  She does a great job of moving herself where she needs to go, but it is an adapted movement, not a typical walking gait. 

The pony walker will always be our first love, because it changed her world.  It changed her world in so many ways.  But, she is a big girl now and she needs the extra support that the Kidwalk offers.  It also allows her to bear some weight on those long legs.

I can't wait to see where Sophie decides to walk with her new wheels.

Not quite ready for the NFL....

Not so great news this weekend for us.

Lucas and Jason were tossing the football around while we were all at the park.  Lucas is in football camp this coming week so they were doing some practice throws.  Well, Lucas missed a catch and jammed the ball off the end of his 2 fingers.  There were some tears and we figured it would be forgotten a few hours later.  Didn't exactly happen that way.

We put some ice on it when we got home and it was starting to swell.  Lucas had his last soccer game that afternoon and he was adament that there was no way he could play.  So I buddy wrapped his fingers in tape and gave him some advil and we were good to go a couple hours later.  He was careful on the field and all was good.

My excellent taping job :)  Beautiful.

He had his first sleepover at our house last night with a friend (they had a blast!) so he had lots of distraction last night.  This morning I figured we should take the tape off and have a look.  Yup, green, purple and blue all across the knuckle.  He said he couldn't move it and it was soooo swollen.  So off to urgent care for x-rays we went. 

Good thing we did, he broke his middle finger and pulled all the ligaments.  What a trooper, he played a whole soccer game 2 hours after he did it!!

Oh, the drama!

So he has a splint for a few weeks to let it heal and we begin our trips to the paed. orthopaedic clinic soon.  He thought the x-ray was extremely cool so it was all worth it ;) 

This is kind of a right of passage in our house.  I broke my middle finger in a rugby game in university (yes, I was on the varsity team, shock!) , and Jason broke his ring finger in a basketball game way back when.
We'll see how football camp goes this week, the Dr. said he can do it as long as he takes it easy.  Lucas is Mr.Competitive, we shall see what happens, could be interesting.   He also starts back into his soccer select team practices this week.  When it rains it pours :)

Summer beach babies

We have made a number of trips to the cottage this summer.  We had our longest trip (10 days) during the big heat wave in July and lived to tell the tale.  But man was it hot for a couple days.

My sister came with her little girl for a weekend visit there as well which Sophie loved. We spent alot of time at the beach, built some sandcastles, did some garage sales, ate fresh local corn and just basically relaxed.

Mr. Riley had a ball too.  We took him down to the beach each evening to cool off, he had so much fun plucking his stick-du-jour out of the lake over and over again.  This is the dog that was afraid of putting his toes in the water at the beginning of last summer.  He was a riot to watch as he dug to China every night and then he would roll on his stick with his legs kicking up in the air like a wild horse rolling in the mud.  He is c.r.a.z.y.

Lucas and Sophie both had a great time swimming in the lake.  The water was very warm in July and  we had alot of time to splash around while avoiding the hot cottage in the daytime.   We played soccer and ladder golf and monopoly in the evenings. 

As Lucas is getting older I see him developing a relationship with Sophie that is different than before.  I hear him talking to her sometimes when I am out of the room for a moment.  He says hi to her in this special way, the same way every time.  His voice goes all high and he says her name all drawn out, I just love it and Sophie laps it up.  She can't get enough of him, who can blame her.

This picture of my two makes my heart beat a little faster.  I just adore it.

We spent alot of time at the beach and even though everyone was slathered in number 60 sunscreen Lucas and Sophie managed to get quite the summer beach tans.  Lucas' hair also turned much blonder, I wish I had that problem ;) 
This was a summer that perhaps for the first time I felt like everything with Sophie came easier up there.  It isn't easy per se taking care of her but it didn't seem much different than at home.  We got our routines down and I didn't worry about being so far away from the hospital and all our regular backup  plans.  It was good.

Lucas going in for the noodle kill.

Going for ice cream each night, sand in the bed, watching movies, waiting for the sunset, mini adventures to new beaches and waterfalls, killing bugs that are so big they make you go ewwww when they squish, finding groundhogs in the shed (yup), that is what the cottage is about.  I am so thankful that Lucas and Sophie will have these kinds of memories from their childhood.  It doesn't get any better.

Can't wait for our next trip

A new way to see the world

A couple weeks ago I came across a post on a special needs forum that I belong to, it was by another mom looking for a bike trailer down in the States for her special needs child.  Someone suggested a special needs Wike bike trailer and the rest, as they say, is history.

I googled wike bike and kijiji Ontario and BAM, there it was.  Just begging to be bought by me.  A mom in a city an hour or so away from us had posted the exact trailer from the forum, for sale, the day before.  It really was like it was meant to be.  I emailed her the next morning and the day after that my mom and I were off on a road trip.  These trailers are over $1000 new and luckily we paid less than half of that for this used one.  However it looks brand new and the mom I bought it from said she only used it a handful of times.  She was super nice and we spent a few hours at her home chatting with her and her daughter who is older and has very similar needs as Sophie.

This week I managed to rig up Sophie's car seat in the cabin of the trailer and it actually worked quite well.  I will need to give it a little more support, but we could use it as it is if we really wanted to.  We just have to find a suitable helmet for Sophie.

