The bathroom gods are against me

Ok, this bathroom is becoming a major thorn in my side. I have (almost) all the supplies I need, I just need to get the floor into a state where I can start. That involves unhooking the toilet and getting it out of the way for the time being. I knew what to do but a toilet is a huge porcelain PITA (pain in the a$$) and I didn't want to risk breaking it and having "new toilet" be part of my bathroom remodeling expenses. So I waited to request Jeff's help in moving it this weekend.

Well, the toilet has decided it doesn't WANT to be moved and is staying put. There seems to be something wrong with one of the nut/bolt thingies that secure the toilet to the floor. The top nut can be moved, but the ENTIRE nut/bolt/nut system is moving together, meaning nothing is coming off. And since the other nut is on the UNDERSIDE of the toilet, which we can't get to, we're at a loss as to how we're going to keep that one secure in order to get the top nut off. This whole thing makes my brain hurt....

And once again I have a time limit. Not like I wanted to still be doing this 2 weeks after I started. I wanted it done within 4 days, which was feasible at the time. But houses are fickle things. And I have 3 little distractions who don't like me working on the bathroom while they're at home/awake. But now that Emma & Sarah are at speech camp (Emma all day, Sarah in the afternoon) and Katie is now taking naps in the afternoon, I have almost 2 1/2 hours in order to work on it!! But, this still requires that the stupid toilet be detached from it's current position. So, it's another trip to Home Depot for me. I think they're gonna know me by name soon.

Central Michigan Down syndrome Society

When Sarah was first born, and we found out about her little something extra, we looked around for some local support. We didn't find much. So, I went online and found a wonderful group of people that I have looked to in times of stress and celebrated with in times of great joy. We have been fortunate to meet up with some of them over the last 4 years, but there's still nothing that beats having a local group that you can talk to & meet up with on a regular basis.

Last year, on Mother's Day, we went out to Bob Evans (a Marie Calendar's type of restaurant). While we were having breakfast, a family walked by & stopped in front of our table. The mom started talking to Sarah, and commented on how cute she was. Generally when people do that, it's because they have some sort of Down syndrome connection. And as soon as I saw the little baby in the infant seat, I saw the connection. We didn't exchange information, it was a nice little meeting where we shared something in common.

Fast forward about 6 months. I get a letter in the mail from a woman who was starting up a local Ds group and wanted to know if we would join. I jumped at the chance and called her right away. What do you know, it was the same family from Bob Evans. Their little girl was named Elizabeth and they had just gotten through heart surgery. We set up a recurring meeting at McDonald's for once a month. She decided, since this town is pretty small, and there aren't many kids with Ds, to include kids with other special needs. Sarah's little friend from preschool, Morgan, who has agenesis of the corpus callosum started joining us as well.

Our little support group is growing in numbers and in activities. We have an official website and a date for a Buddy Walk. So if anyone is in the central Michigan area, you are welcome to join!!

Prayers for Kennedy

On the sidebar, you might notice a new button. It's for a sweet little girl named Kennedy. Kennedy is only about a month younger than Sarah, but has been through so much in her short 4 years. She has a little something extra, like Sarah, but her family has been tested with some medical challenges that we haven't. Last year, right before her 3rd birthday, Kennedy was diagnosed with AML (Acute Myelogenous Leukemia). Kids with Ds have a much higher rate than the average population to get diagnosed with leukemia. But, the up side is that kids with Ds also have a much higher remission/success rate. The chemo schedule for AML is rigorous (this is the same form of leukemia that Chelsea was diagnosed with). It is 6-9 months of chemo, between 4-6 rounds, with each round lasting about 1 month from admission to release. Then there's the side effects of chemo: hair loss, NO immune system, pain, nausea, general fatigue. So many of our online friends have had to deal with this.


After she got through that with flying colors (she's still in remission!!! Yay!!), she had another surprise for her family. See, another medical issue that many kids with Ds have to face is AAI (Atlantoaxial Instability). It is a problem in the upper part of the spine where the neck vertebras aren't formed correctly. Kids with Ds have to be screened starting at age 3 to make sure they don't have this otherwise they could be seriously injured or even paralyzed if they have a bad fall. Sarah was tested last year and so far everything looks good, but she will be getting more x-rays done soon. Kennedy was also diagnosed with an even more serious version of AAI called AOI (atlanto-occipital instability). To borrow the way Leah described it, Kennedy's head is merely resting on top of her spine. She is flying to Philly today to have a spine fusion surgery. This will be a long recovery time for her & her family. To make things a tad more complicated, Kennedy's dad is serving this country in the US Army, and left in December for his 2nd tour in Afghanistan. He will be flying to Philly to be with his family during this time, and will be able to stay with them during Kennedy's recovery.

