Loving this time of year!

We have been truly enjoying this holiday season!
Enchanted Tree Lighting Ceremony
The Friday after Thanksgiving we went to Hyde Park for their Enchanted Tree Lighting Ceremony to kick off the holiday season. We meet my friend, Tiffany and her family there. We had a lot of fun eating chocolate from the sweets shop and wait excitedly for Jolly Old St. Nicholas to come an light up the 30-foot Christmas Tree. Yay! It is officially Christmas time!

Deck the Halls
The weekend after Thanksgiving we broke out the Christmas decorations!

Dan is in charge of the outside decorations and last year he surprised me with a giant blow up Christmas Elephant. Ha! We also have some cute light up Christmas trees for our yard. This year we added candy cane solar lights to our walkway. If we keep up this pace our house is going to look like the Griswold's in 5-10 years!!

Cinnamon Applesauce Ornaments
This is a new tradition we started. They are so easy to made and smell AMAZING!

All you need is combine 1/2 cup applesauce and 1/2 cup cinnamon together. Then add 2 TBSP of glue and mix well. Once the mixture has formed into a dough ball, remove it from the bowl and place it onto wax paper. Then, with a rolling pin, roll out the dough and cut out shapes. Next you will take your shapes and place them on a cookie sheet and bake at 150 degrees for 2 hours. Then, turn off the heat in the oven and leave the pan in the warm oven for 5 to 6 hours. I just leave mine in the oven overnight.

They make super cute gifts too!

Christmas Pajamas
I bought Evan's Christmas pajamas! I can't wait to see my little boy go to bed on Christmas Eve wearing them.

Santa's Post Office
At every Macy's across the county there is a mailbox to collect letters to Santa Clause. We brought Evan's stamped letter to Macy's addressed to Santa at the North Pole, and drop it into Santa's special mailbox. For each letter recieved there will be a $1 donated to the Make-A-Wish Foundation, up to $1,000,000.

I just wrote a letter to Santa!

Picture on Santa's Lap

The week after Thanksgiving we went to Citrus Mall to get Evan's picture taken with Santa. It is so nice because there is never anyone in line and we don't have to feel rushed. I was not feeling confident that we would be able to get a good picture of Evan on Santa's lap. Well, we found the trick... Evan was fine as long as I wasn't the one to put him down on Santa's lap! When Dan took him up to Santa he did great!! I love his smile! I posted the picture from last year too... it is amazing to see how much he has grown over the last year!

Christmas Tree Oh Christmas Tree!
We decided this year to get a artificial Christmas Tree. This was a hard decision for we because we love getting real trees, but Evan and my sinus' were really bad this year. The tree we got is beautiful though. The only thing missing was the smell of the tree. So I went out on a mission to find the best smelling Christmas tree spray- it made all the difference! My sister and her fiance, Jess joined us for  a cozy night at home decorating our tree. Every year since Dan and I started dating we decorate our tree with Christmas music playing in the background and with a mug of hot chocolate! Evan is so fascinated with the tree!

We have so much to look forward to in the next few weeks... making and addressing Christmas cards, making Reindeer Food, making homemade cookies for Santa, reading The Night Before Christmas, hanging Santa's magic key on the front door, driving around looking at Christmas lights, watching Christmas movies, counting down Christmas on our Advent calender, drinking lots of hot chocolate, and spending lot of time with with my little family! I LOVE this time of year!!

Dan, Evan and I star in an Elf music video again this year! haha!

http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/iD8crYFxYoEinomo?cmpid=ey_url

Just Finished Evan's 3rd Year Book!

Click here to view this photo book larger

Shutterfly baby photo books are the perfect way to preserve your baby's precious moments.

I can't believe Evan will be 3 on January 2nd! I feel so blessed to have such a sweet boy! He has grown so much over the last year and brought our family so much happiness!

Therapy and Apps

Evan started Aquatic Therapy last week. We have been working with All Children's Hospital to try to get Evan on the schedule.  When a temporary spot became available, we jumped at the opportunity and took it. Hopefully they will have a full time spot available after the new year.

Evan loves the water and it is a huge motivator for him. He did great for his first session and smiled the whole time! The therapist is wonderful with him. She put weights on his legs/arms and got him to kick in the water to help strengthen his legs/arms. Evan loved all the big gross motor exercises. She did some work with his hands to see about getting him to hold small toys. He did pretty well with the vibrating toys.

After the session, the therapist told me he did wonderful, but that he was going to react in one of two ways. He was rather going to sleep a lot or be up all night! I am happy to report he slept great that night :)

Evan loves the ipad2 his grandparents got for him. Here is a cute video of him playing with his favorite app, fireworks.



