February 14, 2009

Grace had a Valentine's Day party at preschool yesterday, and she was fired up big time for it. She made Valentine's for all her classmates the night before. She's gotten pretty good lately about drawing rather than just scribbling. Currently she can draw flowers, the sun, trees, and people. Her people are pretty hilarious. They're big circles with four lines coming out of them--two arms and two legs. She does make sure to include all the facial features as well.

She had an appointment with her brace maker last week, and he said it was pretty evident that she's grown quite a bit in the last six months. She has to get two new pairs of braces--her full length ones called KAFO's (Knee-Ankle-Foot Orthotics) and her small ones called AFO's (Ankle-Foot Orthotics. She wears her KAFO's to school every day, but on weekends we usually let her wear just her AFO's. Needless to say she's not crazy about wearing her KAFO's, because they're pretty big and unfomfortable. However, they do wonders for her stability in standing, and they keep her knees from buckling in.

February 3, 2009

As the home page of the website says, the RAGBRAI route has been announced. It starts in Council Bluffs and runs through southern Iowa. A southern start will present some challenges because we have more connections in central and northern Iowa, but the Race 4 Grace team is determined to get things going again this year. At this point our main goal is to come up with some sort of small bus to have as a support vehicle during the ride. In the past we've used a bunch of mini-vans and cars, but we're thinking it would be ideal to have a single large support vehicle.

On a different note, Grace is the "Star Student of the Week" at her school this week, and she's loving that. She had to bring a big poster that told all about her and the things she likes, and other than that, I'm not sure what they do for her at school. She definitely doesn't mind the attention, however.

January 23, 2009

Yesterday Grace and I were eating breakfast together, and she changed my day. I was in mourning from a loss the night before and hadn't slept much because of the loss. Then Grace asked, "Daddy, do bunnies talk?" Followed up by, "Daddy, will you tell me a spooky Halloween story on the way to preschool today?" I thought to myself, Grace doesn't care if we won or lost the night before, so stop pouting. She's pretty good about that.

Incidentally, the Halloween story is one of her favorites and usually follows a similar plot-line. Either Petey the Puppy and Sammy the Sheep or the Three Little Dollies end up getting chased by a ghost down a dark street until Grace decides that the story has gotten too scary--at which point the ghost turns into a friendly ghost and all the characters live happily ever after.

January 17, 2008

Not too much new on our end. Grace is getting her fill of Briar Cliff basketball games. Her policy is that she must wear one of her two cheerleader outfits to each game, no exceptions. I brought her into the locker room with me after one of our home wins in December, and now she wants to do it every time. It's fun, she'll go around and give all the guys high fives.

Grace got her new wheelchair delivered yesterday. She's still going to use her Dani as her primary means of mobility, but it'll be nice to have the wheelchair at home when the Dani is at school.

January 3, 2008

Saturday morning, and Grace and I are hanging out at the kitchen table. She's eating breakfast, which this morning is peanut butter and jelly toast and bananas. She's already said that after breakfast she's going to play some computer games. She got a couple different computer-type games for Christmas, and she also likes playing games on our laptop. She's gotten pretty good at running a mouse, and it's fun to watch her learn how to play the games.

We're still trying to figure out where to put all of Grace's Christmas presents--Santa and family were very good to her this year. To summarize, she received baby stuff, barbie stuff, polly pockets stuff, princess stuff, games and puzzles, a fancy purple princess dress, and other clothes. The amount of pink and purple around the house continues to grow. Maybe this summer we'll go ahead and paint the house pink to match everything else.

December 24, 2008

Merry Christmas to everybody! It's Christmas Eve day, and we're at home. We spent last weekend at my parents still unsold house in Clear Lake for our family Christmas. Grace had a great time playing with her cousins Logan, Emmalin, and JJ. She talks about her cousins ALL THE TIME, and she made the most of the couple days she got to spend with them. Tonight we're heading to Marcus to spend Christmas Eve with my Grandpa and Grandma Bird, and tomorrow we'll have Christmas dinner with my Grandpa and Grandma Nelson and other Nelson relatives. In betwee, of course, we'll make plenty of time for Santa's arrival at our house. Grace has recently veered off her typical Barbie and Polly Pocket course and become engrossed in playing with babies. Thus, we anticipate that Santa will arrive with numerous baby-related gifts. Then, later tomorrow we'll head for Carroll to spend a couple days with Michelle's family. All in all it will have been a great Christmas week.

December 7, 2008

We took Grace to see Santa Claus today, and that went really well. She wasn't as shy as we thought she'd be, and she managed to tell Santa what she wanted for Christmas. She told him she wants a purple dress and a doll house. What was most funny was that afterward she told us she wanted to tell Santa that she wants the "Baby Alive" doll that goes "poop and pee," but she didn't want to say the words "poop and pee" to Santa. It was a pretty funny moment.

Also, we got word late last week that her power wheelchair is almost ready. We started the process of getting one back in early August, and we knew going in it would be a long process. It'll be nice to have the chair, which we'll probably have her use to get around the house. She'll continue to use her Standing Dani at school, because that's worked really well and she uses it a lot more at school than she'll use her wheelchair at home.