One Year At Home!

Our apologies for the long delay since our last post, but thankfully, no news has largely been good news. Cailin has had a great winter. As you can see from the album at right or here, she did the commensurate visit with Santa, and as is almost always the case around new people, she was all smiles! She loved her first Christmas with our families--not because she had any clue about the concept of presents, but just because she loved seeing everyone and exploring new (not baby-proofed) houses!

It seems hard to believe that she's been home with us for a year, but it's true, as she came home on February 29th of last year. In that time she's made incredible progress in her development, surpassing most of the milestones for her "adjusted" age (now 14 months), and is catching up with where she should be for her actual age (17.5 months). The doctors would like to see her caught up by the time she's 2, and she seems to be on track to do so--in everything but her weight and height. She's still petite--at just 18 pounds, 2 ounces, but is growing fast enough that the doctors aren't concerned (nor are we). She is still on oxygen when sleeping, and she seems to be growing increasingly unhappy about it. She loves to pick at the tape and pull at the cannula, which we frequently find around her neck--sometimes alarmingly taught. Thankfully the pulsoximeter's charming beeps quickly lets us know if she's not getting enough oxygen so that we can correct the problem!

She's not yet walking, but last week did take several cautious steps on her own under much protest (so I'm told--sadly I was at work). Her wonderful physical therapist was coaxing her to walk to mommy. Apparently many tears were shed, but walk she did. It has not since been repeated, but knowing Cailin she won't let fear hold her back much longer.

As for talking, she's definitely starting to find her voice. We don't understand much of what she says at this point, but we're pretty sure she does say cat, and she can definitely say no. Other words are more debatable... Speaking of our cat, Kotie, some of you may know that she has a reputation of being quite unfriendly to strangers--hissing, striking (she doesn't have front claws) and biting those that might try to pet her. We were fearful that she might react to Cailin in a similar way which might find her seeking a new home (Kotie, not Cailin!), but amazingly, she loves Cailin, and Cailin adores her. Cailin squeals when Kotie enters the room, and Kotie allows Cailin to pet her frequently, and has even allowed Cailin to sneak in a hug or two with barely a protest. Animals are sometimes quite amazing!

We've tried to put Cailin in a bit of a "bubble" during cold and flu season, although it's been broken for things like Santa, family visits, etc. Unfortunately it hasn't been totally successful; Cailin just got over her second cold. It was a nasty one, and she had to go back to wearing oxygen 24 x 7 for a week or so (which was much harder now that she's mobile--it was a challenge chasing her around with a tank, trying to make sure she didn't reach the end of her tether), but she recovered more quickly than I did from the same cold, and is once again off the oxygen except when sleeping, and doing great.

Speaking of how well she's doing, you may recall from posts last year that we are extremely grateful to the March of Dimes, as a number of the treatments that helped to save Cailin's life were a direct result of research funded by the March of Dimes. Lauren has become quite involved with the local March of Dimes, and she and Cailin were recently invited to a photo shoot with the new superintendent of the Philadelphia School District, Dr. Arlene Ackerman. Dr. Ackerman is the Honorary Youth Chair for the 2009 March for Babies. Lauren and Cailin both appear in a number of promotional materials highlighting Dr. Ackerman's commitment to the March of Dimes. Here's an example:

Of course we will be participating in the March for Babies this year as we did last year (hopefully we'll get better weather!), and would certainly appreciate your support of this extremely worthy cause; we'd love to have you join our March in Philadelphia on April 26th! You can go to www.marchforbabies.com/cailinhope to learn more, to sign up or to donate.

We hope you're doing well. As always, thank you for reading about Cailin!