A Much Needed Update

Wearing Daddy's Bears hat in the Go Pod

Nick and Great Uncle Jim

Four Generations

Nick and Daddy

Nick and Aunt Heather

Nick and Great Grandma

Nick and Mommy

Under the Tree

I have been a bad blogger lately. It just seems like there is no time anymore. Let's start with Christmas. We had a small get together with Grandma and Grandpa Matthews before Christmas. Then Grandma T flew down to SC so she could drive back to Chicago with Nick and me. Mark couldn't request his vacation until Dec. 26 so he flew to Chicago on Christmas and drove home with us. The drive up there was not bad. It took us 14 hours which included 2 stops of an hour each. Nick did pretty well. He was getting bored so whoever wasn't driving was on their knees in the front passenger seat trying to entertain him. His favorite thing to do was play with a toy then throw it between the seat and the door. About 2 hours from home he got really mad. He was so upset I had to take him out of the car seat. I felt horrible doing that but it made him stop screaming. When we got there we put him in his play area and he was so happy.

The first few days we did some shopping and baking. He does not like his winter coat at all. We found him a less bulky winter coat that he accepted more but he spent most of the time in the house. On the 23rd something went wrong with the processor for his cochlear implant. I called Cochlear and they said it was something with the programming and the audiologist would have to fix it. Of course we didn't bring his backup processor with us and the audiologist was about 900 miles away so he was earless until Mark got there with the backup on Christmas morning. On Christmas we spent time with the family and opened presents. Nicholas was having a hard time with all the noise so we had to take his CI off. He was in silence for a few days and there were more people there than he is used to so that is understandable. Once we turned it off he was happy. He kept scooting under the tree pretending to be a present. He also enjoyed playing with Uncle Tim's pants.

We found this chair called a Go Pod while we were up there. We bought a new walker to take with us but the seat was so shallow he was flopping over and could fall out so we couldn't use it. The pod has a low seat and he can stand up in it. It is really neat. I have to post a video of him in it. It was next to a chair that had a blanket hanging over the top. He kept sticking his head in the folds of the blanket and jumped up and down. He thought it was great! It was really funny.

The day after Christmas my mom's family came over. It was great that they agreed to change the normal Christmas plans so they could see us and meet Nicholas. The next day a bunch of friends came over to meet him. We also had Mark's cousin, his wife and son, and his aunt over for dinner. It was nice to see them too.

It was a great trip and really flew by. The drive home was not fun at all. We were making good time until we got to the Kentucky/Tennessee state line. There was an overturned semi which caused the interstate to stop. Then there were a bunch of fender benders from the stop and go. Heather and John were nice enough to look online to see if they could figure out what was going on. They found the department of transportation site and told us what to expect. It was right and very helpful. That mess took 3 hours to get through and we only drove 40 miles. Nicholas was getting mad by that point so we stopped for dinner. We brought the pod in so he could stretch his legs out. We were probably the talk of the servers at Cracker Barrel that night. Right when they were serving our food Nick threw up. He just ate too much. I caught the first one in the bib and Mark caught round 2 in his hands. I would have been so grossed out if I was the server. Then about 20 minutes after we got back on the road Nick started screaming. We were going to have to stop for the night or I was going to have to take him out of the car seat. I really didn't' want to do that because we were at the beginning of the mountains and that is the most dangerous part of the drive plus it was nighttime and there was ice on the side of the road. Then I caught a whiff of his diaper and knew it was a bad one. We stopped at a gas station and they didn't have a changing table so we went to the next one and they didn't have one either. So annoying. We had to change him in the front seat of the car in the parking lot. Poor guy had poop all over his clothes and down his legs. It was bad. To top it off it was about 20 degrees outside. He was shivering and crying. We got him in his PJ's and back in the car and he was asleep in no time. So we continued driving. This all happened in Tennessee so we still had about 5 hours of driving. We finally made it home at about 1am after 19 hours of traveling.

The next day Nick had a low fever of 100.5 and was a little congested. We canceled OT and his GI scope. He had whatever it was for a few days. Thankfully it never got bad and he did really well with it. Now Mark is sick and I'm trying not to get it. Therapy was back to normal this week. He did really well in both PT and OT. Both his therapists approved the pod too. You never know, something that we think is great could be really bad to a therapist. His physical therapist had him sitting for 10 seconds. She thinks he is really, really close to sitting on his own. He has really taken to the sippy cup the past few weeks. He looks at it in amazement. When you give him a drink he smiles then grabs for it. He will bring it to his mouth and chew on it. It is so funny how he thinks it is just the greatest thing. This is a big improvement from about a month ago when he would push it away.