We have a spy!

I think that Nickolas comes down in the middle of the night and reads my blog posts and concerns.
And then saves it all up!

After the last post about my feelings having the wheelchair in the house (where I feel it is important to work on walking), and I also realized that it does have benefits in that it gives Nickolas an opportunity to 'play' with his new wheelchair.
But I still put that chair in the van yesterday morning.

Today we went out to Walmart - just the 2 of us, to take it for a test run.
Nick just blew me away with how competent he was to make his chair take him where he wanted to go!
I think that trial period in the house was just what he needed!

I love being proved wrong like this!

And he's talking up a storm as well!

A story of a wheelchair

  Nickolas got his set of wheels this week.

It is orange, and is brand new. It has brakes that work, spolk covers, higher sides so Nick doesn’t’ slouch and stroller handles. It also has cable ties or something for riding in the bus (I'm not quite there yet - but we're still looking at 2 years before we get there).

Nickolas wasn't too sure about what was going on at first.

I personally thought it was so cool to see with without the wheels on!
The orange looks more red in the picture. But the colour is great!

Nickolas and I had a whole conversation about his new wheelchair.
I told him that we were picking up his new orange wheelchair.
"No blue"
"No orange"
Reaching down to touch the blue loaner chair "No blue"
"Well, tough honey, your new chair is orange"
(But your walker can be blue)

A little bit of blackberry distraction while they made some final adjustments.

Nickolas quickly found the joy in bouncing hi wheelchair off of his father.

Mommy, I'm going to get your next!

And we were done.
On our way home with Nick's very own wheelchair!

I was so excited!
Kyle was so exicted that it had a tall stroller handle that was easier on his back!
I never thought I would be this excited with our very own wheelchair.

On the day of Katheryn's party we decided to bring it into the house to show everyone how he is using it.
Nick ha rediscovered his Build a Bear in the wheelchair - he's always moving it in and out and wanted to play with it while he was in his chair.

The weekend was so busy (Easter, birthdays, birthday parties and family dinners) we didn’t get a chance to take the chair out anywhere. So I was OK with it being in the house quickly during the party.

We didn’t go anywhere Sunday (stayed at home with easter eggs and chocolate) and both Nickolas and Katheryn wanted to roll around in the chair.

Kyle and I talked about letting Katheryn use the chair. I didn't want her to see it as a toy, Kyle thought it would be a good idea for Nickolas to see Katheryn in the chair, that it was fun to use and how to use it, that it will move without anyone elses help.



Kyle's reasoning won out - he was right (yes that is now in the permanent blog record).

I’m not sure how I feel about having the chair in the house.

OK I lied. I do know how I feel about having the wheelchair in the house. It is one thing to have Nickolas at 2 years old be in a wheelchair when we are out in public – it’s a stroller replacement, it is his tool for independence, when we are out of the house.

In the house he is looking at independence another way. We are working on his walking, using his walker. I don’t want him using his wheelchair instead of walking with his walker, or even holding our hands.

Even though Nickolas using the wheelchair in the house gives me a heavy heart, I can see how it has provided an opportunity for Nickolas to get to know his chair. In a way that he can’t when we are out and aobut and have tasks to do. When we don’t have the time for him to explore. And when I am right there.

In the house he has freedom, in the house he has time and opportunity to explore his abilities in the chair. It doesn’t hurt when it gives Nickolas a vantage point that he hasn’t had before. The opportunity to get into more trouble.

He enjoys it.
I hope not too much, because that sucker went back into the car this morning.
But I love to see the look on his face as he realzies the full potential of what being in a wheelchair gives to him.

Easter Eggstravaganza

The excitement was overwhelming!

It was another dinner with family!

Everyone was so excited!

What is a family gathering without a bit of matching clothes?

We had Good Friday dinner at the Ridding house.
The family all together, yummy ham, a tea party and some egg painting.
(Notice Kyle is wearing purple too! We ALL matched - no pictures of the 4 of us though).

Sunday morning our Easter started with an Easter Egg hunt.

Katheryn was very interested in egg hunting this year.
She was the master egg hunter!
And then after she found alot of the 60 eggs I had hidden, she wanted to go again.

They settled for eating more chocolate instead.
Nick was very excited that this egg looked like Max!

