Answer to Prayer

Sorry in advance if this is a little lengthy in my explanation, but I want to record it all as it is part of our journey. Let me start off with a little background for those of you who haven't had any experience with this. And, I know there are a lot of you that already understand how this all works, so bear with me.

For children with developmental delays or different types of disorders (autism, cerebral palsy), etc. they can receive services from the state of California through the Regional Center. In our area, it is called Alta California Regional Center but different areas have different names for it. To simplify, I will refer to it as Alta. These services include, but are not limited to, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, respite care and much more. These services are so wonderful because your child qualifies for them based on his need, not family income level, which is a problem with so many of these agencies.

We were already quite familiar with Alta because Kyler had a significant speech and language delay as well as gross motor delay. For 18 months, he received speech therapy, occupational therapy and music therapy. I can't say enough good things about this program. It took Kyler from an extremely frustrated child who couldn't communicate with us or walk, to age-appropriate in this time frame. Early intervention is SO important. If these things are caught early, children can make up so much ground by the time they are three years old. After that, they can definitely make progress, however, it is usually a little slower and the results not seen as quickly.

That being said, when Caden was discharged from Stanford in March, I immediately put a call in to Alta to get him evaluated so we could start services. After all, in the hospital, he was receiving occupational and feeding therapy. So, I knew for sure that those two things would need to continue and I wanted to get them started as soon as possible. Even so, it took until the beginning of May to really get everything in place and therapy started. Caden started receiving feeding therapy and physical therapy as well as working with a developmental specialist. Both feeding and physical therapies meet once/week and the developmental specialist comes twice/month. All of this made me very happy as it is all provided by the state and doesn't cost me any money, yet gives my son the opportunity to catch up in his delays.

Now enter in California's state budget crisis... Legislators are looking for an easy place to slash budgets and they look at the early intervention program. They decided to cut music therapy entirely which is so sad to me. Kyler thrived in music. Kids in general respond so well to music and it helped his speech and language development progress so much faster. I had hoped that Caden would be able to have music therapy when he got older. In addition to this, the state decided that these services needed to be billed to the patient's insurance instead of being paid for through the state. Then, if the insurance denies payment, then Alta will again cover the cost. Insurance can deny if that type of service isn't covered by the plan.

Now for many people this might not be a problem. However, in our case, this could be a HUGE issue. Caden is about 2/3 of the way of meeting his lifetime maximum for insurance coverage. That means once he hits that limit, he will no longer have insurance benefits. And, with the amount that we have to go to the doctor and with one surgery coming up for sure that is a little scary. And, because he is so high risk for infections, he could end up with a lengthy hospitalization if he gets too sick. That could put us over the top right there and he's not even 9 months old yet! So, the LAST thing we want is to have his weekly therapy sessions going through insurance. It will get us to the cap much faster than we want.

These changes are taking place for each family in the program at the time of their 6-month reviews. As of November 7, Caden will have been in the program for 6 months and that is when they want to start billing insurance. I have tried to be as proactive as possible in this situation so I am not left between a rock and a hard place when the time came. So, I called our insurance plan to talk to them about it, to see if they could provide me with a letter of denial for coverage so Alta would continue covering the costs. Our health plan does not cover speech therapy at all, and feeding therapy falls under that category (it is often speech pathologists who do this) so they said they could easily deny for that. I was thrilled with that news! Then, the developmental specialist is something insurance won't pay for at all, so Alta will continue to cover that as well. Our problem was with the PT.

Our plan doesn't have a cap as to how many sessions of PT you can have, it doesn't have a dollar cap on how much they will pay, and you don't have to have an official diagnosis in order for them to cover it. Under normal circumstances, this would be fantastic. And, in my case it is, since I am in PT twice/week and have been for the past three months and probably will be for another three-four months. But I'm not in danger of reaching my lifetime maximum either. In Caden's case, this is a problem. There is no way they can deny paying for the services.

