G.I. Joe

Dominic is officially on the move. He is CRAWLING! Well, by crawling I mean army crawling. But that is more than his PT or OT expected of him. I can imagine it would be hard to crawl when you don't have much use of your right side. So, I am thrilled with my little G.I. Joe! He still needs to figure out how to keep his right arm in front of him, but today he crawled about five feet to get what he wanted in under a few seconds. And he was thrilled to show off his new moves at PT and everyone was impressed. We were all thinking he'd never crawl and just go straight to walking. He probably won't ever crawl the conventional way, but as with everything else, he'll do it on Dominic time and the Dominic way. I'm just really proud of him for figuring it out on his own and how to compensate. He's a stubborn and driven little boy and I know he'll be able to anything he wants if he sets his mind to it!



Aside from that exciting news, life is usual around here. We got to enjoy the last warm day this weekend before it turned cold and rode bikes to church. It was great but I was sporting some back sweat for the people in the pew behind us. My mom also decided to pop up for a visit and we've been having fun with the boys and her and I enjoyed a girl's night out to see The Hunger Games. Woop woop!

Breaking out the bikes

Love surf and turf Sundays!

Backyard fun!

Lunch with Grammy

We are heading to the East side of the state this weekend. I am joining my mother-in-law and sister-in-laws for a women's retreat. This will be much needed alone time with The Man upstairs and I am really looking forward to it. Mike will have a boys weekend with my father-in-law and I'm sure visit with cousins as well. Should be a great weekend!

On The Loose!

Life has been crazy this week for us. With this beautiful spring weather brings spring projects! We had been talking for years about getting new hardwood floors in our dining room and refinishing most of the downstairs' floors. Thanks to tax season, now is the time! I'm super excited but this has been quite the process. Everything has been moved out of the two bedrooms, hallway and dining room and is sitting in either our 3-season porch or living room. Besides the fact that I can't find anything, we're sequestered to the basement, and the house is a mess - we can't access our bathrooms! So, when Mitchell informed me he had to go number two yesterday, I threw the kids in the car and zoomed up to the library up the street to use the public restroom :o) So, we've made it work, but I'm ready to be done showering and getting ready at the gym every day. Tomorrow is the final coat of finish and they'll be done, so Saturday we can have our house back!! I'm really excited, especially now that Dominic is spending more time in his gait trainer, he'll have more room to roam.

New floors in the dining room!

Refinished floors in the 2 bedrooms and hall

Speaking of roaming, Dominic is a man on the loose! His PT put him in the 'Mustang' today and he loved it. He needs to work on using his right foot more because he tends to bump back and forth into walls because he's only pushing with his left foot. But he'll get there and he seems to LOVE being able to move on his own. They're working on getting him a Mustang of his own!

On a totally separate subject, I saw this link about Dr. Arndt and wanted to share it. We just love him and are so happy to see that he's bringing more attention to West Michigan and to DeVos Children's epilepsy program. Mike thinks I should attend the event and I'm thinking about it...

http://www.woodtv.com/dpp/eightwest/Epilepsy--help-for-parents 

We have really been loving this awesome weather. But I'm sure it won't last and we'll be blasted with another blizzard. But, we got Dominic out on his AmTryke tonight for a spin. He loves the tryke but is NOT a fan of the helmet. I guess for now he doesn't need it. It will be a lot of fun to take him out on the tryke this summer.

Yeah for sunshine!

He does NOT like the helmet. I guess flashbacks of his crainial helmet?

Thanks to Curious George, Mitchell was determined to make
an automatic car wash for his cars and trains

Mom with her Dom

This weekend we're home the boys will be cheering me on while I run the Irish Jig. Should be a gorgeous weekend for a race! Then we are hoping to feed Mitchell's obsession with Dr. Seuss and take him to see the Grand Rapids symphony's production of Green Eggs and Ham. Saturday night Mike and I have a date...sort of. We are going to a Laughfest event with some people from work. Should be a lot of fun.

Mustang Sally

This is a short post, but very exciting for us! Dominic has been using an old gait trainer his PT lent us for use at home. But it's old and he can't figure out how to move forward. Yesterday at physical therapy, Robin tried him in "The PONY". It's a newer gait trainer. He did AWESOME! He was all over the place - forwards, backwards, side to side, turning around. It was incredible. Robin was speechless. She couldn't believe it! Neither could I :o) It really convinced Robin that Dominic needs his own new gait trainer. There is a certain one she wants to get called "The Mustang". It's pretty sweet and newer than the PONY. I swear it's on hydraulics or something. It's expensive though, and we'll have to go through all the insurance craziness which can take several months. But it's so thrilling to see Dominic move around and to see him so excited to be moving.

The "Mustang" Gait Trainer that Dominic will hopefully have in about 6 months

Well, that's all! Just wanted to share. My Flip video cam ran out of battery, conveniently. So I didn't get him on video, but here are a couple pics of him ridin' the PONY!

Getting all situated with Robin

Ready to Rock n' Roll!