Did I mention Kennedy has 2 brother's and 1 sister? This whole family could definitely use prayers for strength and courage through this tough time.

Bathroom update

For those of you that were interested, no I didn't get the bathroom finished by Saturday. And as luck would have it, the weather decided it wanted to rain on Saturday afternoon (according to the forecasts) so we moved the party to a local park that have covered areas, as our backyard has no shelter. As it would happen, it started pouring as soon as we were getting ready to leave.

Anyhoo, the carpet and old linoleum are out, but there was one more layer before getting to the subfloor and that has proven harder to rip up. But, I have a plan and all the supplies to get it finished, so hopefully I'll be able to post pics of my new bathroom floor sometime this week. And just the floor cause the rest of the bathroom is still ugly.

Channeling my mother

Ask anyone who knew my mother and one of the first things they would say about is she loved to home repair/home decorating/gardening. If you called her on any given day, she probably could be found painting/staining/installing/planting something. I have already determined that I did not inherit my mother's artistic gene, however, it seems I've been blessed (and depending on who you talk to, including my husband, that might be stretching it) with the "fixer-upper" gene. Over the last 2 weeks, I've embarked on more "fixer-upper" projects than I have in the past 2 years. It all started with me finding 4 rolls of contact paper in my mother's things. I immediately thought of my kitchen and the nasty old paper that was in there, along with the shelves that had nothing and were merely nasty themselves. Over the course of about 6 hours, I put contact paper on almost every shelf in my kitchen & pantry. And then proceeded to rearrange said shelves.
My new project is somewhat ambitious, and my husband has already expressed doubt that I will get it done. When we moved in, it seems that the previous owners had a cat, that was allowed to use the carpet in the main bathroom as a litter box. First of all, putting carpet in a bathroom seems like an extremely idiotic idea in the first place, but I digress. It smelled....BAAAAAAAAD. Poor Emma wouldn't even brush her teeth in there & the smell hit you as soon as you walked in the front door. It was awful. I got lots of advice on how to get rid of it, but they all required that the bathroom be well aerated. Which it isn't, as it doesn't have a window or good air flow. So spraying anything on there that required we allow it do dry was not going to happen.
We have a birthday party here this Saturday and I didn't want to have to make all the guest use the 1/2 bath by the back door. So, I decided to rip up all the carpet, padding & anything else that was under there, and put new flooring down. It already smells better and I haven't even put anything on the subfloor yet. The people who put this carpet in were morons. They put carpet over linoleum because they were too lazy to rip up the old flooring. So now I have a decision to make: be an equal moron and just put new vinyl flooring over the old stuff, or bust my hump & try to rip out the old stuff that's probably been there for 25 years. Did I mention we're having a party here Saturday? There is this product called Kilz that is a sealant of some sort that I was told would block out the smell of cat pee that soaked into the subfloor (which is most certainly likely). I think it's time to go visit our friendly neighborhood experts at Ye Olde Home Depot. It's times like these that I wish my mom were here so I could call her & ask her advice. But, all I have now is WWMD (What would Mom do).

Snot much fun

Being sick, that is. Poor Sarah & Katie. They each have a sinus infection and conjunctivitis. Which are fancy words for a lot of snot & goop all over the face. Katie woke up this morning, wandered into our room (how, I don't know, since I THOUGHT their door had been shut), I pulled her into bed with me and we fitfully slept for about another hour. I hadn't even looked at her when she came in, I did the "eyes still half closed" thing. When we all woke up a bit more, Jeff noticed that her poor eyes were crusted shut. She had wandered into our room pretty much blind. Poor kid. I immediately made a double appointment for them both as soon as I could. They each had a low degree temp of 99.6, and weighed in at 28 & 23 lbs. My little twins, lol. They even get sick together. So now we're on a regimen of oral antibiotics and eye drops for the next week. Fun fun.

