Day #4 coming together....

Wow - a lot of progress today - and we love it so far! As you can see, more steps are being added and the planters are progressing. Tony and his crew are so funny... yesterday I told them to leave their pop cans in the back, then I would take them down to the recycling. They stacked them yesterday in a pyramid, and I mentioned today to them that I thought that was funny because they are landscapers... so today they got even fancier with their building! :-) Tomorrow morning a builder guy will come and replace that board under the side door so Tony and his workers can proceed with steps up to the door. As you can see, Ken's and our front yard is really trashed. Tony is extending the wall so our front yard will be flat without any slopes. We are unsure if we will put any kind of a railing on the steps yet. FYI - each of the bricks is 82 pounds! I will have to guesstimate how many bricks, then figure out the total weight. One of these days when I have nothing better to do!! :-)

Day #3 Looking Better!

A lot of progress today! and we were the most popular (or least popular) people on the block. We had vehicles that were working on the house today taking up the whole street. Captain Clean came and cleaned our air ducts... what a mess, and it was hot because we couldn't have the air conditioning on. We are glad that is over. In the landscaping, you can see the progress that was made. Tony and his crew built 9 steps, and laid the foundation of the wall. Chad came back and dug out extra dirt with the back hoe to make the "trench" to put the plant/retaining wall. A surprise that was found - under a red cap, there was a cement pipe that lead down to either a well or septic tank. He just covered it again with dirt and the wall. Interesting... maybe mom and dad had a septic tank before the public sewer system went in... as you may or may not know, when mom and dad built out here it was considered to be the country.

Day #2 of Construction

Day #2, which should actually be day #3. Of course, it was dry all summer until we had the steps torn out. Yesterday morning we got torrential rain creating a mud slide down the side of our house. Everything was fine for us, but our poor neighbor Ken got mud in his mulch and rock garden, and water drained into his utility room. Because of this rain and mud, Tony, our landscaper was unable to start yesterday, but showed up finally at 2:00 this afternoon to start the project. He will be back Monday to continue, and the back hoe will also take out some of the extra dirt. You can see the back hoe is still parked down by our garage.

Fun at the new Sleepy Eye Pool

Derek, Pam, Cooper, Allie and Devin, along with Grandma and Dar went to the new Sleepy Eye Outdoor Pool on Saturday. Cooper is a little fish and stayed in the water the whole time, Allie was in and out of wading pool, (the wind was cold that day) and Devin hung out and played peek-a-boo. We had a great time!

Bye Bye Steps

Dad & I at the Steamboat Days Parade

Photo courtesy of Marty Larson

Devin had a Renal Ultrasound and a Urologist appointment on Friday. Everything looked good! At this point the Urologist is not concerned about Devin's urinary tract or his Kidneys. Everything in this area seems to be functioning normally. Some kids with SB have trouble with emptying their bladder completely which can cause urine to back up into the Kidney and cause Kidney problems down the road. They will continue to monitor Devin for any signs of problems.

Fun at the pool!

Devin tries to immitate every sound his siblings make. He's just perfected Allie's high pitch scream in the last day or two. The more useful sounds are Mom, Dad, Up & Oow (apparently we hurt ourselves frequently and use this quite often).

We went to see Dr. Winterstein yesterday and found out that Devin will continue to have the splint on as she is concerned that his sockets will not continue to deepen if she takes it off. She did say that as he gets closer to standing, she will probable have us switch to night time and naps only. They cast him next week for AFOs (Ankle, Foot Orthotics) to help keep his heels in the proper position.

Sorry it has been a while since I posted up-dates. We've been trying to figure out what foods to give Devin to keep him regular on the other end and I figure you probable did not want those details.

Devin now has 2 bottom teeth and we have found some baby foods that he likes as well as some other "Graduate" foods he enjoys feeding himself. Of course, he would really like to be eating what we are eating.

Birth to 3 (a county service) has really been helpful in letting us know what we should be doing to encourge Devin with movement. We are trying to get him more interested in tummy time so that he figures out that he can move by rolling or "army" crawling.

We did see the Ortho doctor about 3-4 weeks ago and we go back to see her in mid-June. She is still pleased with Devin's hips but wanted us to continue with the splint with 4 hours of freedom a day. She did mention something about AFO s(ankle, foot orthics) last time but I never count on what she says until she is in the process as her plans seem to change.

Kids with Spina Bifida generally do get some kind of foot orthic and sometimes it also includes the knee and/or the hips depending on the individual child. As I understand it, orthics and/or some kind of standing device is probable the next step for Devin from an Orthopedic stand point.

8 Months and Counting!

Thanks to the family and friends who came for the small baptism celebration we had for the kids. A special Thank You to Marty who captured some truely priceless moments.

Although medically, not much has changed with Devin, he is just beginning to go through that phase that he accomplishes new things every day. His first tooth recently began to immerge. He talks and reaches for whatever he wants (often the T.V. remote!)

We are currently taking the brace off for 4 hours a day. He can get himself from the position of laying on his tummy to a sitting position. His favorite position is sitting and playing with toys.

We continue to struggle to get him to eat cereals and baby food but he loves the Baby Mum Mums the Easter Bunny brought! Along with eating new foods comes a balancing act with his bowels as we are not quite sure how things will progress in this area. Almost every child with Spina Bifida has some kind of complications with bowel and bladder but each case is a little different depending on the muscle, etc.

Spina Bifida Clinic #2

We had a Spina Bifida Clinic for Devin this last Wednesday. We mostly saw doctors who were not able to do much at the last clinic in December because he had the cast. They also did an AP Pelvic x-ray on him that day. The 2 things that came out of the clinic is that he is now eating rice cereal (but doesn't care for it much) and they are already going to start weining him out of the brace!

Although Dr. Wintersteen did not make it to the clinic because of other things that came up on her schedule, she called Friday to let us know that the x-ray showed very good bone mass development so we could start taking him out of the brace for a couple hours a day.

Since the last up-date, Birth to 3 (a state program) has started coming to our house to help us, help Devin. We have figured out some different positions for him to be in and he currently loves to sit on the floor and play with toys (middle picture from last post). The OT/PT people at Gunderson were very pleased with how he sat.