Surgery

Tomorrow we hope that the 3rd time's a charm. Hannah goes in for her 3rd set of ear tubes. This time they will be permanent ones. While I'm relieved to be getting them and be done with the 3 ear infections we've had in the month since the first tube fell out, I'm worried too. She doesn't come out of anesthesia well. She's combative and crazy. It's scary to see. She's also had some sort of post operative complication after both of her previous ear tube surgeries. Neither one has been horribly serious, but bad enough to land us in the ER both times shortly after we had been discharged from the surgery center. Thankfully, Kyle can take the day off and it's near the weekend so if something does come up I won't be handling things alone.

As far as the behavior front goes, Christmas break has been rough. I guess it is to be expected since her routine is off, but this is the absolute worst it's ever been. I'm actually praying for an acceptance to the severe behavior program at this point where only weeks ago I was still wondering if we'd even accept the spot if they said she qualified.

On the foster care front we are STILL waiting on our finger prints to clear and now we just found out that one of the states we previously lived in is asking for yet more paperwork in order to clear our background checks-something about a new child protection law that recently went into effect. On a positive note, a nice lady from freecycle gave me a big bag of infant crib bedding, some baby toys, and a bassinet today.

Photo Notes: These pictures were from Thanksgiving Day. We spent the day together as a family putting up Christmas decorations, eating a wonderful dinner, and remodeling our guest bathroom.

Rough Week

It's been a rough week around here. It started on Monday when Hannah's cough had reached the point that I felt like I had to take her to the doctor. We went in and found out that she had bronchitis and a double ear infection. The ear that still had the tube wasn't draining like the tubes are supposed to help it do and the doctor said the tube was crusty looking and gross. So, we went home with a script for 2 weeks of amox-clav and orders to keep her quiet. Ha! Fat chance! Hannah is one of those odd kids who, instead of becoming lethargic and restless when they are sick, goes into hyper-drive. She becomes even more active than she normally is and it's next to impossible to keep her still. Even the promise of PBS kids or a movie isn't enough to keep her still for long.

Later in the day we had to go to Omaha to pick up her new orthotics and have them fitted. Luckily, they were able to get them into her current shoes so we didn't have to buy new sneakers. I was worried about this since I had just bought her new shoes only a few weeks before we had the appointment where the doctor ordered the orthotics. I really didn't want to shell out money for new shoes this close to the holidays. Upon arriving home Hannah had a spectacular meltdown when I suggested she wash her hands. In fact, she raged. I was barely able to get her upstairs to her bedroom to chill out and once there it was basically impossible to keep her in her room. She kicked her physical and verbal aggression up several notches from normal and for the first time I was almost frightened of her. It took over an hour to get her calmed back down. To find the silver lining in this incident, I was able to video a good portion of the ordeal to take with us to the psychologist the next day.

Tuesday she was cleared to go back to school, but we had to pick her up early for our first appointment with the new psychologist. Armed with my video from the night before, her previous psych report, teacher emails, IEP, disciplinary referrals, report card, etc we marched into our meeting. After studying our paperwork, speaking with us, and watching the video the psychologist came back into the room and told us that we needed to be referred to the Autism Center's Severe Behavior unit for their outpatient partial hospitalization program. We were floored. I knew things had gotten bad, but I had no idea we were now that far from normal 5 year old behavior. She also said that her initial impression of Hannah is Asperger's Syndrome. So, yeah, we are back to that again. I'd been thinking I needed to rename the blog since the last psych took away that diagnosis, but it looks like it may be coming back. The doctor also said that she WOULD continue to see us (and Hannah) if we wanted, that she wasn't just handing us off because she didn't want to work with us, but that she thought progress with her would be much slower and that Hannah needed more intensive help than she was able to give her. We were sent home with a phone number to call and a packet of forms to fill out.

Wednesday was rough, but manageable. Thursday started off ok, but there were issues right before we left for school when Hannah tried to smuggle books to school by shoving them down her pants. A battle ensued to attempt the removal of the books and the drive to school was not happy. Swim lessons on Thursday were awesome and Hannah made a lot of progress, but then after the lesson in the locker room all heck broke loose. Hannah got angry for some unknown to me reason and started shouting mean and disrespectful things at me. If I tried to touch her she'd hit me or swat my hand away. It was SO LOUD and it echoed all throughout the locker room. Every eye was on me and I was terribly embarrassed. I know I shouldn't care what others think of me and my parenting, but seeing all those eyes on me judging it was hard to fight back the tears that wanted to come as I struggled to contain Hannah, get her dressed and just get the heck out of Dodge.