Library Fun

When I was growing up, I went to the library alot....I mean a LOT. Especially in the summer when I was visiting my dad. My aunt would take me at least twice a week: for story time, to get new books, rent movies, the whole 9 yards. I grew up loving books. There are books that are engrained in my memory of childhood: The Boxcar Children, Nate the Great, Corduroy, anything by Beverly Cleary.
I have been remiss when it comes to helping my children have that love of the library. I'll admit before today, it had been at LEAST a year since I took them there. But, even though I haven't pushed it, my kids have still developed a love of books. Emma loves books, and so does Sarah. Katie's learning. :D
So we went this morning, and we had a good time. We got books, a couple DVD's, and audio books to tide us over for the next week or so. I've been a bit short on decent books for me to read lately, so I decided to take a crack at some books that I was supposed to read in high school, but, well, they bored me to tears at the time. I'm not proud of it, but hey, I was 17. And lover of books that I was, I didn't like being TOLD to read something for the sake of a teacher just so I could get a good grade. And now I'm in college doing the same thing, rofl.
Anyhow, so I got "Brave New World" and "1984". I'm about 1/3 of the way through "Brave New World". It's hard to believe it was written in the 1930's, seeing how forward it is regarding what amounts to extreme promiscuity and drug use. I need to think of more books I should have paid more attention to in high school and take a 2nd look at them.

Booty Camp

In case you hadn't gathered based on how old my 2 younger kids are, but I have 2 in diapers at the moment. Sarah is on her way, and I think just needs a little push to be completely free of diapers, but Katie is still aways from that. She's cognizant of the fact that she goes pee & poop and even tells me, but she doesn't like the potty chair. And I'm not gonna push her. She'll get it in her own time. After all, she DID only turn 2 yesterday (and no I didn't post anything, I'm a bad mom, but I'm a single mom for the week, so I didn't have a ton of time).

Sarah is very sporadic when it comes to the potty. She has on a few occasions told me in advance that she needs to go, and will actually go. But other times she acts completely oblivious to it. I don't like the fact that it seems like I don't have the time to focus on making sure she gets trained, but with DH being gone all day (and sometimes for a week for work), having just moved into a new house and still trying to unpack, plus having a younger child always underfoot, it's been beyond difficult trying to have a schedule to go have potty time. So, when I saw this on the Today Show this morning, I immediately told Jeff about it.

www.bootycampmom.com

This woman says that, with parent involvement, she can potty train your child in 1 day. She does these camps 2 days a week, maybe 2-3 times a month, in groups of 4-5. The methods she uses are a little controversial (a LOT of salty snacks & sweet drinks, which help the body have to pee more frequently) but it helps the child get into a routine of knowing what it feels like. She also teaches the child that it is THEIR responsibility to take care of their potty needs. If they have an accident, she has them clean it up (with help and in a very positive attitude). There have been articles written for NADS (National Association for Down syndrome) and she's been doing this for over 4 years. She claims to have a 98% success rate.

The only catch is she's in Chicago. But, that's only about a 5 hour drive. It's totally worth it to me. If I could have Sarah potty trained by the start of school next fall, that would be a miracle, for us as a family & for our pocketbook.

What Sarah & Katie were doing

while Emma was learning how to ride her bike.

We brought out the slide/swing set that Katie got for her birthday last year, and they had a blast. Enjoy!!

I love to ride my bicycle

"The hardest part of raising a child is teaching them to ride bicycles. A shaky child on a bicycle for the first time needs both support and freedom. The realization that this is what the child will always need can hit hard." ~Sloan Wilson

Score another point for buying our own house! At the age of 8 years 5 1/2 months, Emma has learned to ride a 2-wheel bike. She's had a bike since she was 5, but living where we did, on the corner of a busy street, with no real usable lawn, getting her to be able to ride it very often was hard.

Now her bike with the training wheels was way too small. So, Saturday, while out yardsale-ing, we saw a bigger 2-wheel bike that was in really nice condition, for $16. We couldn't pass it up. After a trip to the store for a new helmet, and after putting the younger 2 to bed, we set out to teach Emma how to ride.

The first hurdle was teaching her how shift her weight when she starts falling to one side. She had the pedaling down (and trust me, riding a bike on thick grass is no easy feat) and was doing well with the steering, but turning without falling over was still an issue. By the end of the night, she was able to go in a straight line without falling over, and with me only holding on long enough to get her started.

Yesterday morning we tried again, and within about 30 minutes, Emma was doing circles around our lawn & driveway, again with me only helping her to get going for a second. After I went inside to make the kiddos some lunch, Emma stayed outside and I watched her from the window. She could now get started all on her own & did about 30 revolutions in a row!! I'm so very proud of her! After not having ridden a bike period for almost a year, she picked it up really well.