There is plenty of room for Sophie to grow and I am excited for her to join us on our first bike ride as a family.  I haven't ridden my bike in years so I am excited too. 

We just found 2 bikes at garage sales for at the cottage as well, one for Jason (which is now going to be mine because it is too short for him) and one for Lucas.  So hopefully we will be able to take the bike trailer up there at some point as well.

The Chosen One

Lucas is loving soccer again this year and has a great team with lots of really keen players.  Lucas is speedy (it is his nickname at school lol) and can take the ball up the side of the field like it is nobody's business.  He is a natural. 

Two weeks ago he was chosen to be on the select team, this is a team that they put together which consists of the best players in the Under 8's.  They hand pick them to get extra training through the year in the hopes that they will try out for the competitive team (instead of the house league) next year.  He was a little, shall we say, excited!!

Lucas will continue with his house league team till the end of the season but will also have practices with the select team now till next season.   It is really wonderful because there is no cost to us and he will get to play through the winter.  I had never heard of the select team before two weeks ago so it was awesome to find out he was on this special team.  Now I know I have braggin rights to his ability lol.  I am so proud of him, he gives the game his all and now he is being given the opportunity to really shine!

Summer camp = awesome

Sophie has gone and shown us what a big girl she is, she had a week of camp and she had a blast!  The therapy centre she goes to had a gym and swim camp for kids like Sophie last week, it was for 3 hours each morning and it was just perfect.  There are alot of things that you just assume aren't going to happen when you have a girl like Sophie, her going off to camp on her own at 5 years old is one of them.  But as we know Sophie is a wonder girl and she loved it.

This is Sophie with her wonderful camp partner Brooke.  This was the first morning and Sophie was very interested in everyone that was there and she was definitely trying to figure out what was going on.  Brooke and 7 other awesome young volunteers gave one on one support to Sophie and her 7 new friends along with 4-5 recreation therapists.

This was Sophie on the third day giving me the "mom, can I just go to camp now please" look lol. 

Sophie was exhausted each day when I picked her up and she had some pretty good naps most of the afternoons.  She was very vocal all week and obviously had lots she wanted to tell us.

The Ontario wheelchair sport association came a couple days and gave the kids tips and pointers on wheelchair basketball and other ball handling skills. They did gymnastics and t-ball and soccer and so much more. They also had fun swimming for part of each camp day and did crafts as well. 

Sophie wearing her medal on the last day :)

She was pretty much worn out by Friday and had a strong seizure that night and was very tired the rest of the weekend.  She has been dealing with a head cold since Sunday and it has now traveled into her chest so we will keep a close eye.

On thursday we got a wheelchair fitted for her to trial.  It is a Quickie Zippie and I like it quite a bit.  We returned it today and will now make the decision whether to try another one (an Iris) or go for the Zippie.  There are many pros and cons to the Zippie, so I am not sure yet as to whether we will go with it or not, I will have to see if all the issues I have with it can be accomodated.

My smiley girl :) 

Our other big news is that we bought a Wike bike trailer for Sophie to go on bike rides with us!  I found it on kijiji in another city, so my mom and I hit the road and had a day trip.  The trailer was an amazing deal that I just couldn't pass up, I really lucked out that I found it the day after she posted it.  It was just meant to be. The mom that was selling it was super nice and has a teenage daughter that has many complex needs similar to Sophie.

This is the one I bought  http://www.wicycle.com/special_needs_large_bicycle_trailer.php

I can't wait to get it adapted perfectly for Sophie so we can try it out.  She will need a car seat or something similar to sit her in and then we will be good to go!

Busy being busy

We have had some busy days in our house since the end of the school year.   We headed up to the cottage for the long weekend and had some very hot weather in the days but cooler evenings which was great.

On the ride up Sophie was getting a little bored so I borrowed Lucas' teddy bear Emma and t-shirt (my old sleeping shirt that he sleeps with) for Sophie to cuddle with.  Sophie thought that that was an awesome idea and she held onto that t-shirt like it was nobody's business.  She actually cuddled them both for quite a while.  I was amazed at how interested she was in them and it really distracted her and calmed her down.  She has 2 stuffies that are always in her bed by her feet, ones that we were given when she was born, but she probably doesn't even realize they are there.  Sophie has never had something that she cuddles with and I realized that maybe we have been shortchanging her.  I loved that she seemed to enjoy their softness.

We headed up to the accessible park we found last year, Lucas and Sophie had a great time there again this year.  It is definitely one of the best parks we have found, I really notice how Sophie becomes interested in the different play zones there.  She definitely showed she had favourite things to do there. One day, every park will be an inclusive park like this.  I hope.

What could be better than hanging out with your big brother at the park.  Sophie was in heaven.

Our beach time was not super long because the water was still cold and the sun was hot, but we had enough to keep us going until the next visit.  We were very lucky to have a wonderful nurse come from another Indian reservation an hour away, each night.  So I was able to sleep which made my vacation much more fun!

It was a short trip and we didn't really want to go home.  Tomorrow I am off to pick up a purchase I found on kijiji that should hopefully make our trips to the beach a little bit easier.   Can't wait to show you. 
Sophie has been trialing the new wheelchair as well as going to camp last week, Lucas has also been to camp this week and last.  Lots to catch up on!