Friday morning (today) started off rocky from the very beginning and only got worse as the day wore on. Hannah didn't want to get ready for school and was insisting she had already brushed her teeth when she had clearly not done so (sink and toothbrush were both bone dry!). Instead of fight with her over it, I simply told her that I would just go over them to be sure she had done a good job. She wasn't going to have that at all and got extremely aggressive. In the end she did a number to both me and the bathroom, ripping the drawer out of it's cabinet and the door stopper off the wall and head butting me so hard that tears came to my eyes. I eventually got her calmed and ready for school. I thought it was all in the past. She seemed ready to go, but just after lunchtime I received an email from the teacher saying that Hannah had spit in another student's face at lunchtime. She was sent to the principal for another "detention" during recess. She apologized to her friend, but I fear damage may have been done to that friendship because Hannah said that the little girl told her that Hannah wasn't her friend anymore and that she wouldn't talk to her or play with her for the rest of the day. I can't say that I blame the girl, especially since she had done nothing to provoke the spitting. The thing is, Hannah REALLY likes this little girl. She talks about her ALL the time. She's calm and reliable and a good influence, the perfect friend for Hannah. I have NO IDEA why she would have done something like this to her friend and apparently neither does Hannah.

As the week has wore on I find myself wondering more and more if maybe the psychologist was right, maybe this program she speaks about really is the right place for us. Maybe, just maybe, this could be where we can finally get some help. The only drawback, it's an 8 week program and Hannah would have to be pulled from school for that time. I don't know how I feel about that. Obviously she won't fall behind academically, but I worry about the disruption to the school routine and the loss of relationships that she has started to build with her classmates. It's going to take lots of prayer to decide what to do about this.

Photo Notes: Pictures were taken in November at a park near our house. The cat in the last picture acted like a dog and followed us around EVERYWHERE we went. It even came when called. It was SO FRIENDLY. Hannah was convinced it didn't have a home and that we needed to take it home. To tell you the truth, I wouldn't have minded having it, but a cat that friendly had to have owners so we went knocking on doors in the neighborhood near the park to see if anyone knew who the cat belonged to. We eventually found the owner, but they were totally unconcerned that their cat was across the busy road wandering in the park. That made me sad. He was such a sweet cat too.

It's Okay Mommy

We've been hearing, "It's Okay, Mommy/Daddy" a lot lately whenever we tell Hannah to either do something or stop doing something and she doesn't want to obey. We've really cracked down on the "NO!" so she's been censoring herself a bit and has switched it up to "It's ok" AKA I'm not going to do what you want me to do. I plan on doing whatever I want to do. Though it's pretty creative and it does make me want to laugh sometimes it's driving me crazy. I keep having to take deep breaths to stop from going off the deep end.

To top things off, it's getting really frustrating (for both Kyle and I and Hannah) that Hannah can't hear. We are only 1 week into our 4 week wait before we head back to the ENT and I find myself constantly wondering how on earth we are going to make it that long if her hearing doesn't start improving on its own before then. It's to the point that we basically have to shout everything we say to Hannah VERY slowly and 3-4 times before she comprehends what we've said. I listened to her talk to my mom on the phone today and it was all I could do to not laugh as I heard Hannah saying, "Huh?" over and over and over again. I lost count while trying to keep track of the number of times she said, "I can't hear you." My poor girl. :(