And, there is another problem... most of the providers that do therapy for children going through Alta aren't set up as venders with insurance companies. They have been receiving their reimbursement from Alta or private pay. And, if we go to a provider who is not in our insurance network, insurance will pay nothing. So, that means we would have to change where Caden receives his PT. I really don't want to do that because we LOVE his therapist! She is amazing, knowledgeable, friendly, and she loves Caden. You develop a rapport with the person working so closely with your child and after 5 months, the last thing you want to do is switch to someone else.

Needless to say I've been stressing about this for awhile. I called our service coordinator at Alta and talked with her at length to see if there was any way we could get around this due to our lifetime maximum problem and she said that there wasn't. So, I was beginning to resign myself to the fact that it was going to go through insurance and we were going to hit the max very soon.

Then, last week I was talking to our nurse case manager that was provided to us through our insurance company. It is a free service that helps families deal with complex medical issues. She has been helping me navigate through many things along this journey of caring for a child with medical needs and calls me once/week to discuss how Caden is doing. She lives in Sacramento also and has two children of her own with medical needs so she knows all the area specialists and all the services that are available. And, she has advocated for us on several occasions to get things in place for Caden when I was having difficulty getting it done. Then she had to go on disability leave for almost three months. In the meantime, we had another case manager working with us. She was very nice and helpful in some ways, but she didn't live locally, pediatrics weren't her specialty and she just didn't advocate for us in the same way. She did help answer questions and did some research for us on a few things which was great. It just wasn't the same as what the other girl had done. So, a couple weeks ago when she came back to work, I was thrilled. She picked up right where we left off and began advocating for us for many things.

I talked to her about my stress and frustration about PT going through insurance and about our respite care ending as of September 30. She asked my permission for her to make a couple phone calls on my behalf and I told her to go for it. That was Tuesday. Wednesday morning, I received a voicemail from our service coordinator at Alta saying that due to our situation with the lifetime maximum, they would be able to make an exception for Caden and cover his services through Alta instead of billing insurance. WOW!!! I practically started bawling right then because this is such a relief for me and such a huge weight off my shoulders. I knew our nurse case manager was the reason behind it so I called her to thank her. She is so sweet and just said she was happy to help. In addition to that, she is working on getting Caden classified as a “status 2” which means he will qualify for Medi-Cal. This is a good thing, so that when he does his his lifetime maximum, he will have another way to cover his therapies. And, it also qualifies him for more respite care; up to 40 hours/week of nursing care for Caden. This is so incredible! In order to qualify, he has to be more than 50% delayed in three or more out of five areas: cognitive, fine motor, gross motor, speech, and self-help. Earlier assessments already told us he is in normal range for cognitive and fine motor. However, we thought he could qualify for gross motor and speech and possibly self-help. So, yesterday, we had a couple people come out and assess him on those two areas. In both cases, he is acting more like a 3-4-month-old as opposed to an 8-month-old. So, he qualifies in those areas. Now they just need to get a report from his PT to make sure he qualifies there and then we're set.

I know this is a lot of detail for many of you; probably more than you cared to have. But it helps me when I look back to see what was going on at the time. Anyway, the events of this week were such an amazing answer to prayer! We are so blessed to have the right people in our lives at the right time. Our 6-month review is scheduled for November 5, so we had just a month left to get this figured out before they started billing insurance and I've been working on it for a couple months already. So, having our nurse case manager come back from disability leave when she did was God's timing.

Thank you all for your continued love and prayers. We continue to need them as Caden's journey isn't over yet. He has many challenges and hurdles ahead, but for now, the burden is less. I will update as things take shape.

Pulmonology Appointment

This morning we had a follow-up appointment for Caden with our pulmonologist. When she listened to him, she said it appeared that all his wheezing was coming from his upper airway and not his lungs. I guess that means the steroids and breathing treatments did their job. But from what I could tell, he didn't sound any better, in fact, he almost seemed worse over the weekend. She said from what she could hear today, his trachea was collapsing and causing him to wheeze and cough. That being said, both of the medications he was on won't do any good at this point since they are more geared toward working on the lungs.

