Hanging out with Gee and Papaw

Today Landon and I went to visit Gee and Papaw George. They are building a whole new room onto their house. I think that means they love all the visits they get from Landon and want to make sure he has plenty of room to play! The addition looks great and we can't wait to see it finished. Papaw was in charge of taking Landon for a tour. He was amazed at how quickly Landon get heavy.

Gee was in charge of giving Landon some piano lessons. Landon loves to "play" the piano and Travis and I can only assume that he gets that from his Gee due to the fact that neither of us has that gift. Thank you Gee for allowing Landon to play your special piano. The second great thing Gee does is give rides on her walker. Landon loves for his Gee to take him for a walk around the house. According to Gee, rides have become a grandchild tradition. Trevor, Caylin, and Megan also loved these rides.

A third great thing Gee does is give up her red Popsicle. Who else but a grandmother would give up the last red Popsicle? We usually don't allow Landon to have something like this yet but who was I to tell my mother-in-law no? And besides, he really enjoyed it! Did I mention that he was originally eating goldfish? What a combination.

Aquarium

Today we went to the aquarium in Gatlinburg, TN. Landon took his Granny and Papaw Bill with us. It's a good thing Landon knows the sign for "fish" because he was able to get good use out of it. We had such a good time looking at all of the beautiful exhibits, but Landon had a hard time understanding that when we left one tank there were plenty more to view. When we would move from one tank he would voice his disappointment until he saw the next tank.

There are so many ways to create memories. I'm glad that Landon has Grandparents that love him and love spending time with him. Both my parents and Travis' parents have done so much in order to give Landon good memories of them. That's one reason I love scrapbooking so much. It's a great way to preserve memories so that we will always have something to remind us of all the good times we have had.

Knoxville Visit

Landon and I are in Knoxville for a visit with both my parents and Travis' parents. It's always nice when we get to visit with friends and family.

Landon has grown very attached to his Papaw's. When he sees them he says very clearly," Pap". It is the cutest thing. Here is a picture of Landon giving his Papaw Bill a big hug.

While we were at the Kerr's, Landon took his cousins Caylin and Megan to the park. They took him down the slides, played in the play house, and helped him climb the stairs. Caylin gave him a boost so he could hear Megan talking through the tube and Megan hid below the platform and poked her fingers up through the bottom so that Landon could grab them. I hope the girls had as much fun as Landon did. They are always so good with him.

The only issue we've had since we've been here is rain, and you can't really call it a problem because they need it. The rain has kept us from being able to go outside to play a lot. To remedy this, Landon's Granny Joyce bought him a blow up football ball pit. We thought it was going to be small, but boy were we wrong! Papaw Bill took it outside to blow it up with a machine and had to call for help to get it in the house. I hope the pictures do it justice. What makes the situation even funnier, we also have a kid sized excavator in the living room. I'll have to send picture of the whole get-up tomorrow.

Tomorrow morning we are heading off to the aquarium. I can't wait to see what Landon thinks!

Hearing Test/ENT appointment

Landon had a hearing test and an ENT appointment yesterday. First came the hearing test. Landon has not had his hearing tested since he had tubes put in his ears almost one year ago and we were anxious to see how it went. The audiologist said that he can hear pretty well but one ear drum is not vibrating at all and the other is only vibrating a little. She prepared me for the idea that Landon's tubes may be gone and fluid could be behind his ear drum or the tubes could be blocked. When we went to Dr. Early, ENT, he looked in Landon's ears and told me that both tubes are plugged. Unknown to me, Landon's lack of good sleep at night during the past couple of weeks could be due to the plugged up tubes. What does that mean? Well, first we are going to try medication. I put 3 drops in each ear twice a day for ten days. We go back on September 9 and if they are still plugged he will put new tubes in Landon's ears.

Though this is not the news we wanted to hear it's not that bad. We are glad that we found the problem early on. We will be flying in October and having the tubes working will help during take off. But, more importantly, getting the tubes fixed will allow Landon to hear even better which will help his speech develop even more. God has taken care of Landon this far and we know that He will continue to do so in this situation. We just pray, and ask you to join us, that God will heal Landon's ears however He sees fit.