On a happy note, we had Hannah's first parent teacher conference at her new preschool last week and we came away from it feeling very pleased. They do assessments on the children every 3 months using a skills inventory based on their age in months. When Hannah started she was 2 standard deviations below the norm in the social and emotional areas. Now, 6 months later, she's scoring completely at grade/age level in both of those areas! YAHOO! Now I know we aren't out of the woods yet and that some of her deficits will become more apparent as the social demands grow, but this assessment confirmed what I was already observing which is Hannah is making great strides in her social skills under the guidance of her teachers. I am so proud of my little girl. And to boast a little bit more, she also maxed out her scores on all the verbal, academic, fine motor, and gross motor skills on the assessment as well. :) The only "bad" thing the teacher had to tell us was that Hannah often "questions authority" AKA she's stubborn as all get out! and has a hard time listening to her teachers when she doesn't want to do something. The good news is that even though she often balks at what she's told to do, they aren't seeing any meltdowns when they push the issue and make her do it anyway. She saves that for us! When Miss Karyl was explaining about the gross motor portion of the assessment, one of the skills listed was throwing a ball overhand. I asked if they needed to have any aim at this point or just be able to chuck it wherever it will go. Karyl assured me that chucking it was just fine at this point and then told us a little story. She said that Hannah is actually developing quite good aim from playing with one of the other little boys in the class. Because of the extremely cold weather the kids haven't been able to go out on the playground very often so they've been spending a lot of time in the gross motor/sensory room. They have a kid's basketball net in there and Karyl pointed it out and said that Hannah plays with the hoop a lot because "Antonio is a big fan of playing basketball and Hannah is a big fan of Antonio!" I had to laugh about that one because it's true. Hannah is definitely a big fan of Antonio. Those two are like two peas in a pod. My girl really does like her boys. Practically all of her "friends" are boys and sadly this has always been the case. Even as an infant, she's always preferred men over women. I'm looking for this boy crazy trait to diminish a bit soon, but I won't hold my breath. As a side note, I had a note about this little story written down on some scrap paper to remind me to put in on the blog and Hannah found it and read perfectly and without any help, "Antonio is a big fan of basketball and Hannah is a big fan of Antonio!" and then laughed like crazy! UGH! Now I not only can't spell words out loud that I don't want her to know, but I have to be careful what I write down and where I leave it. I may just have to start writing anything I don't want her to read in cursive! Seriously, I shouldn't be having this problem with a 3 year old!

This past weekend the full moon wreaked havoc in our house. Hannah was WIRED to the max. She was running around and shrieking and jumping, and singing at the top of her lungs and grabbing everything she could touch. I thought I was going to go crazy. At one point I was trying to get her to try on some summer clothes from last year to see if any of them still fit (so far only a few do!) and I could not get her to stay near me long enough to get one article of clothing off and another one on before she was off and running all over the place. I found myself becoming almost hysterical and grabbed her by the waist and gave her a little shake and said quite manically "Hannah! CALM DOWN!" Kyle came into the room at that point and said, "Natalie, don't shake the child." It was then that I realized I was over the edge and I needed to pass her off for a little bit or I was going to lose it. I think things are back to normal now, but really it remains to be seen. She had a rough morning getting ready for school, but that's not unusual. We'll see how she is when she gets back from school. It's not too terribly cold outside (in the 20s as opposed to the single digits before the windchill) so maybe they'll get some extra playtime outside to run the crazies out of her.

Refreshed

Thursdays around here are Mommy-Daughter Day. There's no school, no therapy, no place we HAVE to be. Normally we try to plan fun activities like story time at the library, a trip to the museum, a day at the beach, etc. Lately Mommy-Daughter Day has not been fun. A full day with no set routine has simply been torture for Hannah and therefore torture for me. Today however was amazing. Despite all the things I did wrong (no nap, hopped from store to store, stroller confinement for large chunks of time, two meals at restaurants, changes of plans at the last minute, a doctor's appointment . . . . ) that should have made the day horrible, it was perfect. Hannah and I had a delightful day together. I was worried that the day was going to be bad when Hannah started the day by sneaking out of my bedroom while I was still sleeping, going downstairs to the kitchen, and getting some candy and eating it. She was not pleased when I took the remaining candy away from her and I only narrowly avoided sending her into a meltdown. Still, she managed to recover and the day we had together left me feeling energized and thoroughly refreshed. I needed this day. It's going to get me through many rough days.

One of the things Hannah and I did today was buy new shoes. Her feet have grown and I was not looking forward to having to buy her new shoes so soon after the hard time we had finding shoes that would fit with her braces. We really like the shoes we found last time and I was dreading giving them up. Walking into Stride Rite today, a quick scan of the shelves told me there were no shoes that were a similar style to her old shoes. Apparently that style of shoe is not a spring style. My heart sank. As I began to search for the next best solution I came across some boxes stacked on the floor that didn't have samples sitting out on top of them. It turned out that they were all the pairs they had left of Hannah's old style of shoe and they were on sale. They were seriously on sale. More than half off from what I had paid before. Now, all we had to do was measure her feet to see if any of the remaining pairs fit. Cue Angels singing. . . . . . We had a match! So, Hannah and I walked out of the mall with her wearing the same shoes that she wore into the store only the next size up. I was thrilled and so was she.

