Please say some prayers, Tuesday morning is Quinn's surgery at 8:00 a.m., we have to be there at 6:00 a.m., so it's going to be a long day! The doctor will go down her throat to see how the top of her trach site looks. It should be a simple out patient process, but anesthesia is involved, so it makes me a bit worried. I do know that prayer works so if you could help us out, I would be grateful!


I walked into Chrissy's house to find Quinn and Casey hanging out. I tell you what, Chrissy seriously has super powers! Quinn was over there for a few hours and in that time went potty twice, only sitting on the potty less then a minute both times, and stayed totally dry all morning. While yesterday she sat on the potty for me a few times totaling 20 minutes, and continued to tell me, she wanted to go potty, and did not do it. She will potty for me sometimes, but she does it for Chrissy all the time! We love you Chrissy! Then we got home from Chrissy's and Quinn took a 3 hour nap, as she does not want to miss anything over there, so waits to get to our boring old house and then sleep!



Well John has not gotten to leave Lincoln for the summer so we went to Omaha for a bit. If you have not been to the Joslyn lately, it's great! The children's garden was wonderful. We even ran into one of my students, and she helped me start to think of school and look forward to it!

Then we walked around Nebraska Furniture Mart, dreaming of all the things we would love to have someday, and more importantly trying to figure out what we both like, in my opinion, John goes for boring, and I go for kookie, and those don't mix to well, but I'm starting to change his mind. Weird enough, we ran into our friends from Ohio when we were there! That was so fun! So we got another picture with Karissa!

Finally we got to do some swimming, but not to much, as the water was freezing, but with dad swimming with her, she sure did not want to get out right away! Just look at that big kick in progress! You go Quinn! So a day of relaxing and fun, to get us ready for work and surgery!

Here are a few pictures my aunt took awhile back, and I had to share them, just love them.

We had a doctor appointment today, and I think one each day this week, leading up to a minor surgery on Tuesday, for the doctor to do a scope down Quinn's throat to see what the area above her trach looks like. It's a small surgery, but includes anesthesia, so that is a big deal for us. We should still be home on Tuesday, which is good, because I start back to school on Wednesday. We are moving back into our old school building, and I think I've got over 100 boxes to unpack, art supplies take up lots of room. So please say some prayers for next Tuesday, Aug 2nd. We will be at Children's at 6 in the morning!

Wow, after a busy week of fun in Memphis and a fun weekend with my friends from High School. (How lucky I am to still have close friends from High School) Quinn is exhausted! You can also see Quinn's Micky Button on her tummy in this picture, it is what we use to help feed her. What a cutie pie! I love to watch her stretch out!

Here are Quinn and Karissa, Quinn is telling her quite a story!
I did not get any pictures of Quinn and Grandma, so I had to throw this one in for fun! We love you Grandma!

One of the many fun memories from our trip. Quinn does not like to talk to folks she does not know. I keep thinking one of these times, she is going to give in and talk. Well, it happened on accident for her. We were in our bedroom getting ready for bed, and I was at the foot of the bed getting stuff ready for the next day, and Quinn starts yelling "Mom" because she did not know where I was. Grandma just stepped into the room, and said, "I just heard her say Mom, is that what I heard?" Quinn looked over to see her, and got this look on her face that showed an opps, I was caught, and she did not talk again the rest of the night. Grandma heard her though, so that is a step in the right direction!

Here we are on the drive home, Quinn sang and laughed for a good 20 minutes. OH how I love hearing her sing.



More time with family, relaxing, fun, loving, uplifting moments. I love to see how much everyone loves Quinn. How thankful I am for that.

Here I was just talking about Quinn not being able to go swimming, but my cousin Chase and his wife Cassie have a pool, and grandpa carefully took Quinn swimming, and she loves it as much as ever. She kicked and smiled and loved it.

Now we are in Memphis for a bit! Spending time relaxing with family, and we hit a movie. Quinn went to the auto parts store with both her grandpa's for a fun morning, and we are heading out again to enjoy the day.

7-19-11

Well, summer school is already over. I don't know where the summer is going. Quinn started off summer school, not opening her eyes, and all, but by the end of it was doing much better. She was not totally into it, but much better! Before you know it we will school time again.

7-12-11

Quinn is doing better with school. They are doing lots of painting projects and how she loves to paint! She has come home with glitter all over her, in her backpack, everywhere, and I love it! We have had time to read and go to the library. We have done a few exercises here and there, and I am enjoying every minute I get to spend with her.

After school today, Quinn got to go hang out with Chrissy, Annette, Casey, Alexis, and Michael. They went and did some shopping and made pizza. I hear it was pretty good, Casey pushing Quinn, while Alexis held her hand as they were walking through the isles. Love it! Then pizza making, I love it how they get everyone involved.