Now she wants to make these long treks out to the park and has it in her brain that she'll be able to ride her bike to school next fall. Hate to break it to you kid, but your school is too far away. :( But, we have a nice big high school right across the street that has a sidewalk all the way around it, so I have a feeling we'll be making a lot of family walks around there this summer.















Brownie points for who can guess where the title of this post is from. :D

My Little Helper

Sarah LOVES to help me clean, as long as it's something she wants to do, and isn't forced. LOL She helps me empty out the dishwasher, put laundry into the dryer, and make the beds. Today she decided to take it upon herself to clean our upstairs coffee table.





The pics are a little blurry because they were taken with my cell phone, but she was very intent on cleaning. :)

Katie the Plumber

Feel bad for my children, as 2 of the 3 of them, have no butt. This is proof.




They can't keep their pants up to save their lives. I need to invest in belts & suspenders.

Bad blogger

I have been most remiss in updating my blog as of late. I have valid excuses, but that's just what they are. Quick run-down of what's been going on lately: Sarah's birthday last weekend, job interview the previous Friday (a job I got, TYVM), preparing for finals this week, trying not to freak out over signing home-ownership papers this Thursday, packing, cleaning, etc.

First Sarah's birthday. Because we're moving soon, we decided not to have a big party just yet. We're going to wait until after we're all settled into the new house. But, she did have a small little celebration in her class. I made muffins to bring in, and the kids sang "Happy Birthday" and she had a lot of fun. Katie had a blast, too, showing off her signs and generally causing havoc as she SO wanted to be part of the class. Here are a few pics from the party, taken on a cell phone, cause I forgot the big camera (D'OH):















She had a fun time, and I'm sure we'll have most of these same kids over for her big party in a few weeks. :D

On to the job interview. It was for a student position at CMU. Since I am technically a student, I can get a student job, which is nice, since they have to be flexible to my class schedule and they pay more than minimum wage. Down side is, it's not a ton of hours to start with, but I'm ok with that since I'm slowly weaning the kids (and me) into me not being a full-time SAHM. The main purpose for me going back to school is for me to get a degree and ultimately, work full-time as a teacher. It'll take a few years, but most likely will be reality around the time Katie is either in preschool or K. Anyhow, I got offered the job, and it starts in the Fall semester. It's in the same set of buildings that Jeff works in, so that will be nice. It's also right across the street from where I'll most likely be taking the bulk of my classes, so I won't have to walk very far.

As for the house, we're scheduled to close on it this Thursday. I've been slowly packing up non-essential items and getting rid of a lot of stuff. My plan was to have a yard sale before we moved, but I'm thinking about having it the weekend after we move. Most of our stuff will be at the new place already, which will make it a little easier. I also still have to make time to go out to the storage unit & get Emma's new bed and a few other things.

School is almost over, and Jeff & I are oh-so-very happy about that. We each have 2 finals this week. My last one will be finished about an hour before we close on the house. I'm officially a "Degree-seeking student" now, which is exciting. Since my grades in high school & the 2 semesters I went to a JC weren't all that stellar, I had to kinda prove myself to CMU that I was serious. I guess I did, since they changed my status without me asking them to. :D This means I'll be able to meet with an advisor and figure out which classes I'm going to take. It's pretty cool!

That pretty much sums up how our life's been going lately. Hopefully it won't be another month before I post again. But, I wouldn't doubt it either. :P

America's Favorite Mom

The folks over at Teleflora are having this contest, to see who is America's Favorite Mom. It's going to be a show on TV hosted by Donny & Marie Osmond. There are 15 finalists right now, including Rachel Coleman of "Signing Time"!
I know most of my family knows, but Signing Time has been a huge part of our family's life. It has helped both Sarah & Katie be able to communicate when they had no other means to. Sarah especially, since her speech is very delayed. Rachel is a warm, loving person, who has helped so many families with "Signing Time".
We were fortunate enough to be able to see her perform and meet her in person last year.



So, if you can spare moment, please go vote for her. The link to the page on my sidebar. There you can find code to add this add this same button to YOUR blog. :D

At the Park

We had really nice weather over the weekend, so we took advantage of it and went to the park for awhile yesterday. The kids had a blast and completely wore themselves out.