Another excursion we made was to a new ENT. I liked him. I'm picky about doctors and so far I haven't been super pleased with Hannah's doctors here in Rhode Island. The only one of them I've liked is her orthopedist and the brace shop technician that fitted her for her AFOs. This guy is nice. He was thorough. He had a good rarport with Hannah. He listened to her history. He made his recommendations based both on her history and my concerns. I was pleased. That's what I want in a doctor-someone to be my partner in keeping my daughter healthy. His exam confirmed that Hannah's ear infection is gone, but that there is still fluid filling both ears. She had no detectable movement in her ear drums when he did the tympanogram. No wonder the poor thing can't hear. Kyle likens talking to Hannah right now to speaking with a mini octogenarian. I have to say that I agree. I constantly feel like I'm stuck inside that old skit "Who's on First?" Now we know why. The doctor recommends waiting 4 weeks to see if the fluid drains (normal protocol is 4 months). They'll then recheck her ears and run a hearing test. If the fluid is gone and her hearing is normal then we all shout, "Hooray!" and do a happy dance. If there's been no change or things have gotten worse then we'll have to risk another surgery and put in new tubes. In the meantime we're going to try some dietary intervention to see if we can get things under control. A month ought to be enough time to see if we can make any difference. We're starting with some probiotics and then we'll see where we go from there.

And It Begins Again

It seems that our almost one year reprieve from near constant ear infections and fluid in the ears is over with. This morning Hannah complained that her ear hurt and when preschool called to tell us to come pick her up because they thought she had pink eye Kyle took her to the doctor and it was confirmed. She does indeed have an ear infection as well as pink eye. The worst part about it is that her ear tubes have slipped out of position in both ears (we found out they might be starting to shift in October). It appears that she got an infection pretty much immediately after the tube had moved out of place. This does not bode well. The way I see it (I realize I'm jumping to conclusions, but I have lots of experience with Hannah's ears to go on) we have two options. First we could just let the tubes fall out and go through the cycle of constant ear infections again and risk Hannah having hearing loss from the fluid building up on her ear drum again like last time. OR we can put Hannah through another surgery to replace the tubes and hopefully get another reprieve from the constant infections, but risk having a recurrence of the post op pneumonia she had last time after being under general anesthesia. I don't like either option. I suppose a third option is that we do nothing and the infections just never come back, that this infection was just a coincidence, but somehow I don't think that is a viable option or a likely outcome. Oh, and to top off poor Hannah's ear infection and pink eye she also started complaining of a tummy ache around lunch time and then finally threw up right around dinner time. I was actually pretty worried about this day. The last time Hannah threw up (not counting the times she's made herself throw up when she was angry) she was only a year old and not really old enough to remember how it feels. I was worried about how she would react when the day finally came that she got sick to her stomach. I expected her to be hysterical. After all, it's a scary feeling to not be able to control your body. I shouldn't have worried though because she took it like a champ and was actually fascinated by the products of her efforts. I suppose it helped that her vomit was bright purple thanks to some blueberries! After throwing up we gave her a bowl to take around with her in case she felt sick again and wasn't able to make it to the toilet. When it was time for bed (she actually ASKED to go to bed around 6pm tonight by the way! That about gave me a heart attack!) she said that she thought she needed to take the bowl with her. Just a few minutes ago when she got up to go to the bathroom she told me that now she was just like me because she had her own bowl by her bed (I have gastropariesis and frequently throw up a night) and she sounded so proud! Great! That's not exactly what I had imagined her wanting to emulate about me! The funny part is that she was concerned that Kyle doesn't have his own bowl. She even offered to share her bowl with him if he needed it. How generous of my little girl :) Then the final nail in the coffin today was that both Kyle and I are pretty sure that we both have pink eye too!

Thankful

I know Thanksgiving has come and gone and everyone else has done their "thankful" posts, but I'd still like to write one. I am SO thankful for my family. Hannah and Kyle are my reasons for getting up every morning. I am eternally grateful for God placing them both in my life. When I think about my life before the both of them it just seems odd. I feel as if they were always a part of me. I am thankful for a warm bed to sleep in and plenty of food to eat. I am thankful to live in a country where I can worship God without fear of persecution. I am thankful for my friends and extended family and all the fun times we are able to share together. I am thankful for Tiffany and Mike and the sacrifice they made in order for Kyle and I to become parents. I am thankful that they have both chosen to continue to be a part of our lives. I am thankful that Hannah will always know about her birthfamily and if she ever has questions she will know that she can either ask Kyle or I or just pick up the phone and call Tiffany or Mike and ask them. Most of all, I am thankful for Jesus and his amazing sacrifice of dieing on the cross for my sins so that I can live forever in Heaven with him.