I am amazed to see how quickly Evan has responded to his ipad! Here are the apps he likes…

1. I Love Fireworks Lite- (Free) Great for cause and effect. This is one of Evan’s favorites!
2. Magic Piano- Great for cause and effect. This is also a favorite!
3. Drum Kit XL- (Free) Another one for cause and effect.
4. Bubbles- The app fills your iPad with tons of virtual bubbles that can be popped. The bubbles create life like popping sounds when popped. This one doesn't hold Evan's attention very long.
5. Fluidity- (Free) Visual, interactive app. Looks like a lava lamp. Is good for Evan’s sensory processing challenges.
6. Doodle Buddy- (Free) The app gives Evan the option to finger paint and easily drop in cute stamps.
7. Sound Touch- There are cute cartoon images for Evan to touch. Touching an image brings up a real life photo of the item, accompanied by the sound it makes. Each item has 4-5 sounds and photos. Evan's therapist started using this one with him.
8. Peekaboo Barn- Evan loves opening the barn doors to find the animals. This app helps him learns about cause and effect and helps him become familiar with animal names and sounds. Definitely one of his favorites!
9. Bus HD- Interactive musical book, The Wheels on the Bus. I have to do a lot of this for him, but he loves to watch.
10. Baby See- This app has a series of contrasting, black and white, moving images.
11. ABA Flash Cards – Emotions- (Free) There flashcards show children with different emotions. You can also make your own custom flashcards. I added pictures of Evan’s family, friends, and toys he plays with on a regular basis. I like that I can also use my voice to record the flashcard titles.
12. Choice Board Creator- (Free) This app is great for creating customizable choice boards. It reinforces correct choice by playing an auditory reward. This app is advanced for where Evan is developmentally, but practice makes perfect!
13. Word Totz- Flashcards- This app has built-in cards organized into categories. Also this app has the option to create custom cards with your own pictures, and record your own titles.
14. Talking Tom2- (Free) Cute interactive app. Tom will repeat every noise Evan makes in a funny voice.
15. Talking Dino (Free)- Like Talking Tom2, the dino will repeat everything. It's a cute app!

Video Montage

Here is a video montage I made of Evan learning how to walk! I got this wonderful idea from another WHS mom and had to make one for my little man :) It is amazing to see how far he has come! Grow Grow Grow!

Make a video - it's fun, easy and free!
www.onetruemedia.com

Disney

Our family trip to Disney exceeded all of our expectations. Disney is truly a magical place!

On Thursday morning we left our house and headed to Chef Mickey's at Disney's Contemporary Resort for our 10:40 am reservation. We decided to do the breakfast to give Evan a chance to meet the characters. I was not sure how he would react, but though it would be less stressful for him to meet the character this way rather then standing in the long lines at Disney. Well, Evan was not a fan of the characters at all. He screamed and clung on to Dan for dear life. Dan and I were surprised by this reaction since he usually doesn't get scared or show fear.

So I ended up taking a picture with Mini and Dan got his picture with Goofy! Evan was more then happy to watch the characters from a distance.

We stayed at the All Star Sports Hotel. There was so much to see and explore. Evan had a blast running around the football field!

Thanks to heated pools, we even got to go for a swim in November!

We ended our first day of our trip at the Boardwalk. We ate an early dinner at the ESPN Club and played around on some of the arcade games before heading back to the hotel. We wanted to get Evan to bed early so he would be well rested for the Magic Kingdom.

We got to the park right when it opened and got to see the characters arrive on the tram and preform a welcome song. Then we headed over to the Harmony's Barber Shop for Evan's first hair cut. Evan did not like the scissors and started to cry. The lady cutting his hair tried to pull out all the tricks to get Evan to cooperate, she had stickers, bubbles, a light up spinning toy... nothing worked. She ended up getting the clippers out and Evan thought that this was hillarious and went into a fit of giggles!

This made the rest of the hair cut much more enjoyable.

I was sad to see his baby curls go, but love his new big boy hair cut. It is amazing to us how much older he looks now. Evan got a cute certificate and Mickey Mouse Ears. I got some of his sweet baby curls to add to his baby book :)

I loved seeing Evan experience his first big boy ride, Dumbo. He smiled ear to ear the whole ride.

Here are some of my favorite pictures from our trip...

On the way home Dan and I talked about how much we enjoyed experiencing Disney with Evan. Having kids makes going to Disney so magical. We are so lucky to live so close! We are already planning when we want to go back :)

Smile!

