All About Makenna: 21-22 Month Update

 

Wow!  Makenna is 22 months old!  That means the next entry I write she will be 2 years old!  Everyday she says and does things to remind me that my little baby isn't really a baby anymore.  She surprises us constantly with what she can do and it is so fun seeing her really come into her own.  That being said, I'm glad we still have a couple more months with our one year old before she turns two, I'm not quite ready for that milestone just yet!  We have definitely been savoring the time we have with our one year old and enjoying the last little bit of time that we get to watch are "scooter" and listen to her constantly babbling.  I know it won't be long until the scooting and baby babbles are replaced with walking and talking.  Exciting to see her grown, but still so bitter sweet!

 

A couple huge things happened the last two months!  First ((drumroll please)) Makenna is officially sleeping through the night in her crib!!  It took a while to get to this point, but I can finally say she is completely sleep trained and night weaned!  She goes down at night and for naps without nursing, our bed, and without tears.  It is amazing!!! 

 

Another huge announcement in our house this month is that Makenna is going to be a big sister!!  We always wanted to have our kids really close together (two under two), but that just wasn't in the cards once we were dealt CDH and hydrocephalus.  However, now that things have settled down a bit we are so excited that they will at least only be 2 years and 4ish months apart!  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The last couple of months Makenna has been working really hard on her gross motor skills and her confidence.  She has always been a perfectionist and won't do anything until she can do it perfectly.  She hates practicing new things because she hates making mistakes. It keeps her from taking chances, trying new things, and mastering new kids.  She also thinks through her motor planning much more than the average kid her age.  When she approached a task (such as sitting down from standing), she thinks "what is the worst thing that could happen to me" and of the answer is "get hurt" she is extra cautious and unwilling to independently carry out the task until she is certain she is a pro.  Unfortunately she doesn't realize you can't be a pro until you practice on your own a good bit.  Thankfully the last few weeks she has developed a newfound confidence in herself and it has helped her develop several new skills!  It has been fun watching her try things and become more willing to practice her skills during the day!   She has started pulling up to stand on just about anything she can. 

She got up here on her own!!!

It isn't quite effortless yet, so she struggles a little bit, but she isn't letting it stop her from trying like she was before!  When she pulls up she will cruise the objects in the room with ease even if it involves rounding corners, turning around, or crossing empty spaces.  She has learned how to carefully lower herself back to the sitting position from standing (without plopping down...which was too scary for her to even attempt so she would remain standing until we rescued her) and she can slowly lower herself into the laying down position from sitting up as well (something else she never did until very recently)!  In the last couple of days she has figured out that if she pulls herself to stand on a low object (such as a stair), she can lift her leg and climb!  Today she climbed up two stairs!  Since she has never crawled, she has never been able to crawl up furniture or stairs, so seeing her climb is so exciting!!  Finally the last gross motor skill she has mastered this month is walking with push toys!  She can finally stand up on her own well enough to then walk with the toy.  Previously she would need to lean into the toy for support so much that it would fly out from under her before she had a chance to take a step!  This means she is one step closer to being able to stand up on her own.  So exciting!!

Fine motor skills haven't developed as much the last couple of months, but that is probably because she has been so focused on gross motor and speech!  She has learned how to hold crayons and markers correctly though.  Her grasp looks like a 4 year old, it's amazing!  She has mastered the pincher grasp and can pick up really small objects and put them in small holes with ease.  She also understands the concept of putting shapes in a shape sorter now, although we usually have to show her which hole the shape goes into before she will meet with success.  Another thing she has been working on for a long time is stacking.  She has never really been willing to practice (goes back to the whole perfectionist thing), but finally this month she has started to figure it out.  She loves to nest containers into each other and will put rings on a ring stacker.  She will also occasionally build small towers if she is in the mood.  

Speech the last two months has just exploded.  She must have somewhere close to 250 words at this point and she is really good at using her words to get what she wants, answer questions, and make observations.  She is constantly saying "I want ____" and "I need ____."  She will use words while playing such as "baby go night night" or "baby want bottle" and she will use words to get her way.  She is constantly telling us what she wants to do, where she wants to go, and what she wants to eat.  My favorite is when she says "I gotta scoot!" She answers questions such as "How are you?" with the word "good" and "What are you doing?" with "nothing."  I find some of the words in her vocabulary to be so funny.  For example she will say "daddies gone" "Sadie's lost" "I'm stuck" and "gross."  She is also very polite.  She says thank you without being prompted the majority of the time and will say "bless you" on her own if she hears someone sneeze.  She also used words to tell us when she needs the potty, which has been helpful!  She still loves to sing and is constantly singing "happy birthday" and "amazing grace" and she also understands pretty much everything we say.  We can ask her to bring us items, hand us stuff, or complete simple tasks and she will understand what we want and do it.  She still does a great deal of babbling as well, but you can tell it all makes sense to her.  Everyday her babbles contain more and more real words. It is just so incredible and rewarding to watch her learn our language.  I know her advanced vocabulary is all thanks to how much we talk to her and the number of books we have read to her every day of her life (at least 5 books a day, usually more like 10+!).  It feels great to know that we are developing a child with a broad vocabulary and a love of books.  As a teacher I know that is going to be her saving grace as she enters elementary school with some delays.  