Moving on to current news in the Spontak household. . . . Poor Hannah has a double ear infection AND a staph infection. Along with that she's got a cold and a horrible cough. She's miserable. I feel so bad for her. I gave behavior boot camp (more on that in a moment) a rest today to simply cut her some slack.

Even though she's sick, Hannah's been doing some mighty fine reading lately. Her sight word vocabulary continues to increase and she's starting to read sentences consisting entirely of words that are sight words for her quickly enough to have some comprehension. This is a big deal. She no longer labors over every single word pausing to notice each and every word, but reads fluently from one word to the next until she reaches one that is not immediately recognizable and then attempts to sound it out. Tonight in the bathtub she was asking me to write sentences for her to read on the bathtub walls using her tub crayons! Don't get me wrong, we aren't reading chapter books here or anything, but still mighty fine reading for a two year old if I do say so myself. Here's a sampling of what she was reading tonight in the tub. I can see a cat. The dog can run. Hannah sees the sun is up. Daddy loves Hannah. We like cats and dogs. Can you see the bus? They see it. We like to go to the zoo. Do you like bees? Mommy and Daddy love me. He is up. Is it on the top? No, you can not run to the bus. Are you sensing a theme here? :) One thing that is really cool is that she's very good at using picture clues and context to figure out an unfamiliar word. For example, the other day she was reading a book she had never seen before that had two sentences per page and followed basically the same format on most pages. The first line was usually, "Can you see it?" Then the next line was something to the effect of, "I can see a ____________." (or we see a, they see a, he sees a, etc) Most of the words for what the people saw were not words Hannah is able to sound out, but she was able to figure out the mystery word using the context and the picture on each page. She read the entire book without error pointing to each and every word as she said it, even difficult words like rooster, horse, and mouse. I was so proud of her. I thought Kyle was going to have a heart attack when she picked it up and read it like a pro for him. When she finished he turned to me and said, "Does she have it memorized?"

Ok, about behavior boot camp. Lately Hannah has been VERY sassy. She says "NO!" all the time, shouts, whines, and uses a nasty tone of voice to attempt to get what she wants. I've tried about everything, but hadn't really seen any results. Things got really bad over the holiday weekend after being indulged by various extended family members at Thanksgiving gatherings. I finally had enough and informed Hannah that she would no longer get warnings about speaking rudely, arguing, or saying "NO!" when told to do something. Now she is immediately put in time out without discussion or elaboration for any of those offenses. So far this shock and awe method has been working fairly well, but it's too early to say if it's a real change in behavior or if she's simply feeling out the changes.

Hannah's appointment with the orthopedic doc is Monday. I'm very anxious to go and see what they suggest. Lately her running style has become more and more "odd." For you horsey people reading, she very significantly wings out when she runs and this really slows down her speed, causes her to veer to one side, and seems to increase her tripping. Tuesday is our meeting with the special education department within the local schools to begin the transitioning process from early intervention to the public school system. I am also anxious for this meeting since I just have a feeling that it's going to be a tough road given her gifts to convince anyone that she ought to qualify for special services. I plan on taking some videos of her at school and at home to demonstrate the significance of the difference between her capabilities and what she is able to display at school to take to the developmental clinic in February, so if I need to use some of that footage to convince the folks here that there are definite issues then I will.

Hannah is seriously excited about Christmas this year, but doesn't quite get that Christmas is a holiday/event/day and not a place. Multiple times a day she asks me if we are going to Christmas today. She's still sorting out the secular and religious aspects of Christmas. Today I gave her a children's nativity set to play with. While I was opening it up she saw Jesus in the manger and correctly said, "That's baby Jesus!" Then she caught a glimpse of a donkey and asked, "Is that Jesus' reindeer?" I had to bite my lip not to laugh hysterically in her face. A lengthy conversation resulted detailing the characters in the Christmas story and differentiating them from Santa and his friends. Last year she wouldn't go near a Santa and referred to all Santa's she saw as "No-Na" AKA Noah as in Noah's ark. This year she's requested several times already to go see Santa (and his reindeer). I plan on taking her, but I'm not optimistic about the prospects of the visit being successful. Then, you never know. She does have a thing for men with facial hair! I'm really looking forward to decorating the house and picking out the tree with her this year. I just know she's going to have a blast. Now will be the time when she starts understanding and remembering traditions and begins to form warm fuzzy (hopefully) holiday family memories. We will also be going to see the Nutcracker in a few weeks. Kayla (Hannah's birthsister) will be performing in the production and we've been invited to attend. I'm super excited because I've always wanted to see the Nutcracker and also because I think Hannah will love it. While we were on our cruise in September Hannah was enthralled by the Vegas style shows they had each night. She loved the singing and dancing and would get up and dance along. I think she'll really like the music, costumes, and dancing at the ballet. I just hope she'll be able to sit through the whole thing. I'm not sure how long it is.

