Where do I begin??

It's been over a month since my last post. And things have been quite interesting around here. This might be one long post..or maybe I'll break it up into a couple of posts. I haven't quite decided yet. So we'll see how it goes.

Carson:

I love this picture. It looks like Carson is saying "Brody, I have your car. HA HA HA! Aren't you going to try to get it away from me?"

Carson turned 5 months earlier this month. He is getting more precious everyday. He has big brown eyes that just melt pretty much everyone's heart. And he sure knows who to give the eyes to, to get what he wants :) I really don't feel like there's anything significant since month 4. We are starting solid food this week. We could have done it already but I wanted to wait until after Christmas to eliminate more work to do while we were traveling. As the picture above demonstrates, Carson is somewhat of a bully to Brody. We knew that would eventually happen, but we thought it would be when they are older. He loves getting Brody's toys, but his favorite..pulling Brody's hair. It makes me laugh every time. Brody looks at me like "Mom, this mean kid is beating me up!"

Brody:

Brody with his good buddy Caleb V. I don't think we'd make it through Hope Group without Caleb! We love this family lots, despite all the t.u. paraphernalia you see in this photo.

I can't believe my Brody boy will be 2 next month. Craziness! I think in my last post I mentioned that he went to TX Children's once but had to go a second time. Our second visit was the week before Christmas. We saw a doctor in the physical medicine and rehab department so I guess she was really able to tell a lot about his muscles and joints. As she examined him, she noticed that he had low muscle tone, a weak pelvic area, his knees hyperextend and he rolls onto his ankles. She said all of these are related but she isn't sure what came first. It's like the chicken and the egg. One thing happened and it is causing the others but there's not a clear answer as to what the source is. So she prescribed braces for his legs.

I have to admit that when I first heard this, I was picturing bulky metal things like Forrest Gump wore. But they've come a long way since then...and they won't be like that at all. According to the description we were given and the website, I assume they'll look like this.  They won't have flowers and butterflies of course. Brody would never forgive us for that. Our big man is getting cars and trucks. So in the next couple of weeks Brody will be getting his new leg accessories. Its going to be a huge adjustment for us. Its going to take him a while to get used to them..I don't even know how he'll walk in them. But obviously that's what they're meant for.

After 4 months, we'll go back in for her to re-evaluate and see how much progress he's made. There's a chance he could wear them up to a year. We're hoping that by combining this with physical therapy he'll be out of them sooner than expected. But if not, that's ok...we'll make the best of it!

So besides all of the walking drama, Brody is his usual funny self. He has started adding a few phrases to his vocabulary. Our favorite is "I don't know." He uses it when you ask him where something is and he sounds so concerned when he says it. And of course he raises his shoulders and hands in the "I don't know" gesture. Other phrases he uses are "There it is", usually in response to the first question; "There's ____" (insert someone's name), "Where'd it go?" and there's a couple more that I can't remember. So after typing this out it seems he is always looking for something haha. I'm not gonna lie, a couple of weeks ago I was concerned about his speech. I didn't think he was where he should be. But after talking to a few people and counting up how many words he uses I let it go. He has more than the 25 the dr. said was normal. And, we've noticed that he associates sounds with objects, which they said is fine. So instead of saying car...he says "vrrooom." Instead of cow, he says "moo" when he sees one. But he knows its a car and a cow if you ask him. He just chooses to say the sound instead of the word. He does this for a few objects but then randomly will bust out with new words all the time that I didn't know he knew. So maybe its just the way he thinks about things and he'll be a really creative person.

He wanted to get in the jumparoo...before we put the seat in.

He has a new love of playing in containers.