Because It Rains...

Because sometimes it rains, we can do this...

...just take off those 'ears' and play in the rain.

I am completely exhausted by the end of each 14 hour shift every day, but we are having fun. Less than six weeks left of our summer off from school. I really do miss work, being in the classroom, teaching all those starving minds whenever a teacher needs me to fill in for her/him. It's trying at times like when a fight breaks out or when I hear glass breaking   at the end of the day when we've been full speed all day long, but I have to tell myself that sometimes rain is just rain, it will pass...I don't have to turn everything into a storm. And besides, if you don't just FEEL the rain, look at rain, smell the rain, you could miss all this!

He'll Just Drill Your Ear

So Brook had an ear ache ALL WEEKEND. She got me up several times last night in major pain. Finally when she woke, her ear was draining.....ahhh relief! I already had drops for that so I put some in while I awaited the ENT nurse to call me back. Since this is her second infection this month, and since she is a ci patient, I decided to double check w/them and see what I should do. Irrigating the ear w/warm water and use my drops should do the trick and if not I'll call them back in a few days. Brook already feels so much better.

When we were waiting for the nurse to call, GAGE decided to take this opportunity to horrify his sister when she asked what Dr. W would do to her (she hasn't seen her ci surgeon in a couple of years!). I walked in and heard him say, "Well, he'll take a drill and put a Q-tip on the end of it and he'll just drill your ear." Thank you ! Luckily she was already getting up to double check this information with me. I will have to say, he did at one point use a drill like instrument during their cochlear implant surgeries...but I don't think they even realize that...yet.

Yes, deaf children can use the phone independently

Brook has yet another suspected ear infection. I'm just gonna bypass her pediatrician this time since she hasn't seen her ENT in a while and see what he says. This is the opposite ear and last time the omnicef didn't seem to help, she continued to hurt for more than a week til her ear started draining at which point her doc gave her drops and that did clear it up. Our surgeon likes to keep up w/his ci patients if they have recurrent ear infections so I'll call and get an appt. with him next week and just give her pain meds round the clock. She did go out (w/her camo shirt of course) with her Daddy (since Gage had spent the night at my mom's) and he let her borrow Gage's BB gun. TOTALLY THRILLED THE CHILD!

It's taken lots of practice (and now that both are bilateral, that has helped!) but they can talk on the phone very well, needing little help from us. As you can see, I got in trouble when she discovered I was filming, lol. Brook is bragging to him that Daddy walked around outside with her while they looked at birds took her 'hunting' this morning. But I must say she did kill a leaf, and was quite proud she had shot the thing. Who knows what would have happened had if fallen from the tree or something, so we thank her for that!



(Heart is a stuffed animal that he sleeps with  that they love very much!) Nanny caved and bought her a FurReal rabbit-whatever you call those things) and he got some more Legos and army trucks.

Again, if you are an Alabama parent/teacher/caretaker of a child w/hearing loss or just want info on what AL has to offer, facts and events, etc. go to the AL PEEPS blog and also find us on facebook by clicking on the badge on that blog to receive even more info! Click here to visit blog

a hummingbird...

Nothing excites a hearing-deaf child more than discovering a sound for the first time. Yesterday, Brook came in bubbling over, "Come here Mama, Come here, I heard a hummingbird!" So I grabbed my video camera and let her tell me all about it.

Busy Bee & Cat Speech Therapy

So I've been a busy bee (those are real bees from my back yard!) reading and posting all things relevant to Alabama PEEPS either on that blog or on the PEEPs facebook page (see blog) regarding hearing loss in our Alabama kiddos. Lots to do here in Alabama and trying to move quickly but hard to do when kids are out for the summer. My next step w/the PEEPs program is another park get together somewhere else in the state. I'm trying to be fair to everyone and accessible to all parts of the state.

Gage was mapped today, that went well. He didn't have any more electrodes turned off! He's hearing much better I can already tell.

Brook was seen giving the cat speech therapy again. She believes in the AVT principles and talks to them with very lengthy detail...example: "Cat if you see a mouse, eat it! It is your job! Dogs, if you see a mole, eat it! And cat, always say 'thank you' okay?" Here you may find this same cat more than 2 yrs ago learning the pledge at just a couple of days old.

Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's Day! I was blessed to have a great Daddy growing up and now I am blessed to also have a great father-in-law too who gave me his son who is Super Dad so Happy Father's Day!  We had my annual family bbq last night. My husband grilled us up some goodies, the kids played. Here are my nephews (all grown up, omg!) and my little niece. She's terrified of dogs so if she looks a little nervous, SHE IS (we have 2). She and Brooklyn had also been into some makeup! Not sure if they meant to look like cats or if that's just the style now? lol

Gage is going for MAPping on Tues. He seems to hear better w/each individual ear rather than bilaterally. We'll see if it's fixable or more trouble on that right ear that's double mapped due to electrodes being shut off.? He's a trooper and managing fantastically. You could definitely tell when his pill (ADHD) wore off last night! (and every night for that matter) But it was near bed time and we managed to keep him safe til he was snuggled deep in his covers (where he remains right now).Gage loves his Dad because he's funified and fixes things as you can read here (a Sunl is an old 4 wheeler he harasses his dad to fix every single day they work on together)...

while Brook  thinks he's swett, ahem, I mean sweet. She also notes him as a stare (star) and at the very end, her ulterior motives shine when she just really wants to kick him out of my bed so she can sleep/cuddle with her Mommy! *grin* love it.

That is awesome!

While on the phone this morning with my six year old child (who spent the night w/my mother) I said, "Ask Nanny if she needs more squash." She immediately shouted to another room, "Nanny, do you need more squash?"

So what? She is a deaf child, speaking to her mother via telephone without any assistance! That is independence, that is awesome! In fact I was the one needing assistance when she said "I have a bad cough." I had no idea what she was saying and luckily Nanny repeated the unexpected sentence. I thought she was saying she had a bad fall.

She loves to cook and help me in the kitchen. Today, we've already made brownies, and later we will tackle roasting a chicken, cooking a beautiful cabbage my mother in law gave me, squash, beans and who knows what all we'll cook up for dinner. I have plenty of help!

We're Pooped

Nah, not that kinda pooped, I guess I should say we've been pooped on. And after they finished spreading what led to such an nice aroma around the house of chicken manure, they politely came back this morning to spread lime to neutralize the soil. See...

Can't wait see that beautiful field I love so much as it's new grass grows all summer long.

After the dust cleared, Brook relaxed in her pool.

and Gage supervised PawPaw D as he enlarged our yard thanks to the borrowed dozer. Thanks Farmer Peanut!

Brook could feel all that heavy equipment and told me she could "hear" it.

And check out our flowers!

Good thing my husband likes to garden, I have a black thumb!

We're Not Normal...

"Mama, we're not normal" says my nine year old on the way home from vacation Sunday.

"What do you mean?" I ask.

"Me and Brook, we're not normal, no one else has implants but us."
"Lots of people have implants."
"You're unique!" Shouts a voice from the background (my mother).
"Yes, and it's always best to be a little unique or else you'll just blend right in with everyone else. You and Brook are actually pretty average kiddos aside from wearing something to make you hear."
"Yeah, I like not being normal." **big smile**
"So do I."

Yesterday, while she was swimming (no hearing) I tried to tell Brook what type of meat my father in law had dropped off at the house (it was bbq) but I was about 30 feet away, and she can't read lips anyway. Being mostly carnivorous, she was determined to know what type of meat it was "Chicken? Ham? Steak?" So I took a chance and signed (finger spelled) the word pork. She shouts "Pork!" and we both started cheering! I'm so surprised she remembered the letters since we don't typically sign. Gage never liked signing and never would even attempt it, but since she can't speech read like he can, I'll be happy to sign more often.

My Dad and I took the kids to the park yesterday after we returned the rental van back to the car rental company. We have nothing now on our schedule until next week, so finally we can get the house back in order, play or do nothing. We've been busy ever since school got out.

My poor broken toe is much better, still purple and tender a bit but like I say, taping it to a good toe & wearing tennis shoes is the key.

Mountain Folk

I know, I know, we already ARE "mountain folk" but this weekend, my mom and my sister and her daughter along w/me and my two kiddos, visited The Great Smoky Mountains.

Medical Bracelets...check!

Bubba Gump Seafood...check!

...the kids are enjoying their novelty light up cups from our wonderful dinner we had there! It was extremely loud in there and my kids were starving so they didn't even try to keep up w/conversation...I could barely hear myself!

Attitude...check!

Miss B unfortunately had to be put under house arrest for the aquarium visit due to behavior (Mother stayed w/her since she had no intentions of going there for the 100th time anyway) but she redeemed herself and was paroled soon after to finish packing in the fun and adventure.

I had to take the girls into the 4D Motion theater for a second round of the body jerking, stomach turning, make my sister have to leave during the first showing...movie that made us feel like we were actually skateboarding and snow sledding. I'm not sure which one of us laughed the loudest. I do know Gage had trouble keeping his glasses on (you know the one size fits all black movie glasses) on his tiny ears when he watched it. I told him to hold onto the seat w/one hand and his glasses w/the other.

We traveled thru Cades Cove and saw a couple of bears in the far distance and walked around visiting some old bldgs.

Brook hangs on to her prized possessions when looking over a bridge...good girl! Oh we had fun, but so glad to be home. My toe is much better for those who helped me on Facebook w/my broken toe incident! Ice, tape, ibuprofen and tennis shoes=all good!