Here's a link to some pictures.

http://gallery.mac.com/wilso4jm#100180

We have too much crap

This is a revelation, I know. A house of 5 people, 3 of which are under 9, and we *gasp* have a lot of stuff. Most of the time, I am able to hide this fact by excellent use of drawers, closets, and strategically placed furniture. Every house has a junk drawer. We have a junk drawer, a junk desk, and a junk closet. And I would be perfectly content to leave things as they are, if it weren't for one thing: we're moving...in a month. Now, seeing as how I enjoy my sanity and it is slowly slipping away from me day by day, I choose NOT to have it completely swept away by trying to pack up 4 1/2 years worth of stuff in one weekend, ironically enough 2 days after I have my last of three finals. That might see me curled up in a fetal position, whispering,"Just burn it all, and collect the insurance."
So, I have been packing up things here & there, mostly in Emma's room, due to the fact that THAT room has the highest concentration of crap in the entire house. I swore to myself that I was going to get rid of at least 1/3 of the stuff that she has in her room. Garage sale, Salvation Army, trash can, I don't care how it leaves our house, it's going to be GONE. At first Emma was reluctant but I have pulled out the old stand-by,"If you get rid of stuff you don't NEED, you have more room for stuff you WANT." Yes, that works on 30 year olds as well as 8 year olds. And she earns an allowance now, so she can buy whatever she can afford. Which, on $3 a week, isn't much. Which is a good thing.
A couple weeks ago, I packed away 90% of her books, leaving out only a handful for her & the littler ones. I went through Sarah & Katie's closet last weekend, and combined with a little bit more in Emma's room today, and now I have a big pile of stuff for a garage sale. Along with 3 garbage bags full of trash.
Why not just hire a moving company to come do all this hard, back-breaking work for me, you ask? Because I'm cheap, people. We're not rich, by any stretch of the imagination, and moving costs moo-lah. Even when you're only moving 1/2 mile down the road. So, our plan is to pack all the little stuff up ourselves, and then get someone to either help us, or just have them move all the big stuff. We have a whole month, due to the end of our lease not being until May 31st, to be out of this place. So, we're supposed to close on the new house on May 1st, which will hopefully give up plenty of time to move in, get this place cleaned up & ready so we can be out by the 31st. Never mind that Jeff is leaving for a week in the middle of that. At least finals will be over, and the weather will be nice. So, anyone up for a road trip to help us move?? :D

Too Many Friends

I have way too many online friends. :) Not that that's a bad thing, but when I'm trying to keep up with everyone's blogs and read them each day, it just takes up too much of my already limited time. So, Jeff turned me on to this RSS reader, which checks the blogs & other websites I put on there for new stuff and then brings it all into 1 window. SUCH a time saver, because I don't always have time to click each blog I have on my favorites individually, and I sometimes go weeks without checking some. The one we use is "NetNewsWire" but I know there are a wealth of RSS feed programs out there.
I already have a bunch of blogs on there (as well as MSNBC.com cause I love the news but don't get time to actually watch it, lol). Unfortunately places like Facebook & MySpace don't have RSS feeds or even Atom. But if you have a blog, please link to it in a comment (unless you don't want it "out there" in cyber space, then feel free to send me an email) so I can put you on my RSS feed. And, if you feel comfortable, I'm also trying to update MY blog to link to all the blogs I read. Let me know if it's ok to put you on that, as well. I CAN put Facebook & MySpace pages on that. :)

