Random Thought

Gwen probably climbs out of her crib at night and walks downstairs to get a midnight snack, out of the pantry. Then she runs laps around the kitchen before going back to bed.

Fun Stuff

We spend a lot of fun time with Gwen this weekend and she just keeps surprising us. 
We made some strides on the walking front:

• On Friday Gwen was standing up and leaning against me all while playing with my iPhone.  I moved and she stood, alone, for like 10 seconds!!  She has never done that before!!
• On Saturday instead of having Gwen hold onto my hands to walk, I had her hold on to the base of 2 spoons, while I held the other end.  I then let go and she took 2 steps on her own!!!  It was very exciting.  Unfortunately, she knows I am out to trick her so she refuses to play this game again.
• She can now climb the steps herself, while holding on to the railing/spindles. 

New words that she busted out this weekend:

• Cracker
• Apple
• Cold

Other fun stuff she learned to do this weekend:

• Mike taught her to put her finger to her lips and say "Shhh". 

Wordless Wednesday

The Cuteness That is Gwendolyn

Too bad it isn't Wordless Wednesday because these cute photos speak for themselves!

Gwen's First Dentist Visit

Gwen had her first dentist appointment today.  The place we took her to was awesome.  They had Play Stations set up and tons of toys for Gwen.  The inside had TVs playing movies, on the ceilings, above each dentist chair.  There was also a huge salt water fish tank which Gwen loved.  Gwen did okay, shed a few tears.  They really only looked inside her mouth to make sure everything looked healthy and normal.  Here are some pictures from her big day! 

Family Fun Weekend

This was a fun weekend for the Jurbala family. On Friday night Mike "helped me" put together Gwen's new kitchen, and Gwen loves it. She even made everyone, including the cats, breakfast. It is fun to watch her know how to work everything, including the microwave. She even fed her baby dinner. On Saturday we headed to the St. Patty's Day Parade. We spent about 20 minutes at the parade and then headed to a patio for beer and lunch. The weather was perfect......65 degrees and sunny. . Gwen had a blast and laughed as the loud motorcycles drove by and pointed at the floats and the drunk people in the parade. Sunday we met some new friends for brunch but Gwen was a bit rough around the edges. It was one meltdown after another, but I think it is because another tooth is coming in.

Is it bad that every time she flings herself to the floor in misery that I laugh?? I can't help it. Every time she flips out it cracks me up. I mean seriously, what is so wrong in her life that she has to be so dramatic? She gets to nap 3+ hours a day, she gets to play all day with her friends, and eat what she wants and poop her pants. Well the last item is gross, but.....................still.

I'll stop chuckling to myself about Gwen and her melt downs, and let you enjoy some pictures!!

Wordless Wednesday

Evaluation

A while ago we set up an appointment to have Gwen evaluated because she was not walking yet.  The county offers free evaluation and services.  I wanted to be pro-active and am SO GLAD I was.

We took Gwen to be evaluated this morning and she is showing significant gross motor delays. She has the gross motor skills of an 11 month old and is only in the 5th percentile. She has week ankle and hip muscles which are causing the delay. There will be a physical therapist coming into our home to work with her. She also has extremely weak face muscles and that is why her mouth is always open. This could potentially hinder her speech in the future (although she is doing great right now). We can no longer use sippy cups and have to use ones with straws as well as give her more chewy foods. Luckily, Mike’s mom’s best friend is a speech pathologist, so we are hoping that she will be able to recommend developmental toys and things we can do, to fix that.

On a good note, she is extremely intelligent. They did tests on her and made their way through the 19 month check list and found nothing that Gwen couldn’t do. The occupational therapist said she could have gone on all day to see how far ahead she really was, but that isn’t why we were there. They said they could tell that we are very engaged parents and that we are doing an amazing job with her (the OT even said I stole her thunder by already doing the right things with Gwen to help get her walking/strong). I guess if anything had to be delayed; it is good that it is the gross motor skills although you never want to hear that your child is delayed by 6 months on anything.  We have a plan for what we want to see her do by 20 months.  Hopefully with the right amount of work, we can reach those goals.