Then after a quick nap at home, we went to therapy. This was a bit different then a regular session. We started fitting her for her power chair. Instead of a regular seat, we are spicing it up! Quinn when she is calm, sits great, but sometimes you can tell she gets tired of sitting, and so she squirms all around and kicks her hip out and moves her pelvis forward, and I think wow, look at you moving, but her therapists thing, OH NO! That is not good posture, and that can lead to all kinds of issues down the road, so we are looking at making her a special seat that keeps her in proper alignment. You know only the best for our Quinn! Goodness.

So now you can see her sitting on this beanbag chair, and they would push and pull the beans around her until it was nice and snug and then they sucked all the air out of it, all the time making sure Quinn was in good alignment. I was not sure what to think, but after seeing Quinn sitting in it so nicely, I loved it. She held her head up better, due to the extra support around her torso. Then Suzanne and Chrissy started sharing how with that extra support, Quinn should be able to hold her head up better, and kids tend to do better with many other things, as they don’t have to worry about how to hold up their bodies so much. We will just have to do extra work in her walker, so she stays as strong as possible. Then after they molded the chair around Quinn, and pulled the air out, the mold stayed in place, and through amazing technology, they ran this cord over the chair to record the placement of the beans, an electronic mold was created! We accomplished another step in the process of getting Quinn her wheels. Oh, we also picked out colors today. I personally was not going to go with yellow, as Quinn will look like a bumblebee, but as Kurt was naming off colors, Quinn went nuts when he said yellow. So I asked her a few more times to try to sway her to a nice silver or pink, but nope, she was more then sure that she wanted yellow, so a yellow and black chair she will have.

We don’t waist time at therapy, as everyone was pulling and tugging on those beans, Stacie and Quinn were busy eating lemon pudding. I was impressed, with all the hustle going on around Quinn; she was loving the attention, and still doing a great job eating her pudding. What a great day! As we loaded up in the SUV (soon to be van, so please start praying for us, as we get started looking for a different vehicle to drive Quinn and her soon to be, new wheels around in) I could tell Quinn was tired. By the time we got home, she was sound asleep! What an exciting, busy, wonderful day she had today!

july 11, 2011

While I was working out at Madonna a couple days ago, I saw a bunch of families walk by me to go out to the pool. Sometimes I wish that could be us, where Quinn could simply walk out to the pool, we could splash and I could teach her how to dive, and tell her not to run on the cement. The simple things I once planned on doing with her. Well instead of getting to emotional over it, I started thinking of all the things that we can do, and by the time I was done, I knew how good we have it. So here are just a few things that I thought of as I was walking on the treadmill at Madonna.

What I love about Quinn. I’m thankful that Quinn likes to snuggle into me and hold my hand. I’m thankful she loves to hear the music at church, and relaxes and smiles when we go there. I’m thankful that we can park close to the stores in special parking just for us. I’m thankful that Quinn pushes me away when I go to kiss her sometimes, while other times calls out for kisses. I’m thankful that Quinn could sit and read books with me for hours. I’m thankful that Quinn is interested in going potty on her potty chair. I’m thankful Quinn wants to drive a power chair. I’m thankful she has been seizure free for along time, and out of the hospital. I’m thankful she is so stubborn, that is a very good thing sometimes. I’m thankful that she giggles when she hears we are going to wash her hair. I’m thankful that I get to cuddle up with her at bedtime, even if she does not like to go to bed until it’s way to late. I’m thankful she does not throw fits in the department stores. I am thankful that she will throw things onto the floor of that department store if I put things on her lap. We make a game out of it. I just know better then to give her breakable things, while we are shopping. I’m thankful I get to pick out cute things for her to wear, and that she likes wearing them. I’m thankful I get to do her hair, and she does not complain too much. I’m thankful she sits at restaurants with us so nicely. I’m thankful for my friends and family who love her for who she is. I’m thankful for all the people we have met because of her special needs. I’m thankful we have been able to share our story with a few folks here and there, and hope we can inspire a person or two, a little bit. I’m thankful she will holler for me, when I’m cleaning or not right next to her, and she wants to know where I am, and once she sees me, she gets quiet and looks the other way. I’m thankful she likes to cuddle and sing.
We have got it pretty good!

Well, it's been a tiring week, full of love, cuddles, and naps. First, Quinn is loving cuddling with her 4 month old cousin, and she loves holding her, like she holds her baby doll. She continues to look over and make sure Kyra is doing ok. So fun.
Then it's nap time, Quinn fell asleep in her walker, notice her picture behind her walker. We splurged on a fun picture of her for the soon to be house. Just an FYI: she does have shorts on, they just rode up a bit, so this picture is totally G rated.
Finally I walked in on Quinn and dad taking a snooze, along with Ariel, who Quinn still loves to pieces.
Another fun story, as we were hanging out with family over the July 4th weekend, I went into the living room to see John, using his skills, as he has learned a few exercises to help Quinn learn to roll, well, he decided to help her cousin, Kyra learn how to roll. It was pretty stinking cute!
We also got to play with our cousins over the weekend, and it's always good to see family.