Update on Emma

I was reading back through a couple months of post and I haven't really done an update on what's been going on with Miss Emma. Today we had her 3rd quarter parent/teacher conference, so what better time??
Emma is doing just great. She making great strides in school and I am very confident that she will do great next year at her new school. She's been in the Resource room for reading/spelling since the beginning of the school year, and she's making progress. Her ST & her Resource room teacher still think that her delay in reading/spelling is directly correlated to her speech. She's already met almost all her goals for speech this year and her progress in the resource room is coming along accordingly. I am 95% sure we want to put Emma in the CMU speech camp this summer. At first, I was a little hesitant because I told her that she was going to PEAK again this summer, hopefully with kids from her new school, so she could meet some new people. But, after attending a seminar about the speech camp for Sarah, I really think that 6 weeks of 6 hours of speech therapy will GREATLY help Emma. So, we're going to try to send both of them. Sarah's will only be 1/2 day. Emma will be able to meet new friends during spring soccer as I'm putting her new school as her home school, so she'll be grouped with kids from there, including Sarah's preschool teacher's daughter, who will ALSO be going to Emma's new school next year. Her name's Emily, and they know each other from soccer last year. I'm hoping that will be enough. I know that moving to a new school and leaving all her friends behind will be tough, but at the same time, we need to do what's best for Emma academically. I would REALLY like to get Emma out of the Resource room next year. She is SO very bright and has a fantastic imagination. She's just having a little problem with a few things.
As for school, her report card looks awesome! There are a lot of new things introduced in 2nd grade, and she's not getting as much time in the classroom (due to resource room pull-outs twice a day, every day of the week) so she's struggling a little bit with the new content, but she's working very hard. She knows she doesn't HAVE to make up everything that she misses due to being in the RR, but she wants to.
Last year about this time, there was talk that Emma might have a Learning Disability. I asked both her RR teacher & her classroom teacher and they don't think she does. They really think that the speech is what's affecting her reading & spelling, and once that either continues to improve or is resolved (which after 6 years, I hope would be soon, but it might be something she struggles with for a while still) the reading and spelling will fall into place. They are noticing that as she's making improvements in speech, there are noticeable improvements in her reading/spelling. Which makes me happy, but I'm still wishing she could get over this hurdle.
In my Special Ed class, we watched a movie about Learning disabilities, and a psychologist had come up with a comprehensive format to pinpoint a child's exact learning disability. I asked them about this, and they said the school psychologist has something similar, so I asked her to set something up to get Emma tested. Not that I WANT her to have an LD, but at the same time, I want to make sure Emma has the best learning environment possible. If she needs extra support, and isn't getting it because her educators don't know about something, she's not getting the best we can offer her. If nothing at all, her getting tested will show that she DOESN'T have one and we'll know for sure, and can continue on the course we're following.

Ah Croup...

I genuinely feel for those parents whose children get croup on a regular basis. Before a month or so ago, none of my children had ever had it. The "stridor" that they described could have sounded like a train whistle for all I knew. Well, when Sarah woke up in the middle of the night about 2 months ago, struggling to breath and sounding like she'd swallowed something furry, Jeff & I freaked out. I'd like to say I was calm and collected, but no. I was scared that she was going to die due to lack of oxygen. So, off to the ER at midnight we went.
Last night (or was it very early this morning....I can't remember), Jeff shakes me awake & says something to the effect of,"Sarah's crying, I think something's wrong." I go upstairs, and before I even get to the top, I hear the familiar sound of something furry trying to escape from Sarah's throat. She's on the floor, right before her bedroom door, freaking out cause she can't breath really well. Having been a fairly decent parent, and reading up on croup after the last incident, I knew first to try either a steamy bathroom or really cold air. So, I started up the scalding shower water to steam up the bathroom and we sat there for about 10 minutes. Then Jeff got the lucky job of standing outside on our deck (in Michigan, in March, you get the idea) with Sarah wrapped up in a blanket for about 10 minutes. Her stridor wasn't completely gone, but she was breathing a lot better. We decided against an ER trip, and brought her down to our room. She slept pretty fitfully, and still wasn't breathing completely normal, but it was a lot better than before.
This morning, she's doing fine. Has the funky breathing only every once in awhile. Kept her home from school just to be on the safe side. I think she might also be spiking a little fever, so there's no sense in exposing her classmates to this. Poor kid. She always gets the weird stuff at an age when you'd think she'd be beyond it. Case in point: last year around this time, both Katie & Sarah got their first ear infections. Sarah was THREE and Katie was ONE. Who ever hears about 3 years olds getting their FIRST ear infection? That's generally something you deal with when they're infants. This croup thing is the same thing. She didn't have a history, so where is this coming from? Just add that to the long list of health questions I have pertaining to Sarah. This kid is a medical enigma, no explanations for anything. Just thanking my lucky stars that croup isn't contagious.

World Down syndrome Day

Today is World Down syndrome Awareness Day. A day to spread the word to the world that Down syndrome, or Trisomy 21, is not a disease, it's not an affliction that people "suffer" from, it's not something to be feared. In our history we as a society have never liked embracing differences. From the color of people's hair or skin, to which hand they use, we always have used labels to lump people into groups. Today is a day to spread the joy and unconditional love that comes with that extra chromosome.


Does it look like they are suffering?


The love between sisters


Happy World Down syndrome Day!!