March for Babies Success!

A quick post to say THANK YOU! and post some pictures from the walk on Saturday. Thanks to everyone's generosity, Team Cubby raised $2,860! Twelve adults and two babies joined Jeff, Jake, and I for a great walk. Thanks again to Carmen and Jeff at Koala Tee for our great shirts!! We had a lot of fun and really appreciate everyone's support.

Yay for healthy babies!

Give me a solid for healthy babies, Steph!

A nice, leisurely stroll

Plenty of time for pictures

And hi-jinks

In case you wondered which one was him...

We were really excited to run into Jake's primary nurse, Annette, in the parking lot as we were leaving!


Quite a difference from August 2008...


And finally, on a different note, does anyone know where to buy (or know someone who makes) busy/quiet books for toddlers? These are the cloth/felt books that have buttons, snaps, zippers, ties, etc for them to practice on. I had one as a child and loved it, and Jake has a lot of interest in buttons, snaps, etc lately. Click here for an idea of what I'm talking about. Thanks for any leads!

Spring Time

Spring is in full force in North Carolina. The dogwood blooms came out this week and the daffodils are already saying their goodbyes. We're supposed to have temperatures in the 80s all through this Easter three-day (at least for me) weekend.

Jake learned the sign for "outside" a few weeks ago, and he signs it almost as soon as he gets up. He loves, loves, loves being outside. He plays with his basketball goal, goes down his slide, chases the dog, and just likes to wander through the yard, picking up leaves, acorns, rocks, and anything else that looks interesting.

We started a signing class last weekend for parents and babies/toddlers. The teacher comes to our house and a few other families come over with their kids. Jake liked it and paid attention fairly well for an almost 2-year old in an hour long class. The class was recommended by Jake's speech therapist, Tracy, who advised that we continue to teach him new signs as we work on his speech. Tracy now comes once per week and we have seen some real progress. Jake is far more vocal than he has been in the past and he now has at least three true words (mama, dada, and baba for ball).

Even though he has had some progress with speech in the last few weeks, Jeff and I are coming to terms with the fact that it seems that Jake might have a condition called verbal apraxia. The easiest way to explain it is that for kids with apraxia their minds have trouble telling their mouths how to form words. Jake is too young to diagnose, but he seems to have some classic symptoms - receptive language is far ahead of expressive language, he can say a word several times and then not be able to say it again (for days or even months), and when you watch him try to speak it is as though you can see the wheels turning and he is trying very hard, but he just can't get it out.

Of course, this isn't news that any parent wants to hear and when the speech therapist first suggested it (we've been operating from the thought that he just has a "preemie speech delay") it felt like a kick in the gut. In fact, it still feels like a kick in the gut. But after doing some research, it feels like we can't really deny that apraxia is a definite possibility.

One of the main websites we've been going to is www.apraxia-kids.org. The first time there I was reading through their Family Guide and came across a page on Feelings, Emotions, and Coping. I almost laughed out loud when I read the following line:

"Your picture of your child’s perfect life has been shattered."

Any dream I had of a "perfect" life for Jake was shattered almost two years ago lying in a hospital bed. We knew that life, especially the beginning, was going to be very, very hard on Jake. At that time, I wondered why something so many women do without really thinking about it (carrying a baby to term) couldn't be reality for us. And now I can't help but find myself wondering now why something that nearly everyone takes for granted (speaking) can't come easy for my child. Jeff is an eternal optimist and reminds me that we have been incredibly lucky and that we have a wonderful little boy. And he's right. But sometimes you can't help but wish you were a little luckier...

Here's a video and a few pictures of Jake from back in February when we still needed hats and gloves. Thanks to Andrea for knitting him the adorable bear hat, and thanks to Jenny for coming to visit!

Three generations of Walker men

March for Babies, Take Two

It's that time of year again - when we shamelessly use our blog to raise money for the March of Dimes. As you all know, Jake was born too early. He was in the NICU for 87 days, and while we avoided many of the major preemie health problems, he did have trouble breathing. Within the first minutes of life, he received surfactant which essentially helped to keep his lungs from collapsing and sticking to themselves. Research into surfactant was sponsored by the March of Dimes (MoD) several years ago, and today MoD continues to sponsor research into the causes and treatment of prematurity.

Jake is part of a club no baby should have to be a member of - less than 1% of babies in the US are born before 28 weeks but almost 13% are born before 37 weeks and considered premature births. Every day, thousands of babies are born too soon, too small, and often very sick.

We're walking in the March for Babies on April 24th, and we need your help. Please consider joining our Team (Team Cubby, of course!) or making a donation. You can make a donation by clicking on the badge at the right. You can join our team by clicking here.

Thank you!!!

Jeff and Jake on the day Jake was born

Jeff and Jake on the day Jake came home

Jeff and Jake on Christmas Day 2009

GO BLUE!

After Christmas in Indy, we went up to Ann Arbor. In the interest of getting this posted, I'm going to go light on the narrative and give you what you really want - pictures and video.

