20 months, Holidays, and Dallas Part 2

...You read that right. I sleep longer than 2 hours at a time now. We have discovered the miracle of cornstarch.  Plain old cornstarch from the baking aisle of the grocery store.  

Because my blood sugar cannot stay stable for long periods of time, kids with my disorder are given cornstarch at night. It takes longer for the body to metabolize cornstarch so adding it to my bottle means I am now sleeping 4-5 hours after the formula/cornstarch bottle. Before I was only making it 2-3 hours. Mom looks much more well rested now.

My 20 month stats:

Wt- 22.5#
Ht- 30.5"
Words- go, No!, hi, bye, "ruff", "meow"- for the cat and the cow. I will repeat "mom" and "da" and a few other words. 

My classic move now is the Flop. Yes, without even watching a single basketball game, I have a flop that is so perfect, I am the envy of NBA players everywhere. If I feel I'm being ignored, when you finally turn around to look at me, I can fall back to the ground while getting both arms into the air and yell "ouch" , all while giving a look of "what was that for?"  It happens fast and unexpectedly so mom has not been able to get video yet. It would go viral for sure. 

My hair is getting long. I have 2 ponytails in this pic

I am strong enough to start carrying our ferret around. Mom keeps a close eye on the situation so that PETA doesn't show up at our house. 

My favorite activity is still running outside. Thankfully its still warm enough on most days. But winter is around the corner and soon I will be hitting the magic carpet on the ski slopes again. 

Michael will be here for Thanksgiving as we lay low and eat all our favorite foods. Instead of a trad'l meal, mom has everyone put their requests in and she makes it all. Its an international, mostly carb fest of hodge podge items but it means everyone gets to eat their fav.

In two weeks I will be in Costa Rica with my friends from the Halloween pic. All four of us flying together... G_d help the other passengers. They won't even know what hit 'em. Or what they did in life to deserve that flight. Good thing the FAA has approved the use of small electronics for all phases of the flights now. We will just hope our neighbors invested in noise canceling headphones. 

Great pictures to come. 

Happy Thanksgiving.

alexa

20 months, Dallas, and Holidays part 1

Clearly my schedule must be packed because I can never find the time to sit down and write. Or maybe I just can't sit down because I'm a toddler on the move. Either way I will just apologize and move on.

So it seems like months ago but soon after my last post was Halloween. Dad actually participated in choosing a costume. Because he is a realist, he thought it was doubtful I would wear the hat so we chose a costume that would be recognizable without a head. That eliminated all 4 legged creatures (minus the zebra) so we went with the spider. And I even wore the antennas! We had some of my friends over for pizza and then headed out for my first real trick or treating. I love candy and I love running so it makes for a great night.

Hayley helped do the pumpkin...but I did the hard stuff (like sitting still with it)

4 cool girls born within 11 months

Right after Halloween we had our first visit to see Michael at his college. He is having a great time although I'm sure he misses me all the time.

Not sure why Gumby was visiting the Fiji fraternity house 

I was helping B and D down the stairs

The Campus

Clubs at engineering colleges build cars in their free time

Two days after we visited Michael, it was time to head to Dallas for Brandon's big surgery. Mom said my only job was to NOT get sick. Because the craniofacial specialist and the metabolism specialist work out of different children's hospitals, Brandon and I would have been in two different places. Mom says she would have quit at that point and just flown home without us. Good thing I followed directions and stayed healthy and happy at RMH (Ronald McDonald house) with aunt Angie. Brandon's surgery went very well and we got to go home two days early.

Giving the thumbs up from the PICU

We were able to get a room at the RMH which could not have been a nicer facility for me and for Brandon when he got out of the hospital. There were indoor and outdoor play areas, meals served by local organizations every day, and lots of kids for me to play with. It is an amazing charity, and if you are ever looking for a place to donate your money or time, I highly suggest looking into your local RMH. 

Playing with my friends at breakfast

And in the indoor playroom

The outside play area

Angie driving me around the playground

In the teen room after Brandon got discharged

The volunteer crew who brought one of the dinners

That crew made sure B was well taken care of

And just like that we were ready to head home. Brandon will be in the halo for 2 months and then they will head back to Dallas to have it removed. I am not invited on this quick trip.

This post is getting long and I don't know if Blogger has a limit so I will continue with a new post for my big news....

I sleep now!

Cheers

alexa