Walking, Walking, Walking!

He is really walking!

I decided to give Nickolas a bit of a challenge when we went to a party yesterday.
We brought the walker in with us. AND we made him walk with it.

Made is a bit of a strong word.
Nickolas wants to walk with his walker now.
But usually before it was a hassle to bring the walker in, when we could just carry him to where he wanted to go to play with the other kids.

So I guess I should say that we made ourselves bring the walker.

The challenge - walk, in a crowd of people, people you don't know, in grass, and over bumps.
Challenge accepted!

It was 16 months ago that the idea of a walker was first brought up.

And 1 year ago that we tried out, and then brought home our first walker.

I remember I had dreams of Nickolas walking in the walker for Halloween. But even though things didn't move as fast as I had dreamed Nickolas still moved forward slowly, but surely.

We kept changing and challenging him.

And we worked with what he needed because I had faith that we would find the one.

Just before Nickolas turned 2, he took his first independent steps in the walker!

But the journey was not without hard work and some tears.

And the flexibility to change things up when we hit a plateau, or just wanted to find something that works.

And in April we had our very own walker!

I learned that we had to take some breaks from the walker. And I learned that I couldn't push it on him. But also that I could make my own adjustments - like when I put on the swivel control, so that even though it was harder for him to move, it gave him the ability to control where he was going.

Nickolas finally realized that he could do it!

And that's my recap of Nick's walker journey!

Jumping for joy!

A mother will do anything for her kids.

Some things are just a little more difficult than others.

Like acting like a kid and playing on a trampoline! That was hard!

Especially with all the laughter!

Just to add a note - I did not at any time land on either kid - when I was looking over the video (even though I was there) some of the jumps looks like I landed right on Nick. So watch the video and enjoy - no one got hurt.

But sometimes we just have to sacrifice our illusion of acting like an adult! (even on the eve of your 34th birthday - maybe especially on the even of your 34th birthday)

I was a little hesitant to let Nickolas go on the trampoline to begin with.
My thought originally was what would he be able to do? He can't jump on it?

But really there was no harm in putting him in and seeing what he could do.
I really should have known better thinking he couldn't  do something!

And even without anyone else jumping on the trampoline, Nickolas still hopped himself all over!

Post-camp Party!

I think we have spoiled kids - as you will see over my next couple of blogging posts, the kids have 3 parties in 3 days.

But the first is a March of Dimes family BBQ.

There was lots of fun things to do.

Spider man was there, and so was Duke the Marlies dog-mascot

When we first met him in the hallway, Nickolas was TERRIFIED!

Shaking, screaming, I-want-up-NOW, terrified!

Nick kept calling him the bear. But he eventually understood that Duke was a dog.

And he would not let him out of his site while we were outside.

Even when we were home, Nick kept saying "the dog scared me".
Sorry Duke!

Nick wasn't really interested in much that they had.
He really wanted a balloon (unfortunately we said no, which was probably really mean of us, because w told Katheryn yes). But we just couldn't deal with 2 screaming kids.

They had a firetruck and firemen, a police horse (complete with police officer), a bunch of different animals, including this little baby kangaroo. Katheryn eventually got brave enough to touch him. But Nick was not interested.

What he really wanted, desperately, was to get his face painted.
BLUE.

So we decided on a blue Spiderman.

Everyone was happy!

Conductive Education Camp - part 2

The second week of conductive education camp went smoothly.

Nick knew he was being dropped off, and was really excited when mommy or daddy picked him up (because I'm back at work full-time I couldn't take the time off like last year - so Kyle and I split up the weeks). It was exhausting for all of us to be out of the house and ready so early in the morning. But definitely worth it.

Every day Nick came home with the fun crafts he had done that day.

(The time-travelled to the 60's)



And Katheryn wanted to do all the same things when she saw what Nick had!

And asking after Katheryn. As soon as he say me (or Kyle) the second words after "Mommy" was "where is Katheryn, where is Daddy?"

But I think the separation was really good for him.

Standing and do things, always adding some kind of challenge to what he was doing well at continued.
And Nick finally participated in the floor program (without crying) by the end of the second week!

 How did Nick become such a big boy!

Conductive Education Camp - part 1

Nickolas started his first child-only camp!

Nick was able to 'upgrade' even though he isn't 3 years old yet. They thought that he was ready to be more independent and with older kids.

So we had Conductive Education camp through March of Dimes for 3 hours a day, for 2 weeks.

It had only been a month or so since we had our final spring session with Abigail, so Nickolas knew exactly where we were when we pulled into the driveway.

But we did not talk ahead of time that he wasn't going to have mommy there. I didn't want to get him worried, and over the spring I started doing less and less so he could get used to doing things without me coaching him.

We walked in together. But when it was time for me to go...

MOMMY!!! I WANT MY MOMMY!!!

And I left.

I had no idea what I was going to hear when I picked him up 3 hours later.

But Nickolas was fine.

They said he was upset and crying for about 30 minutes. And didn't participate in any of the floor part (which he hates anyways). But that this is normal.

And it will get better.

Nickolas got to walk through the doors - all by himself!

And I already showed the video of his experience with the ramp

Over the 2 weeks Nick got more and more comfortable and transitioned better every day.

Until finally the last couple of days we had absolutely no tears at the drop off!

And Nickolas made all kinds of new friends as he 'travelled back in time' in a time machine

We got a book at the end of camp with all of the pictures and what Nickolas was doing good every day - as well as talking with the conductors when we picked him up.

Things that we worked on was walking over a floor ladder or between parallel bars and stepping over things - going control over where his feet were going, instead of anywhere. Walking in parallel bars and between ropes - all with a fun activity (building castles, finding dragon food).

He also worked on picking things up with his toes (dragon food) and passing things to his friends.

Some of the things that Nickolas did well was sitting on the peanut ball, pinching things with his toes and stepping over a floor ladder

By the end of the week Nick was having fun with his new friends!
The ever-typical boy. Always wanting to be in the drivers seat!