Sshhh...

Sshh!! Ssshh is important. No, no, don’t be quiet. Just listen. Listen to a child that could not hear say, “Sshh…” But rather, when Rena says it its more like “thhshhshhshhshh.” She’s trying and she is almost there.

Vicki and I noticed her mimicking us over the weekend. When we play with her with her little baby we pretend to put the doll to sleep and we say, “Sshhh, she’s sleeping” and we hold our fingers over our lips as we shush everyone. Rena and Sophi do the same the difference being that Rena comes very close to making the sound. I was with the girls for their speech therapy today and had Rena showing off. Our therapist is thrilled with how quickly she is coming along. Add to this that we asked Rena today vocally to find her baby doll, no signs, no hints, just the sound of the words and she went for it! She heard it; she recognized it; she responded to it. How Awesome!

And no, don’t worry about Sophia. She’s coming right along too. Remember, her program is set a little lower than Rena’s in terms of intensity so she’s not getting quite as much. Regardless, we are sure now that Soph is turning to her name when we call her. The other little thing is something that Vicki and I discovered while we were giving them both a bath tonight. Sophi and Rena both love birds and especially ducks (ducks in books, ducks on T.V., pictures of ducks, ducks in the bathtub). We play auditory games with the ducks too. “Sophi, the duck goes quack, quack, quack, etc.” In the bathtub tonight Sophi let out a series of loud guttural sounds. She kept doing it over and over again and I started to laugh. I told Vicki that she sounded like a barking seal. We couldn’t figure it out. I was on my way to get her a bucket of fish when Vicki put it together, “Jeff, I think she’s quacking…” She was absolutely right. Every time Soph would pick up the ducky she’d bop it around to the rhythm of her seal barks. Now, granted she doesn’t have the sound quite right but she has put it together that the duck makes a sound and does so in a particular pattern. In other words, she’s been listening.

So there you have it, Rena’s first “Shush” and Sophi’s first “Quack!” What a hoot!!

November 2006 Gatlinburg

My sister has requested that we update the blog with new pictures so that the "Bacon Strips" i.e. scabs might be moved a little further down the line. My initial response is to say, "Just wait until we get their tonsils taken out." But since those are in good shape right now we'll have to wait on those photos for a while. At anyrate, here you go sis...

This time last year Sophia was still on oxygen and weighed around 6 pounds. So we missed last year but this time we were able to participate in the Rogers' family annual Gatlinburg weekend. We were able to hit a trail thanks to our handy baby hiking backpacks. We did a short 3 mile round trip hike to see Laurel Falls.

Laurel Falls

Vic packs Soph with no trouble at all...

Rena digs her first quality piggy-back ride...

Soph can't take any more of the fresh air. She's out.

And so is Rena who's sleeping standing up!

Girls playing in leaves. Great lures for drawing in Smokey Mountain Bears...

And it works!!

Oh, but really they are safely in the mini-van while dad is foolishly outside taking pictures. I was using a telephoto lense so I was not nearly as close as it might seem. Pretty cool, huh? First time we've ever seen a bear in the wild. We saw him from the road after we got back from our hike.