When Dylan was a younger I was never told the importance of how great it is for kids with down syndrome to learn to drink from a straw. This helps encourage the tongue retraction and discourage tongue protrusion. But, most of the time, when the child learns to drink from the straw initially, they will drink with their tongue sticking out and therefore be sucking with their tongue, not their lips. This does the exact opposite of what you want the straw drinking to do. This encourages tongue protrusion and completely prohibits tongue retraction.

We had started Dylan out on a sippy cup once he turned one, but it was more of a bottle with a soft spout.  We let him start with this not knowing that we should have started him on a sippy cup that had a straw. At that time I was just excited that he was drinking on his own. After awhile Dylan's OT therapist said we needed to try and get him to drink from a straw. She recommended us getting the
"Honey Bear". It is a bear cup that has a straw, but you can help squeeze it when the child is learning to drink out of it. This helps them understand that something is coming out of it. Well..Dylan wanted nothing to do with it, he just wanted his sippy cup.

So after months of trying we decided to try other things and work back words. We got rid of the soft spout sippy cup and got him onto a hard spout sippy cup that actually is better for them. It does not let their tongue just lay flat. We also started doing some more oral motor skills with him blowing and using his lips more. One of the activities that I have been working so hard on is getting him to blow at the little party windmill toys. This is a great activity because it helps him to understand the "cause" and "effect" this promotes that if they blow that the windmill will spin, so it helps to get him excited! After about 2 months Dylan finally used his lips and was blowing that little windmill. I was so excited! Dylan has been doing so awesome and we are so proud of him!


IMG 5650 from Michelle Lopez on Vimeo.

Haylee Lynn:: 1 Month Old

My baby girl is 1 month old. Where does the time go? This last month has been pretty busy in our house. Going from 1 baby to 2 babies is definitely a game changer. Trying to figure out how to split your time with both is a challenge. What I thought was going to be very hard actually has become very easy ( well not easy ) but easier then I thought. I have made it a priority to make sure Dylan is still getting all the attention as he has been the only child for the last 3 years. It won't need to happen all the time, but we wanted to make sure the transition of a new sibling in the house was a smooth as possible.

Haylee is very different from her brother as a baby, but that was expected! Not every baby is the same. She is very needy and what I mean by that is she will not let me put her down. The baby bjorn has become my best friend. She does not like her swing or her bouncy seat unless she is sleeping. We recently had to switch formulas on her. She has been very gassy and fussy for a few days. After doing some research most babies have an allergy to cows milk and it is very hard on their bellies. So we decided to switch her over to Nutramigen, it is a Lactose Free formula. If any mom's our formula feeding I would recommend this as it saved our life and really helped her. She is a total different baby then she was just 2 days ago. She sleeps pretty good at night and is only waking up once which is huge for only being 4 weeks old. She smiles a lot and just a little love bug! I am loving having a girl, but very different from a boy. We love you Haylee!

It's Christmas Time

This past weekend we finally got around to putting up our Christmas decorations! This is my favorite time of the year....Can't wait for all the celebrations with the family!

Illumin Ocean

Last weekend we went down to the Harbor where they had this amazing light show all set up. It is called " Illumine Ocean" Its all Christmas lights of ocean animals all up and down the harbor. It was so magical and so awesome that they finally did something in our town that made it feel like the holidays. We went with my Dad, Step Mom and Step Sister. We went and had a wonderful dinner and then headed on for our journey to look at the lights. Dylan had so much fun and I was so happy to finally kick off our Christmas month!

Thanksgiving

This year we went to my Dad and Stepmom's house for Thanksgiving. I was so excited to be spending it with my Mom, My sister and her family, my Step Sister and Grandma. There is nothing more that I love then to be with family and have a big group for the holidays!

We started our beautiful morning off with a family walk around the trails by our house. The weather could of not had been more perfect. This was Haylee's first Thanksgiving and I loved being with my little family. Cathy my step mom did an amazing job on the food and I think I ate WAY too much! We played card games, drank wine, played in the back yard with the kids and just had an amazing "Thankful" day!! Now on to Christmas...

Walking & Milestones

In our home we have a saying with Dylan that " Dylan will do everything on his own time" We have had this since Dylan was a Little baby!

Dylan currently goes to Physical Therapy 3 days a week and we have been working very hard on his walking and his stability and strength in his legs. I was hoping that he would be walking by time his sister arrived, but that is ok. Like I said he will do it on his own time. Well a few weeks back our nanny and I were sitting in the living room and we decided to work with Dylan and sure enough he took his first steps!! I was a mess, yes crying hard and could not believe my eyes. I knew he would do it, it was just a matter of time and when he felt confident enough. I was so excited that I was home to see this moment and share it with him and our family. We are so proud of him and how hard he works. He still has a little ways to go before he is actually "running" but he is such a strong little boy!

IMG 5354 from Michelle Lopez on Vimeo.