Random things Evan does that makes me smile...

Evan hates closed doors- Our bedroom is right off our living room and we have always kept our door shut. Well, Evan must think we have a party going on in there and that it must be the cool place to be. Dan and I think it is so funny that every time we open the door or leave it open for a second to run and get something from the room, there is Evan running for the forbidden room! He wants in there SO much. We have let him in there to show him that its really nothing special, but it has not deterred his interest in that room.

Here is a picture of him when he backs himself into the door and bangs it to let you know to open it and let him in!

Being creative- Evan finger painting is so so messy! I love how he is not afraid to get messy. Evan's paintings are not limited to the paper, by the end Evan is covered head to toe in paint :)

Escape attempts- During play time we keep Evan barricaded in our living room and it has not been until recently that little man has made has made escape attempts. Sometimes we leave a little space open to see if he can figure out how to break free. He was so proud of himself when he figures out he can get between the wall and the pack n play. I love seeing him try to figure things out.

Playdates with good friends- Evan and his best buddy Joshua together. Here they are at the aquarium checking out the alligators.

Payten and Evan had a great time playing with play dough. I love this pictures because of his expression. So cute!

Making a mess- We have a water table that I keep inside and put tactile things in there for Evan to explore. Since we started do this with him he as started to use his hands more and more. We have found out that he loves beans and beaded necklas'. They get all over the place and make a huge mess that I now have to clean up multiple times a day :) Now to teach him how to put things away...

Watching Evan and Dan fishing- We went to the Make a Difference Fishing Event and Evan and Dan caught 6 fish! Evan evven got his first metal!

  Evan saying dadadada- LOVE his sweet little voice!

Our Saturday at Home

The last few days Evan has been fighting a cold. He always seems to get sick around this time of year and when Evan gets sick he doesn't bounce back quickly. This weekend we decided to stay in and take it easy. This morning Evan fell asleep in his bean bag chair watching the Wiggles. This never ever happens it was so cute!

Playing with pots, measuring cups, plastic bags... it kept him entertained for almost an hour!

Last week we took Evan to see a Neurological Ophthalmologist. Evan did great, but was not too happy with getting drops in his eyes. The doctor told us his MRI looked good and so did the structure of Evan's eyes. The doctor explained that we are still not sure exactly how Evan's brain processes what he sees and it could be helpful to do some visual therapy with him. One of the suggestions he had was to add some more black and while contrast.

So, yesterday I decided to made a hanging mobile to go over his crib. I made it from differnt size embroidery hoops covered in black and white fabric. I love how it turned out! And Evan seems to really like it too. 

Some other things we have been doing for visual stimulation have been reading books with black, white, and red images and I've made some flashcards with different black and white shapes to show him. He has been doing really well at tracking these cards.

Looking forward to having friends over tomorrow for a cookout and football to celebrate a good friends birthday. Hope everyone is having a great weekend!

* I just noticed this is my 100th post :)

Goodnight!

Evan Update

I thought I would do a quick update on all the new things Evan is doing these days! We are so very proud of our boy.

We got Evan a table and chair set from Ikea. Here he is playing with play dough and cookie cutters. He did great sitting at the table in his little red chair.

Look who is sitting in the bath all by himself. He loves the freedom of having the whole bath tub to play in.

Evan's new favorite game is peek-a-boo. We put the pillow pet over his face and he uses his arms to push it up :)

He has been drinking out of a cup for a while now, but he always would lay down in his pack n play to drink. Now we are working on drinking sitting up.

We are also working on getting rid of the passy and not rocking him to sleep. He keeps amazing us every day!

Creativity and an Evan update

My new obsession is pinterest.com. I love to look through the many ideas and think of how I can incorporate them into our home, what different art projects I can do with Evan, what new dinners I can try to cook... Here are a few of the projects I have done and I have so many more that I want to do!

I took at 12x12 frame and put a piece of scrapbook paper in it and vola, a do-it-yourself white board! Perfect place to put my things to do lists, grocery lists, and meal planning ideas. So many options! And I can switch the paper to give it a new look whenever I want!

I made this yarn wreath for my parents condo.

A little fun art project I did with Evan. Cute little lobster made from his foot and hand prints!

This was a joint effort from my mom and me. We made it for my mom's class room. Her teacher friends are so jealous! We made another one for Rachel's friend, Heather's classroom. Dan says I should go into business :)

This one I made for myself. I learned how to make felt flower and love how it turned out.