"You've got big feet Grandpa Dale"

"Aunt Jen has big feet too! Her boots go all the way up my leg!"


"Another dog to love!" (that's Figo under the love tackle from Jake)


"I'll write down the gifts this year Michigan Grandma"


"This is a great book about dogs, Grandpa!"

Some of you may know that Jake's favorite book is an out-of-print title called Gas Station Charlie. It's a true story about a Golden Retriever who "worked" at a gas station in Saline, Michigan near Ann Arbor. Charlie has passed on, as has his son, but his grandson Harley works at the station now. We took Jake to the gas station while we were in Michigan. Here's Jake meeting his favorite character.


He's just a little excited.




We took Jake to campus one day. It was really, really cold (don't forget Jake is a Southerner!), so we didn't go quite as many places as we would have liked to, but we still got some good pictures and got to see some old stomping grounds.

"Down with the Buckeyes!!"

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

We're now "those crazy parents"

Okay, so we've been "those crazy parents" with regards to preemie things (hand sanitizer anyone?) for a long time, but we really jumped off the cliff into crazy parent land when we decided the best way to get home for Christmas in the Midwest was to get up at 3:00 a.m. and leave under the cover of darkness. Amazingly enough, those crazy parents know something and this strategy worked really well for us. Jake handled the 12-hour car ride like the trooper he is and we got to Indiana while it was still daylight.

Jake had a great time with his cousin Lily, Aunt Kathryn, Gamma B, and Papaw George, but his heart belonged to Bailey the dog.

"Let me show you how to open that Papaw"

"Let US show you how to open that Papaw"

"Who is this dog?"

"I like the Colts too, Papaw!"

"I love this rocking horse that was Gammy B's when she was little"

"This dog is fun!"

"Oh, so that's how you climb up and down the stairs super fast"


"I really love this dog"

"Play us another one Gammy B!"

"I really, really love this dog"

We also got to see my good friend Amy and her son Elliott while we were in Indy. It was great to catch up and for Jake to have another little playmate. Elliott was born right around when Jake was due, so they are pretty close in age.


Jake wonders how Elliott got all that hair...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

After the fun of Indiana, we headed up to Michigan for more fun! Pictures and videos coming soon!

Catching up

Jeff and I just finished watching the special 19 Kids and Counting... (or rather, I just finished making Jeff watch it with me). Back in December baby Josie was born weighing 1 pound, 6 ounces at 25 weeks. I know people have lots of opinions about the Duggars (except Jeff who had never heard of them until tonight - my husband is not exactly a pop culture guru). But say what you will, I feel like I could actually relate to them now. The fear in JimBob's eyes is what is still with me: Jeff had that same look while we were in the hospital. A woman from a preemie board I go to wrote a really excellent blog post about the Duggars back when Josie was born. You can find it here. (and you can also read the amazing tale of Robbie!)

Enough about the Duggars. We have a lot of catching up to do around here. Here's the last few months in pictures.

Here's an outtake from our Thanksgiving day photo shoot at Cousin Todd and Aunt Suse's. A pretty good picture but we are all looking different places, which is slightly disorienting...


Todd and Susannah with Jake. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner with Todd, Susannah, her sister Mary, and her mom. That makes two years in a row of Thanksgivings in the D with friends and family. Not having to cook is very nice! Thank you!!


A series from our attempts to get a "at the fireplace by the tree" shot.

"Very sweet"

"Why are you grabbing your foot?"



"Don't grab your foot."

"Okay, let's try somewhere else."

"Yeah, that's not going to work either."


In early December we headed out to the Outer Banks again. This time hitting the southern end and a really nice little town? spot? named Frisco. Jeff's boss at Datatel took the whole team out to a little shack by the sea (aka, a huge 9-bedroom house that sits right on the beach with a heated pool, hot tub, the works!) to celebrate the end of the NC Project. We had a lot of great food and drink and the company was wonderful as always! Jeff was lucky to get to work with such a great bunch of folks for such a long time.

Mom and son in front of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse...

The Datatel NC team (with Jake wandering in)

In early December Jake was evaluated by a speech pathologist because we had some concerns that although he seems to understand most things, he is still not saying much. She confirmed what we essentially already knew. His receptive language was at a 19-month level (ahead for even his actual age at the time) but his expressive language was at an 11-month level. The pathologist had a number of things for us to try, and for Christmas I did get what I wanted - Jake's first word, which fittingly is "woof." He's now added "moo" and the occasional "meow." It seems that he really wants to talk to the animals before he talks to us. Fortunately, he signs for "food," "more," "help," "all done," "please," "bye bye," "book," and he blows kisses, so we know, roughly, what it is he wants. We are going to start speech therapy this month, so maybe sometime soon we will have a video of Jake talking.

He may not be trash talking yet, but this kid is already a baller. Here he is in late November with Dad's basketball...