This is both good and bad news. It means his lungs have cleared which is great! However, he has tracheomalacia which means his trachea isn't formed correctly and can collapse when he coughs, etc. The Xopenex breathing treatment he was on actually works to soften the muscle in the trachea which is opposite of what we want to do. So, she is discontinuing both the Xopenex and the steroid. And, she is replacing the Xopenex with Atrovent. This is a medication commonly used in pediatric asthma patients (and no, she said he doesn't have asthma). She said it helps to strengthen the trachea and help it be more rigid which is what we need for him. We are to do up to four breathing treatments per day as needed.

She did a trial of the Atrovent in her office to see how he responded to it. When she listened to him afterward, she said he definitely sounded less wheezy. That's a good thing. When I asked her more about what was going on, she thought he did have a viral infection which started all this off. Then, the Xopenex and steroid helped clear up the lungs and what is left is in the upper airway. She said his horrible sleeping and crankiness was probably due to the steroid (yuck!) and now that he's off it, he should start sleeping better again. She said mist might help him, so she thought sitting in the bathroom while running a hot shower might help. The steam could help his airway.

I feel much better about his situation after our appointment today. It's amazing how fast things can change, in either direction. Thank you all for your continued prayers as he works on having a complete recovery.

Having a breathing treatment just before bed

He is so amazing! He handles his treatments so well. Such a sweetheart!

Reflecting

I think most mothers (and fathers, too) can relate to wanting their child to be perfect and healthy in every way. I don't think we would be normal if we didn't want that. I didn't get that with either of my boys. Kyler was born with pulmonary valve stenosis, a congenital heart defect (CHD) which was corrected at three months of age during a heart catheterization. In addition to that, he had a significant speech and language delay and gross motor delay. We are so blessed that his CHD was fixed so “easily” and he hasn't any further problems with it. And, with the help of speech therapy, music therapy and occupational therapy for 18 months, Kyler is now age-appropriate in the areas of his previous delays. Again, we are so blessed to have been able to provide Kyler with the necessary services to help him catch up where he was behind.

I remember when Greg and I were talking about having another baby. Before we even decided to try to get pregnant, I remember praying for a healthy baby. I felt we had struggled so much with Kyler and I didn't want to go through that again. As it turned out, we found out we were having a baby with significantly more severe problems than Kyler. Problems we were initally told would be fatal. Most of you have been following our story, so I won't go into major details here but will list the major problems he was born with (not what was actually seen in utero). Coarctation of the aorta (CHD), diaphragmatic eventration (a form of congenital diaphragmatic hernia-CDH), congenital scoliosis and several other more “minor” anamolies.

Of course we did receive a miracle and Caden is with us and alive. What an amazing thing! However, he has significant challenges he has to face in the months and probably years to come. I don't want to sound ungrateful for where we are at, because I definitely am not ungrateful. I am so happy to have my baby boy with us and doing as well as he is. But he will have ongoing respiratory issues and he faces HUGE gross motor delays. And, the fact that he still REFUSES to take any food by mouth is another huge stress. I realize in the big picture, these are relatively “small” things but they are stresses.

There are times when I grieve the loss of a “normal” child that I didn't get to have. I grieve not being able to simply enjoy the first days/months/years of their lives. Instead we are faced with constantly having to make medical decisions, not being able to attend certain events because of not wanting to expose your child to the germs. This feels selfish in so many ways, yet if I am honest, I feel that way a lot.