Fun with Dad

This evening was spent at the pool. Travis met us there after work, so dinner was the family favorite.....pizza! Travis was able to watch Landon "swim" and splash in the water. Landon and I were happy to have Dad there with us today.


When we got home Travis took Landon for a ride in the "box car" which is one of Landon's favorite things to do. When Travis is through, he has to hid the box so that Landon doesn't keep asking to do it over and over. Travis is training Landon for roller coaster rides....watch the video and see for yourself.




And just to go back a few days....I took Landon to the Virginia Discovery Museum last week. They have an area in which the exhibit changes every so often. Right now it has a construction theme. Landon put on the vest and hat, well, OK I put the vest and hat on him, but it only stayed on long enough to take a picture.




He also help a "Big Boy" make a gear machine and thought he was so big. The little boy that was playing with Landon keep saying "My name is John. You can call me John" each time I referred to him as "that big boy".









He also enjoyed playing with the funny mirror and the "floating ball". We had so much fun I'm sure we will go back when it gets to cold to play outside. I was really impressed with all there was to do. Landon had a really good time. Maybe when you come to visit we can make a special trip so you can play too.

RED

Landon has been learning the color red. We have done all kinds of "red" activities in order to recognize the color. We have:

• played with red Play-Dough using red utensils,

• put red beads on a rod to create a red pattern,

• painted a red picture,

• placed the red items on the red mat,
• worn red clothing,
• ate red food ( which is his favorite),

• drank from red cups,

• read red books,

• and created a red page for "Landon's Colors" book.

Believe it or not, most of the time if you ask him to pick out the red item he can do it. He can now also sign the word "red". What color will be next? Blue! but it may be a little while. We want to make sure he really knows one before we move on to the next.

Not a Boo-Boo, Boo-Boo & Learning to read

Yesterday Landon "borrowed" a pen from his Occupational Therapist and made a mark on his leg. When he discovered it last night he came over to me, signed Boo-Boo, and then pointed to his leg where the mark was. It made me laugh so hard. When Travis came home from work, Landon tried to show his Daddy but he pointed at the wrong knee.

He has become so good at using his signs to communicate with us. It is amazing to watch him learn. He is now up to 49 signed words. After doing a little research we feel it's time to start exposing Landon to "reading". There has been reliable research done that shows many children with Down syndrome show the ability to learn to read at an unusually early age. The majority of children in the studies learned to read single words by three to four years of age and some even earlier. One of the other factors in knowing when to start teaching reading is when they know 50 words. After reading the article by Sue Buckley: Teaching children with Down's syndrome to read, http://www.down-syndrome.org/perspectives/9/ , I purchased a few of the books cited to learn a little bit more. I was amazed at what all the children learned. I know that Landon may not read this early but we won't know unless we give him the opportunity.

Opportunity. That's one of the things I have learned with Landon. We don't know what he can or will do unless we give him the opportunities to try. And just because he tries to do something now and doesn't succeed doesn't mean he can't do it, it just means that he is not ready to do it now.

Visiting Newport News

Laney and Emily were former
students of mine from Hilton.

Travis had to go back to Newport News Shipyard for work so Landon and I went with him. The Vaughans, the family of a former student, welcomed us into their home for a couple of nights. Their house is an absolutely beautiful house on the James River. One of the highlights of the trip was taking a boat ride to Captain Chuck-a-Muck's for dinner. This was Landon's first boat ride and he loved it. He laughed at the spray hitting his face and couldn't keep his eyes off the wake the boat made. The other thing we were able to do was visit the Virginia Living Museum. Though Landon was not overly interested in a lot of the exhibits, he loved the gigantic fish tank. I think we could have left him there while we looked around and he wouldn't have missed us.


The other highlights were having lunch with a few of Travis' former coworkers on Friday and my former vice principal, Kelly Gwinn, on Saturday. On Saturday evening, we were able to meet up with Matt and Heather Brady and their son Luke. It was great to be able to catch up with everyone and hear that all is going well for everyone. The time went by way to fast and it was time to go before we were able to do all that we had hoped for. Many other of our friends were out of town that weekend but we love seeing those we could and look forward to the time when we see the others in the future.