Happy New Year!

Happy 2014!  I wish that all the things I post in my head could magically appear on our blog...My posts are coming so infrequently, I hope I have another one before 2015!  We have had a great fall and Christmas. 

Snuggles for Santa!

 

Luke's requests for Santa Claus were as simple as last year...keys, crunchy potato chips and cookies. Santa was kind and brought him all three. Although the keys Santa brought still weren't as good as mom and dad's keys...he cannot be fooled with fake keys - even if they appear real!  He gets slightly (ok, maybe a lot!) obsessed with things and right now car keys are a HUGE obsession.  But he only wants our keys.  We thought if Santa brought him real keys then we could stop worrying about whether or not he was losing our keys.  No such luck...his joy over his Santa keys lasted about two days!

Keys!

Physically he has had huge gains.  He is now able to jump off the furniture and land on his feet (check this out!).  Now, poor Ben would have been told NO in a hot second, but Lukie...well, it's good for him.  He calls it Canyon Ball since that is what Ben called jumping into the pool.  So we see him hop up onto the couch and yell 'Canyon Ball' as he dives off.  He's really jumping good distance, too.  So now both monkeys are regularly jumping off the couches. It's not creating good habits or polite children but it sure is creating one strong little boy and that is our goal.  He will also pretty much only get on the couch by climbing on the back.  He's turning into quite the little monkey! 

Ben and Luke have been having a great time together.  As they're playing, I often hear them get into arguments which is music to my ears.  It's so great to hear 'NO I DIDN'T!  YES YOU DID!'  being screamed from the top of their lungs.  Ben has gotten really good and realizing things that are going to upset Luke and he jumps right in to try to make him laugh or tickle him.  It's really sweet.  It usually erupts into a lot of underwear talk and booty shaking but that's ok.  While I feel bad that Ben is in the position - probably for quite a long time - to be on the lookout for Luke, I also realize that's just what big brother's do.

Luke has always had mild eating issues.  He had a hard time learning to drink thin liquids but has mastered that.  With his low muscle tone, he has a hard time realizing how much food he's putting in his mouth.  He always needed to be watched carefully when he ate and have his food cut into small pieces.  He has come sooooo far! Now he gets angry when we cut his food up.  He is successfully taking bites with very few reminders and rarely overstuffing...unless it's an Oreo.  Who can blame him then? 

Luke's starting to make gains conversationally, too.  He still has a hard time carrying on a two sided conversation, especially with peers.  But we're excited that he's starting to take part in conversation and making sense.  His language skills overall are amazing.  He's talking in long sentences and starting to sing a lot of songs.  His favorites are Drummer Boy and Happy Birthday currently.  He is starting to stutter a lot which I'm wondering if it's in connection with the return of the bad...seizures. 

As I said I've been posting a lot in my head with all of the stuff he's been doing that is amazing so I don't want to focus on this part.  The seizures did reappear over Christmas break (REALLY?!  Argh. Next year we're heading south.  I'm done with Christmas!)  They're a little different than they were before which is worrisome.  I'm kind of wondering if he's been having some that we didn't recognize for awhile because it's been within the last month that his stuttering has picked up A LOT,  he's been getting upset really easily, and we have noticed a little more clumsiness.  I received calls from both his daycare and classroom because he was acting abnormally recently.  So we're working on getting that back under control again...we had almost 8 sweet seizure free months...hopefully we'll be looking at more this time.  I hate them.  A lot.  But I am grateful that we usually can get them under control.  I'm always afraid that 'this time' we won't be able to but there's no point in focusing on that right now.

Happy, happy New Year to you all!  My only resolution is going to be to try to enjoy all the wonderful moments we're having right now and stop worrying so much about the future!  Hope you're enjoying your moments, too!