BJM’s Photos

Cathy has been Ally’s sitter since she was 1. She has exceeded every expectation we ever had. She has stepped right up and never blinked an eye with Ally’s DOCband and braces that have required her to go a little above and beyond. (she always goes above and beyond) Less than a month after starting with Cathy, Ally had a seizure and she had to call 911 for the first time in all of her years of watching kids. Every holiday Cathy throws awesome parties for her kids and parents. Halloween this year was no exception. Cathy made baked pasta, bread sticks, cupcakes and pumpkin pies for everyone. The kids did a craft, got to paint their own pumpkins and show off their costumes. From left to right on the couch we have Cathy, a flamingo, an angel, Dora, a fairy (Ally), Tinkerbell, and a pumpkin. The last picture is of Ally inhaling a cupcake. She hasn’t been eating well at all lately and has actually lost a little weight over the past month. . so this was worth documenting 🙂

Ally has been in PT most of her life and she’s quite a trooper most of the time. Jen has been her therapist for about a year and a half and we love her. She has worked closely with us to get Ally where she is physically.
Jen pushes Ally quite a bit each session, but even when she completely melts down, she quickly ‘forgives’ Jen and is happy to see her next time. Yesterday as we pulled into the parking lot at the Children’s Hospital Close to Home Center, Ally realized where we were and said “We’re at Jen’s house!” LOL!
Here are some pictures from this weeks session. The exercises on the big ball work on her upper body strength and allow Jen to stretch Ally’s right side and hip which is where most of her issues seem to originate. The steps work on her leg strength and stability. The balance beam is a real challenge for Ally since she has issues with mobility in her right hip. Stepping with one foot in front of the other is really hard. (she sneaks in shuffle steps if Jen isn’t watching closely. . that’s cheating!) 🙂 The swing works her core strength, balance and legs. Jen puts a weight on her left leg so that it’s harder for Ally to swing that leg over the swing to get on and so she has to work a little harder to stay balanced and hang on. This session ended with 5 minutes on the treadmill with a 2 lb. weight on her left leg. She was obviously exhausted but with some encouragement, she pushed on and finished. No pictures of that. She was not pleased with us.

My friend Amber called this morning and asked if Ally, Nicholas and I wanted to go with her and Annabel to the pumpkin patch down the road while Bryan and Frank go to their martial arts class. We got there about 11am and it was SO windy and cold that we soon changed our minds about taking the girls on the hay-ride back to the field. We opted for going into the barn to get a cup of spiced cider and to try and get some cute pictures of Ally and Annabel against the hay-stacks and pre-picked pumpkins. And here is a sampling of what we got. . . . as you can see they were NOT in the mood to cooperate and look at the camera.

We then decided to go over and check out the straw maze, the calves (who were cute but boring since they were sleeping) and the blow-up bouncy castle. Nicholas took Ally through the straw maze and surprisingly, she LOVED it! As soon as she came out, she ran around to the entrance and crawled back in. After a couple trips through, she didn’t even need Nicholas’ help and went through a few more times by herself. Annabel even got curious so Nicholas took her through. She emerged with a huge smile on her face too!

Ally was dying to go in the blow-up bouncy castle. We timed it well and no other kids were in there so Ally had a good chance of being able to stay on her feet. Annabel got jealous so we sent Nicholas in with them to hold their hands etc. He did a great job and they had a ball in there. (apparently sticking your tongue out helps you jump, right?)

Here is my favorite picture of the day.

Oh yea. . . They didn’t have great pre-picked pumpkins for sale and we were too cold to go back and get any for ourselves.
We left and didn’t actually purchase any pumpkins! LOL!

Ally loves to try to climb up the ‘mountain’ part of the jungle gym but definitely needs support and guidance. She looked back at Bryan to make sure he had a good hold on her then continued on her climb. I couldn’t help but laugh at the look of concern on her face in the second photo. . like “I’m being brave but you’d better be holding on TIGHT!” LOL!

While Nicholas was hanging out with one of his friends today, we decided to take Ally to Homestead Park to play since it’s such a nice weekend. Ally got enough swinging in today to at least last her through the winter into next spring. We got her out once to climb on the equipment but she ended up back in the swing yelling “Higher Daddy, Higher!” She was fearless as we pushed her higher and faster. . laughing the whole time.

Ally has been working with her physical therapist for months on trying to ride a tricycle along with other skills. It’s a lot of hard work since her legs just don’t have the strength they should. She’s made wonderful progress with the trike the past two therapy sessions and has gotten going on some pretty long stretches down the hallway. Steering is NOT her strong-point as it takes pretty intense concentration to move her feet. 🙂 The therapy trike has modified pedals so her feet are velcro’d to the pedals (which helps a LOT by the way) Sometimes her therapist puts the trike on the treadmill so it does the work for her and she can get the feeling of how her legs should be moving. The past few times we’ve taken her out on her trike at home, she’s tried to pedal by herself and gotten closer to being able to do it on her own. It’s tough without the help of the velcro straps though 🙂

One evening last week, an ice cream truck rolled through the neighborhood. We’ve rarely bought anything from them, but Nicholas stuck his head in the house and asked if I had any cash. I didn’t. . so he ran and got his wallet and ran back outside with Ally. He took her across the street and came back with a SpongeBob pop just for Ally that he bought with his own money! He didn’t even get anything for himself! He then sat outside with her and helped her eat it. She even willingly shared some with him 🙂 He shared later that he tried to buy her a Dora pop but they had just run out! Eeeek! He makes it obvious every day how much he adores his little sister. . and I think Ally likes him just a little bit too! 🙂