Christmas Mama

I didn't end up making chili I made my first ever turkey pot pie! Maybe Chili tomorrow.
I have had this idea in my head for a few years and I'm just not sure how to do it... I think it would be really cool to have a really big nativity set - like 2-3 FEET big! I'd like to have Mary pregnant and and on Christmas eve make her tummy "normal" sized (Don't we wish it really worked like that girls?) and put a Jesus baby in the manger. I really love the idea I just can't figure out how to do it. Now that I actually have a child I want to do this even more. The only thing I can think of is paper mache. And a pregnant belly, well, velcro a seperate piece or something? hmmm there are many ways I could do this aren't there? If I ever get around to really doing it I'll post pictures. Any ideas are welcome!

It's a chili day

I have to go to the store. Husband is a little cold at work today so... chili it is. right now I hardly look at other ppl's recipes. So I don't know why I'd share one. (hmmm, maybe other ppl really do read them). Even my sis who doesn't eat anybody's chili will eat mine. So here goes... the thing about making chili is that it's yours! If you don't like part of it, don't put it in. (leave the beans out if you want!)You control what goes in it so you control if you like it!
I use:
1 lb or so of browned ground beef
some cans of kidney beans
1 packet of mild chili seasoning
1 cut up onion
1 cut up pepper - the color of the pepper depends on my mood and budget
1 can of v8 or tomato sauce
some cans of tomatoes - the kind depends on my mood
then I cook it in a big pot
sometimes I add cheese to the top
** here is my secret ingrediant**
I always use scoop chips as a spoon. It's always more fun to eat anything in a novel way so it gets eaten (even if you know it's good for you!)

on a roller coaster, blindfolded

I feel as if I'm blindfolded and riding a roller coaster. Just when I think she is improving someone with the education to know what to look for says there is a concern. Sparrow’s neurologist amazes me. He see's things so quickly, and notices things that I don't! I'm with her 24/7!!!! Her eye still tends to go to the left?? Let me see? My stars, it does! Once again I went in expecting to hear how I'm a worry wart first time mom. You see she had stopped tracking with her eyes (something a month old baby can do). She had stopped saying the words she could say at 6 months old. Most curiously she started sticking her tongue out to the left. I had all sorts of perfectly normal reasons why a child would do these things. Eyes - she's a torti baby, she just has to readjust to using her eyes now that her neck is straight, no problem PT is working with us on this. Speech, well of course she is working on other skills and doesn't need to practice those words she knows them already, normal! Tongue, well she is getting a new tooth so that is probably bothering her.
Even better, before her appt she started beginning to track again, she said "Jack" and "Mama" again. and sometimes she puts her tongue straight. Cool - it was a glitch now it's gone we are going forward....
   But no he had to shock me and say sometimes when skills come and go it means there is something going on with the brain. Lets get an EEG. (I can hear a record being scratched like a movie sound effect- rewind, back up, what???)    But I said she is better!
   Am I dreaming? Wake up Me, wake up! I guess I really am awake.
Today is PT and her fitting for her leg braces. Husband and my cousin had a wrong pic of this in their head, think plastic velcro closure shoe-like things. Not Forrest Gump. Still, in my head it's a foreign object that I don't want her to need.
   I trust God and I know that if these things help her in any way then I can be a good Mom and handle the fear and stress. But I don't have to like it. What do folks do who don't have God? I can't imagine trying to survive this without Him who is my comfort.

Swallow study number 2

Today it was feeding therapy ***M, she ate a Pringles stick for lunch!!***. Tomorrow is her second swallow study. We are hoping to find out that she is cleared to swallow thin liquids without choking (and that it's just our imagination that she is choking on the thick stuff). I am glad for the pediasure that I was originally hesitant to give her. It's keeping her alive and keeping the weight on.
Wednesday we go for a recheck to the Neurologist to make sure her tone isn't worsening and to find out why we are having some glitches. She is no longer tracking objects with her eyes and her tongue is deviating to the left when she sticks it out - which is often.
Thursday we have PT and she is getting fitted for her leg braces. I am told that they have cute colors/patterns to pick from. I haven't been able to make this OK in my head yet. Of all the things that have been difficult you wouldn't think this one would be that bad. But I flat out don't want her to need them, and I hate knowing that she does.