I have many friends who currently have “healthy” toddlers and babies, or are pregnant. I am so thrilled for them that they have normal, healthy babies and can expect to go through the normal adjustments of adding a new baby to the household. I wouldn't wish our situation on anyone! I wish everyone could have healthy children. But, it can be hard not to compare your children to those around you. I see babies the same age as Caden, or slightly younger, doing all the “right” things. They are rolling over, crawling, pulling up, crusing around furniture, etc. It's awfully hard to not look at Caden and wish for him to be able to do those same things. His therapists (physical therapist, feeding therapist, and developmental specialist) are constantly reminding me not to do that. I need to evaluate him on how far he has progressed from where he started to where he is now. And, when I do that, I can see significant improvement. I am not ignoring the strides he has made because he is definitely making progress. But I still grieve the “hoped-for” healthy, normal child.

In talking to another heart mom, I mused as to why we were faced with these challenges. Especially when you see some pregnant women smoking through their entire pregnancy and having a perfectly healthy baby. Or a teenage girl pregnant with an unwanted baby, give birth to a healthy child. Then there are those of us who do everything we can to stay healthy during our pregnancy and desire our babies with all our heart, only to discover that the child we are longing for and love so much, has problems, even life-threatening conditions. This heart mom said she thought it was because we were equipped to deal with them and give them the help that they needed. I think she is right. In many ways, the issues with Kyler prepared us for the situation with Caden. We already knew what resources were available and could more readily access them. So that is a blessing also!

Another thing that is hard is that we encounter a couple different kinds of people. There are those who thought that the minute Caden was discharged from the hospital, that everything was fine and there was nothing wrong with him anymore. And, there are those who seem to think that Caden is knocking at death's door every day. And, there are many people who fall somewhere in between. I suppose there is truth to both sides of these thoughts. On one hand, he wouldn't have been discharged from the hospital if he wasn't well enough to leave. And, on the other hand, he is still high risk for getting sick which could potentially be fatal depending on how severe it is. That being said, I feel like I am often trying to convince people one way or the other. It's tiring.

For some people I feel I am trying to convince them that Caden still has many challenges and health concerns and that he's not out of the woods yet. And for other people, I feel like I'm trying to tell them how healthy Caden is and how well he is doing; that he's not going to drop dead at any moment. It's a strange place to be and a weird feeling to have. I know that people probably just don't have enough information to really know how Caden is doing. So, what I am saying right now is that he is doing amazingly well considering where we started. He surprises all the doctors in regards to how well he is doing. But he still faces many challenges and will remain a high-risk child for many years. I mourn not having a typical, average baby where I don't have to constantly explain things to people.

I know this post sounds like I am feeling sorry for myself. I admit I do feel that way some of the time. But most of the time, I don't have the time for that. I have to be focused in order to get everything done I need to which includes many doctor and therapy appointments each week. Let me say that I am blessed and I know it. I have a wonderful husband who recognizes I can't do this alone and is there for me and our boys. I also have two amazing sons. Kyler is a live-wire! He has enough energy for the whole household, if only he could share it. :) Even though I have a hard time keeping up with him most of the time, he brings so much joy to my life with the things he says and does. Of course, he is three and a half years old so he also knows how to push my buttons and add as much stress to my life as possible. Then there is Caden... What can I say? He is the most amazing baby in so many ways. In contrast to Kyler's intense personality, he is mellow, laid back and just plain sweet. He has such a sweet temperament and every day he gets more interactive with us. I love the quote that says, “having children is like seeing your heart walk around outside your body.” It is so true. Both my children have huge pieces of my heart and I don't know what I would do without them. As much stress as I have, I love my chilren more than I thought was humanly possible. I am truly and wonderfully blessed!

Breathing Treatments and Cardiology

Yesterday (Friday, September 18) ended up being a very stressful day for me. I will get to that, but first, let me start with his cardiology appointment. We got some good news there! We saw Dr. Van Gundy at 12:30 to follow up on Caden's echo from a couple weeks ago. He said the pulmonary pressures were very close to normal (YAY!) and his aortic arch (where they repaired the coarctation) looked perfect. He said from a heart standpoint, Caden is completely repaired and doing incredible. What amazing news!!!