I also made a wreath out of cocktail umbrellas for my sister's new apartment. It turned out really cute. I will have to ask her to take a picture of it so I can post it on here.

As you can see I have been busy crafting... I do it at night when Evan goes to bed and it has been really relaxing and nice to do something creative!

Here is a video of Evan playing with me.


Evan has learned a new trick. He can now stand in the middle of the room by himself. I am so proud. He is getting so strong! Go Evan!


I recently joined a support group. It is a wonderful group of parents who have kids with an abnormality in chromosome 4, like Evan. I have met many wonderful parents who have shared their stories and experiences with me. The group has an annual fundraiser, Kammies Kause, and we were asked to have our little ones paint a picture that will be auctioned off at the event. I was so excited that Evan could participate! We got our 11x14 canvas and Evan had so much fun finger painting. He got paint everywhere- he was covered in paint by the end, but he had fun and we got a great masterpiece to send in for the auction. Dan and I are sad we are not going to be able to go to Kammies Kause this year since it is in Indiana. We are already planning to go next year though.

Here is the finished product from my little artist!

Dan and I want to do something to help raise money for the support group. The encouragement and resources we have gotten from this group and been such a blessing to us. We have some ideas and will let everyone know when we have things finalized!

Birthday Suprise for Me and Water Therapy for Evan

After weeks of plotting and planning Dan and my sister pulled off a wonderful surprise party for me. I was SO surprised! It was amazing to walk into my parents house and see so many of my friends and family there to celebrate my 30th birthday. I still can't believe they were able to pull it off without me figuring it out. Dan told me I was not an easy person to surprise since I always like to know what is going on and ask tons of questions! Thanks to all my family and friends for making my 30th so special!

We are really excited to start water therapy with Evan! This was his first time in it. Evan doesn't like new things... but I can't believe how great he did the first time. It was so cute to watch him just float and kick around in the water. This system is a water-based method designed to stimulate, strengthen and help improve the baby's physical and mental development.

Water therapy has been proven:

• Strengthen extremities (arms/hands/fingers and legs/feet/toes)

• Greater flexibility and range of motion

• More lung capacity

• Improved weight gain

• Better sleep patterns

• Increased stimulation to the brain and nervous system

We want to give Evan every opportunity to develop to his fullest potential! I am always on the look out for things that will complement his traditional therapies.

"Feet First"

We have been busy this summer working with Evan on some new tricks! He is now able to get off the couch "feet first!" This might sound like a small thing but it is really exciting to us that he is now able to do this. For the longest time he would just try to dive off. Yikes! I can't believe how big he is getting. Some other tricks we are working on are coming when we call him and getting him to understand that there are certain things in the house (the DVD rack) that he is not allowed to touch. He is make such great progress. I am so very proud of him! I was able to capture him getting off the couch "feet first" today on video.



Have a great weekend!

The Life That's Chosen Me

I found this video tonight. It is called The Life That's Chosen Me, by Karen Taylor-Good. The song touched my heart...





I love this kid :)

4 Years Together!

Happy anniversary to my husband and best friend!

This year for our anniversary we decided to start something new. We got a basket that holds 12 envelopes. Each labeled with a month of the year. And each envelope will contain a pre-planned, date just for us! To add an element of surprise, Dan took the odd months and I took the even months, and we planned dates for each other. Some of the dates will take place at home and some are planned for the local area. It will be fun to see what we have planned for our dates.

The plan is to open the envelope together at the beginning of the month, look at the calendar and decide on a date. So right from the beginning of the month, we'll have a fun date on the calendar to look forward to!

Summer List

Yay for summer! I found a list on line of 101 things to do during the summer. Dan and I stole some ideas from this list and came up with a few of our own to do with Evan this summer. Here are some of the things we put on our list...

1. Make homemade icecream
2. Eat watermelon
3. Play outside in the rain
4. Visit a local farmers market
5. Collect seashells
6. Visit the Glazer Children's Museum
7. Make s'mores in our backyard firepit
8. Collect fireflies in a jar (for when we are in Philly in July!)
9. Go feed the ducks
10. Watch planes take off and land at an airport
11. Make homemade playdough
12. Eat popsicles
13. Have a picnic
14. Visit a petting zoo
15. Build a fort out of sheets
16. Go on a bike ride
17. Watch fireworks
18. Grow flowers
19. Make fresh lemonade
20. Go on a nature walk

Today we crossed off "Eat Watermelon" Evan was not sure at first, but he ended up liking it!



Looking forward to crossing more things off our list...



TGIF! Have a great weekend!