And then there is feeding!  If you read back to a year ago you would see a chubby little baby who was obsessed with foods.  She loved fruits and veggies and while cautious in most things, was an unusually adventurous eater willing to eat just about everything we gave her!  Well fast forward to a few months ago and our little eater became a picky eater.  Or really just not an eater at all.  In the course of a day she would eat a piece of pasta, a cracker, and a bite of chicken.  It was scary and so unlike her.  At first we blamed the fact she was so sick, but even after getting better her appetite didn't improve.  She lost a pound in two months, which meant she dropped from the 50th percentile to the 3rd.  Scary!  Finally a couple weeks ago we tried lowering her reflux medicine dose and just like the time before, that seemed to do the trick!  Her appetite came back!  Although she still refuses to eat any fruit, veggies, or any type of milk.  She has started to wean from nursing (only nursing for comfort) and because she refuses milk, her nutritionist is worried about her calcium intake (she can't take calcium supplements because of her dairy and corn allergies.). She's started seeing a new feeding therapist and they have upped her to twice a week, we are hoping her issues with food can get figured out soon.  Thankfully she loves pasta, rice, chicken, and pizza.  She is a big meat and carbs kind of kid.  So she is back to eating, we just need to work on balancing her diet a bit more and making it more healthy.  She has also learned words for a lot of foods, so she will constantly tell us exactly what she wants to eat.  It is so cute and very nice not having to guess, but it gets tricky when we don't have what she wants!  She has even started getting more specific telling me she wants "hot chicken" (I gave her cold chicken from my salad once...oops!) and "sauce."  It's so funny!   Drinking wise she still chokes on water and refuses milk, but she will drink apple juice.  For a long time she was only drinking 1-3 ounces a day out of a cup and now she is up to 10-15!  Huge improvement, although they want her closer to 30 ounces (including fluid from food) a day.  I'm just happy she is drinking from a cup.  When she was younger I always said I would never allow her to drink juice, but now I don't care.  She can drink whatever she wants as long as she will drink!    She can also eat whatever she wants.  If she requests pasta for breakfast or cookies (fig newtons) for snack, that is what she will get. Right now our mission is strictly keeping her hydrated and getting some weight back on her body.

Health wise the last two months have been kind of crazy.  The ear infection she had in the last entry was really stubborn and refused to go away.  She did 17 days of antibiotics and it was still raging.  They ended up giving her antibiotics shots for three days in a row and that finally knocked it out!  Stomach bug, strep throat, sinus infection, and a 3 week ear infection all within 5 weeks!  She also cut two of her two year molars and three other teeth, so now she is up to 14 teeth!  Poor girl had such a rough time!  We also went back to Gainesville for check ups with neurosurgery and pediatric surgery this month (19th return trip in 22 months!).  They did a chest x-Ray and Makenna was a champ.  She sat still without going in the tube and didn't cry at all!  This was a relief for me because since I am pregnant I wasn't able to go with her this time.  It was the first scan (minus in the NICU) that I haven't been by her side, so I was thrilled she handled it well!  The x-Rays looks great and Dr. Kays was impressed with how well she is doing over all.  He wasn't thrilled that she isn't walking yet and was concerned with her weight drop, but said he knows both will come with time.  Neurosurgery was also all positive.  They didn't have to do a MRI since she had the emergency scan in May, and said she won't need anymore MRI's unless we fear her shunt has malfunctioned.  They also said clinically she looks good and cognitively she was developing wonderfully!  They were beyond impressed with how good she looks.   All good news during that trip, which was amazing, and to make things even better both pediatric surgery and neurosurgery said she doesn't have to come back for an entire year!  She has been going every 1-4 months since discharge from the hospital, so this is super exciting news that means she is finally on a healthy/stable CDH and hydrocephalus schedule! 

So there you have it!  Makenna continues to grow and develop everyday.  She is meeting and exceeding expectations and doing incredible.  She is a sweet, social, talkative, engaging, smart, funny, and beautiful little girl.  We love her to pieces and can't wait to see her step into the role of a "two year old" and a "big sister" over the next months.  Despite all the craziness that was outside our control, she makes being a mom rewarding, fun, and exciting.  I'm blessed to have her in my life and thank God everyday for the gift of time.  Half of all CDH parents had this time taken away from them.  I am so thankful for every day...hour...minute...and even second I get to spend with her.  I know so many parents would give anything for one more second and I am determined to never take a single moment of her sweet life for granted.  

 

 

Height:  32 inches

 

Weight:  20 pound 12 ounces
Eyes:   Brownish-green
Hair:  Light brown, getting curly, and very long!
Clothes:  12-18 months
Diapers:  Potty trained!
Food:  She also likes noodles, meat, pizza, rice, pea crisps, salad, and quinoa
Sleep:   Finally sleeping through the night!!!
Shoes:  size 3
Favorites:   Makenna loves markers/crayons, Frozen (Anna), keys, remotes, Sadie, and books!