In addition, we talked about whether or not Caden could fly. Of course, that is assuming we have some place to go. :) I told him we had gone to Tahoe for a couple days and it seemed like Caden's respiration rate increased for a few hours but then came back down to normal (his normal, that is). Dr. Van Gundy said based on that, he said Caden is cleared to fly. He just said we can't take him on a 24-hour flight. Ha ha! I really don't think we're going to be taking Caden on a trip around the world right now. So I think we're set. And, we don't need to go back to see him for three months! And, that is for an office visit, not an echo. :) So awesome! That is the good news.

Then, the doctor went to examine him and listen to him. When he got close, he said, he's wheezing. I had noticed it for a couple days, but he has done a little bit of wheezing in the past and it has gone away pretty quickly so I hadn't gotten really worried about it. But as he listened and watched him, he said he was concerned. He wanted us to call the pulmonologist's office and tell them the cardiologist wanted him to be seen that afternoon because Caden was wheezing and retracting. I honestly didn't know if I could get him in same day or not because I'd never tried. But I told Dr. Van Gundy I would call their office the minute I left his.

So, I got to the car and put the boys in and called our pulmonologist's office. I got ahold of the advice nurse and told him that we were just leaving the cardiologist's office and he wanted Caden to be seen that afternoon. It was 1:20 when I called and he put him on hold. He came back a couple minutes later and said Dr. Chipps could see Caden at 2:30. So we rushed home to get more milk for Caden since I hadn't planned on being out during his next feeding. And I started calling friends to see if anyone could watch Kyler while I took Caden in. I normally take Kyler to all Caden's appointments, but for this one, I knew that I couldn't have him there distracting me and causing trouble. He had woken up very early that morning and the appointment was right during his quiet time. So he woulc have had a hard time behaving. Luckily I was able to get ahold of a friend who could watch him for me.

When I got to Dr. Chipps office, they took me back pretty quickly and he came in to do his exam and ask me questions. When he listened to Caden, he also was very concerned. He said the wheezing didn't sound good at all and he wanted to start him on breathing treatments immediately. The nurse set him up for a treatment in the office and we did one right there. Then, they gave us our own nebulizer to take home to continue the treatments at home. He has to have them every four hours while he's awake. In addition to this, the doctor is concerned there is something viral going on in his lungs and he wants to treat it aggressively so it doesn't get any worse. So he started him on steroids as well. He also said we needed to keep a very close eye on him because if it gets any worse or his color changes, we will need to take him to the ER immediately. It's a little scary to be told that by the doctor, especially because Caden has done so well since he's been home.

I went to the pharmacy to fill the prescriptions and had a little trouble there. The doctor had failed to put the dosage on the Rx and so the people at the pharmacy had to call the answering service (it was now after 5 pm) to get the answer on how much to give him. When the nurse practitioner who was on call gave them the dosing information, it was very different than what Dr. Chipps had told me. So then I spent the next hour and a half trying to get that resolved. I finally got the nurse practitioner to call me back and discussed it with her. I told her what the doctor had told me and after our conversation, we worked out the dosing details.

It just ended up being a very stressful day as I went from one thing to another. And, when the doctors tell you how concerned they are, it really makes you worry about your child. And, since yesterday it does seem like Caden's breathing has gotten worse. He had a really hard night last night. So I am glad we are doing the treatments but it is just a little stressful when we don't know how severe it's going to get. We so badly want him to be healthy and get stronger. But he has an uphill battle with his small right lung. :( He is normally a very happy, easy-going baby, and it's hard to see him feeling yucky. Please pray for his lung to grow and for his wheezing/retracting to get better and for him to start to feel better soon.

Kyler's 1st Day of Preschool

On Tuesday, September 8, Kyler had his first day of preschool. I have really been looking forward to this day for awhile and so has Kyler. He really needs something more than I am able to give him at home. He needs a structured, environment where he can play, do art, and learn social behaviors. And I think it will really help him as he learns to listen and obey the teachers as well. He is going to a Christian school which is very close to our house. Proximity was very important to me when choosing a school because I didn't want to spend all morning in the car. It is less than five minutes away and goes from 9-Noon on Tuesday and Thursday mornings.