Each kid had a basket full of eggs (or 'eggth' as per Nick).
Eggs are one of the Nickolas' favorite things in the morning, and to look for them and then find chocolate ("chockla") inside! Wow this holiday is great!

Katheryn thought that the chocolate was OK, but stickers were what she wanted!

The rest of the day we stayed home and enjoyed the chocolate high and the post chocolate low.
But with our super busy weekend, we took what we got and stayed home.

The kids actually got into alot of stuff.
Nickolas had the oppurtunity to get into more trouble than he usually can, but that will come with my next blog post!

A Teaparty to Remember

My baby girl turned 4!

I'm not quite sure how that happened, one  minute she was a baby and just learning how to do everything! And now she's 4! She's excited to start school!

She can write how name and knows her numbers, letters, colours, can sing all the words to her favorite songs and likes to learn how to do things with Special Agent Oso. Her new favorite channel is Disney Junior, no longer Treehouse and she has favorite princesses (Cinderella) and colours (rainbow) and she loves fish and mermaids.

Katheryn has been talking about her birthday cake for months! It was supposed to be white, with strawberries. And on her birthday we were supposed to all hide and jump out and sing "Happy Birthday!"

She opened presents, ate her favorite breakfast (pancakes) and lunch (pizza) and dinner (more pizza - but at a restaurant). She got to go to one of her favorite places - The Ronald McDonald room at Holland Bloorview, with her boy-teacher.
She had a shirt that has bubble guppies on it. It says

What time is it?

It's birthday time!

And she had a frilly skirt - no birthday tiara though (she hated it).
Katheryn had a great birthday. She told us that it was perfect!

She didn't want her birthday to end. Good thing - because her birthday party was on Saturday!
It was a Max and Ruby themed birthday tea party. And everyone had to dress up.
Tiara's and bow ties were encouraged!

It was a small party - just family, but everyone participated in my craziness!

And my sister in law made Nick his perfect bow tie!

Katheryn was too busy running around to stop and let me take many pictures (she spoiled me on her actual birthday).

So what do you need for a Max and Ruby Tea party?

First you need some crazy people to wear bunny ears!
OK maybe just one crazy person - but I wasn't the only one

You need tea cups.
I didn't think I had any, until I remember my grandmothers good dishes set - perfect tea party tea cups! (For the adults - the kids had plastic)

Decorations!

Appropriate snacks!
My sister in law made these! Tea cups and tea bags!

And Birthday cake of course!

The cake would have looked significantly better if I had properly read the instructions and not put the cake transfer on upside down!
But the kids didn't care!

Both of them thought it was so cool that Ruby and Max were on the birthday cake!
And each picked out the piece that they wanted.

To finish out the day I had a whole bag of crafts that were bunny/Easter themed.
We didn't get a chance to do many of the crafts - everyone had so much fun being together!

But I made sure we decorated some Easter cookies before everyone left!

Happy Birthday Baby Girl!
I hope that you had as much joy celebrating your birthday as we do celebrating you in our lives!
We have told Katheryn that now she is 4, it means she has to eat her vegetables. (It hasn't worked so far).
I think that 4 is going to be a great year!

Our weekend was so crazy busy, I'm dating this blog post as April 5 - Katheryn's birthday, even though the party was Sat April 7.

Walker Success - for real!

We have walker success!
I know I've said this before. And every walker we've had we have had some type of success with. But never like this.
Nick absolutely LOVES it!
Look at the joy on this face!

And he wants to be in it. He asks to walk in it.

And then he just goes!

He would be running down the hall if he could figure out how to get his feet and legs not to tangle themselves up.

He's been leaning to one side, I guess we will work on that. But for now I'm just so happy moving!

 Nickolas is doing well with walking in straight lines, and for small distances in the house.
I'm not sure how to get him to use it more, actually functionally, instead of just when we want to work on it. I'd hope that he could use it to move around the house, instead of crawling.

I'm not sure how to make that happen. Of course crawling is easier for him. And yes he can walk in the walker, but why would he when he can crawl?
I guess its the same as when he was army crawling and we knew he could 4-point crawl. But he didn't know/want to crawl like that, when army crawling was working just fine.
I guess it just takes time.

Nick doesn't have to concentrate when he's walking now. Which leaves him time to make funny faces when I'm taking pictures of him walking!