The new play room is proving to be a resounding success. We spend TONS of time in there, mostly on the hammock. It's been quite helpful in calming her when she's out of sorts and an awesome way to do a little sensory pick me up as needed throughout the day. She loves to climb in and out of the hammock and to throw herself to one side so that she tips over and falls out onto the bed. She thinks it's hilarious and we get that glorious "coo" of happiness we used to hear when she was a baby when she was in her swing or when Kyle would do the "Demon Drop" with her (hold her in a prone position over his head and pretend to drop her to the floor, slowing the speed just as he reached the floor to lie her gently on her back). We hadn't heard that lovely sound for quite some time. It really is the ultimate sound of happiness and contentment. I wish I could recreate it for you. Maybe I'll try to get some video of it.

PS. The pictures are from Grandkids' weekend at Mamaw and Papaw's house in November.

First Ear Infection

The cold I mentioned that Hannah was getting in my last post turned into her first ear infection. She's now on a 10 day course of antibiotics that she has to take 3 times a day. I'm extremely glad that she is good about taking medicine because I don't even want to think about having to give her meds multiple times a day by myself if she didn't cooperate. The fact that Hannah is so good about taking medicine is probably partly just her personality, but I'm sure the fact that she sees me take so many meds has something to do with it too. I didn't know quite how in tune she was to my physical health and my meds until one day when we were in the grocery store and I put a bottle of vitamins in the cart and Hannah tried to take it from me and said, "Hannah hold medicine." She will also try to diagnose me whenever I deny her requests to pick her up, dance with her, or play the "get you game" (chase her). The first thing she will say is "Mommy hurt" and then once I confirm that she is right she will then try to decide what hurts. She will guess my back, head, or legs. It makes me sad that she is not even 2 years old, yet she already has a good grasp on my pain and it's limitations. If I say that I am hurting she will usually give me a hug or kiss and say, "feel better Mommy."

Potty training is going fairly well given that we aren't very serious about it. I try to take her to the bathroom at least a couple of times a day, but that doesn't always happen. She's not asking to go sit on the potty yet, but she has been telling us when she pees every now and then and she pees almost every time I sit her on the toilet now. She's also pooped four times. Today I took her in to sit on the potty when she had a dry diaper and then she peed as soon as she sat down. I'm not sure if she was actually holding it or not, but I'll take it as a good sign. She's also asking to stay on the potty for longer and longer periods of time ever since that first time she pooped. Even though she's not asking to go in and sit on the potty, I wonder if these other things are a sign that I need to get a little more serious about the potty training. I don't want to push her too quickly, but if she's ready to be rid of diapers then I certainly don't want to prolong the process! I'd love to have that money we spend on diapers to use for other things.

Today we took Hannah to the gym where she takes her gymnastics class for their Saturday open play program. She had an absolute blast and completely wore herself out. By the end of the hour she could barely haul herself up onto the trampoline or even walk straight! She was so cute running down the room long trampoline bouncing all the way. Speaking of gymnastics, next month Hannah will be performing in her first gymnastics meet. The gym has a preschool gymnastics show to raise money for St. Jude Hospital every year and this year Hannah will be participating. I can't wait to see her show off for everyone.

Recently we got a pleasant surprise. Mike, Hannah's birthfather, was in town for work and he called to ask if he could drop by. We hadn't seen him for awhile so it was nice for Hannah to get the chance to spend some time with him and get to know him better. Next week we also have date set up to see Tiffany and the twins so we can get Easter pictures taken of the kids again like we did last year. We haven't seem them since before Christmas so I'm anxious to see how the twins have grown and for Tiffany to see how much Hannah has changed.