On the first day of school, he was so excited! I made him oatmeal for breakfast and Greg made him a green smoothie. We wanted him to have a full tummy and lots of energy for his big day. Greg and I both went to the school to drop him off. He could hardly wait to get there. He jumped out of the car, put on his backpack and started running toward his classroom. He couldn't get there fast enough. As a parent, it is so great to see the pure joy in your child's face. What a blessing!

We signed him in and he went off to play. I had a hard time getting pictures of him because he was so excited about everything. But I had to document the first day. I stuck around for a few minutes and watched him play. He definitely was not concerned about me leaving him which is a good thing! He said, “Are you going to leave me here?” When I said yes, he got a huge grin on his face.

It was a good morning. I came home and put Caden down for a nap and I got so much done around the house. It was so quiet! When I returned to pick Kyler up, one of the teachers told me he was quite a “character.” I'm not sure that's a good thing or not. But it was the first day, so hopefully he'll settle down and get used to the routine quickly.

Now that he's been going for a couple weeks now, he seems to be settling into the routine. He loves going and is happy when I come to get him. Overall, it's been a very good experience. When I ask him about his day, the first thing he tells me about is what they had for snack. I think that's hilarious. Of all the things he could tell me about, food is at the top of the list. Then over the next few hours, he will usually tell me more about his day and what he did. It's so sweet because he starts singing the songs they teach them like “If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands.” And he will say things about how Jesus loves him because he is special. I LOVE that! It makes me feel like we made the right decision about where to send him. He has adjusted so well and is truly happy. I hope it continues.

Here are some pictures from the get-acquainted day and the first day of preschool:
Eating his breakfast of oatmeal and a green smoothie

Posing with the proud Daddy

Now it's Mommy's turn :)

Big boy with his Cars backpack

Running to get into preschool as fast as he can!

Posing with Mommy in the classroom

Proudly pointing at his name on his cubby

Ready to go home and have lunch

Camping in Tahoe

Last Friday, September 4, we decided to try one night of camping at Lake Tahoe. Until the last month, our cardiologist had told us we were not allowed to take Caden to elevation due to his concern for him going into respiratory distress. However, following the heart cath in July, he told us he would like us to try a couple days in Tahoe to see how Caden responded. And, if he struggled, we should immediately drive back down the hill.

We really enjoy camping and were sad we hadn't been able to do any this year due to Caden's restrictions. So we thought we would take the opportunity and do one night in Tahoe to see how he did. We left in the morning and drove to North Lake to see if we could find a campsite as a first-come-first-serve since we didn't have a reservation. We were able to find a nice spot in a campground we have been to a couple times before. It's really close to Squaw Valley. We put up our tent and set everything up inside and then headed over to Squaw to hang out with some good friends who were staying there for the week.

We spent the afternoon with them. The men took the boys on a little geocaching adventure and had a nice time while the women stayed at the condo with Caden while he napped. We ate dinner together and then everyone but me and Caden went hot-tubbing. It was a wonderful, relaxing way to spend the afternoon/evening. Later that night we headed back to our tent to put the boys to bed. We all went to sleep fairly quickly only for Greg & I to get woken up a little after midnight by Caden screaming. This is not like him at all. He's been sleeping through the night for quite some time now, so this was pretty strange. Nothing we could do could calm him down but eventually he stopped and settled back down. Thankfully Kyler slept through that whole episode. However, he woke up around 4 am and was awake for a couple hours, eventually going back to sleep. We all woke up a little after 8 and headed back to our friend's condo for breakfast. Rough camping trip, right?! :)

We ended up spending the morning with them. The men taking the boys on another hike while the ladies stayed at the condo. It was really nice and relaxing. Then around noon, we headed back to our campsite to break camp and drive home. Caden did really well overall. I closely monitored his respiration rate while we were up there as that is what our cardiologist wanted us to do. On Friday afternoon, it was pretty high but it never went over 100 and by that evening it was down in the 70's which is normal for him. So, when we see the cardiologist next I will let him know how it went and hopefully he will clear Caden for air travel. It would make life easier if he was able to fly places. But we want to make sure he is healthy so we will follow the doctor's advice.

