The holidays are coming! Christmas 2009

Photo Tinks by WiddlyTinks.com

Sam doing THRILLER!

New set of ear tubes and bronchoscopy

Well we spent a few hours up at CT Childrens this past Tuesday. Sam had to have his 3rd set of tubes and a bronchoscopy. He is doing great! He gets fluid often on his ears which can impact his hearing so we keep him as fluid free as possible with the tubes. Croup happens about 8 times during the cold season with Sam so the ENT wanted to check his airway for obstructions. Sam is free and clear. His air way is narrow but that is normal for a person with Down syndrome. We just have to dive into the liquid steroid for 2 days when it comes on, which btw is like 1am! This way we will avoid and ER visit.

So...as you can see Sam recovered beautifully! He is still nursing a little and need some TLC in recovery~ No wonder he bounced right back!

My 2 older boys had tonsils and adenoids out

Well..I was brave and so were Cole and Jack this past Friday. They both had their tonsils and adenoids out. Dr.S said "those tonsils were like cottage cheese." SO glad they will not suffer like I did as a teen with strep and such!
Here they are...so happy before surgery! We are 3 days post op with a lot of ice cream and TLC.

Down syndrome Awareness Month

October is Down syndrome Awareness Month. I am going to try to post daily to create more awareness for all the beautiful people out there with Down syndrome including my son Sam:)

Fact: The medical term for Down syndrome is : Trisomy 21

Sam has AFO's !!

So Sam was fitted a few weeks back for AFO's. He was doomed from the start when it comes to his feet. Mommy pronates, grandma...Aunties and so on! Sam will strengthen his leg muscles by having the correct footing behind it.

We could NOT find a shoe that fit this AFO at all. We tried Target, Payless, Stride Rite...you name it and even taking the inserts out a no go. We knew we could order the ugly Hatchback shoes for him but I would not put those on my other boys (UGLY)..why Sam? I was determined to find a normal looking shoe for him!

We found this ROCKIN store called FOOTPRINTS in Newington,CT. We went on a Saturday and they were so super busy you have to take a number! The service there reminded me back in the day when my mom used to take me to Buster Browns to get my shoes 2x a year:)

They really know there stuff there and deal with AFO's all the time! We found a great pair of New Balance Sneakers in XX Wide and we also picked up a pair of socks so he will not chafe at all on his legs. They really are great there! I will post a pic of him wearing them soon. We have to wean into them:) We did pick up a pair of inserts for his other shoes when he is not wearing the AFO's so he can have support all the time.

Here is a pic of his new AFO's.

Clean house and SCORE!

So we had a very productive weekend CLEANING. My room was last week. This week was the playroom/office. Whew, is all I can say. I just don't know how we can build up so much stuff. Really, I am not out buying toys every week for my kids. I have figured it out after cleaning up the war zone. It is BOYS! They love to take apart things, cut things up and throw stuff everywhere. Really. I have never seen so much cut up paper in my life. I am banning them from scissors (just kidding, but I would like too)!
So, 9 big black garbage bags later..yes 9. I would say 4 of them were garbage and the rest Goodwill. It does feel good to look in there and see a nice organized area!

We totally SCORED at the Goodwill while brining stuff there, we made 3 runs this weekend. We picked up an Imaganarium train/play table for 24.99 in mint condition. Looks like it came right out of the box. Unbelievable! You just never know what you can find. We picked that up quick as it would not last long there. The boys LOVE IT! We had a train table from about 9 yrs ago but the board was trashed and it did not have drawers like this one!~ WAHOOO!