Overall, we had a great time and look forward to doing more camping next year. It was a nice trial run for a longer camping trip next time. It will be even more fun as Caden gets bigger and more mobile. Enjoy the pictures of trip.

Arrival at the campsite

Our tent is all set up

Me and my big boy, Ky

Caden all bundled up for bed. He seems a little confused as to why he has 500 layers on!

Kyler all ready for bed in his sleeping bag

Kyler and Greg on a hike

Caden sitting in Kyler's camping chair

Kyler wanted to hold Caden in his chair. They were so adorable!

My three boys :)

My and my babies

No More Meds!!!

As of Friday, September 4, Caden is officially off ALL his medications!!! I can hardly believe it! We were almost there a month ago when he weaned off the last of the meds he came home from the hospital on. But we started his 4-weeks of antibiotics that day, so we didn't even get one day without anything. So, Friday was amazing! Woohoo!!! No more meds and I hope it stays that way.

Being on the bactrum for 4 weeks really did a number on his body. It really stripped out all the good bacteria from his body and made him gassy and cranky and gave him the worst diaper rash I've ever seen as well as thrush in his mouth. We gave him probiotics every day but they really didn't seem to help too much. We also went through several full tubes of creams of various sorts to no avail. But since Friday his diaper rash has pretty much completely gone away and the thrush in his mouth has significantly subsided. He also seems to be in a happier mood as well. What a blessing to have a healthy, happy baby! He will be 8 months old tomorrow (September 9).

State Fair

I have a lot of catching up to do on blog entries... Too busy! On Thursday, August 27, Kyler and I went to the California State Fair. Our heart support group had tickets so we got to go. Unfortunately Greg had to work and Caden couldn't be in the sun due to his antibiotics. So, it was just me and Kyler. I thought we would have a lot of fun. However, that day I think the temperature was over 100 and we went in the early afternoon which is Kyler's nap/quiet time. He was very cranky and whiny the whole time. He wanted to be in the shade all the time (I can't blame him for that) and wanted me to carry him. I haven't really carried him much at all in the last year and I was exhausted. Of course I had forgotten to bring the stroller so it was either carry him or not move. :(

We met up with another mom from Hearts of Hope with her two kids and spent an hour or so with them. We went to see the animals and Kyler got to see the new baby calves and piglets. He liked that quite a bit. We also indulged in a deep fried S'more. I guess I was just trying to clog up my arteries once and for all! We walked around a little bit, got free M&M's ice cream sandwiches, rode a couple rides (Ky loved the Monorail) and headed out. We were barely there two hours but we couldn't have stood it much longer. It was so hot and Kyler was whining so much. But when we got in the car to drive home, he said, “Mommy, I had SO MUCH FUN!” It's hard to believe since he certainly didn't act like it. But at least we tried. :)

Deep Fried S'More

Trying to rehydrate



Touching the snake! He's braver than his Mommy!

With our M&M ice cream sandwiches

Kyler really enjoyed his


Very hot and ready to go home

Kyler's Swimming Lessons

This summer Kyler took four weeks of swimming lessons. He absolutely loves being in the water and we want him to be a little safer. I wouldn't say he can really swim, but he is comfortable in the water and enjoys going to class. It's also a good way for him to burn up some of the endless energy he seems to have! But in order for him to improve, he's going to have to listen more to the teachers and be willing to let go of them. For now, I'm happy with how he's doing. He has no fear which is both a good and a bad thing!

Here are some pictures of his lessons: