Almost a month! So much to update . . .!

I can't believe it's been almost a month since I've posted anything. I guess that gives you an indication of how crazy-busy I have been lately!

Kevin Updates

Kevin is doing really well. He is making a lot of progress. On May 1, Kevin took his first solo steps! He took about three or four steps from my dresser to Daddy, just as we were leaving the house for work! It was totally unexpected. Of course, since then, I have only seen him do that twice more. However, he uses everything to help him walk now--he walks along the furniture, the walls, and often uses his push toys. He usually walks barely holding on to one of our fingers. I think he just needs to build up some confidence. He has also become proficient at climbing onto things, and opening doors!

In terms of his speech, he still has a lot of grunts and non-verbal sounds, but he is also doing well with the words from the speech therapist (we are moving up to the next sheet of words next week). In addition, he often randomly imitates words that he hears on TV or from one of us (for example, "rainbow"--"rah-bow").

Kevin's had a lot of doctor's visits in recent weeks, too. We went to the neurologist, who said there's a 95% chance we won't find the cause of Kevin's delays, and eventually he'll catch up to other kids. She's still scheduling an MRI to make sure his brain structures look good (just to rule anything out) and we may do some genetic blood tests to check for any diseases/syndromes, but she hasn't decided yet.

Kevin finally had another hearing test, too. The results were pretty much the same as last time: fluid in both ears, and they are not sure what is causing it. Therefore, they're sending us to an ENT (Ear-Nose-Throat specialist) who will hopefully sort out the cause of the fluid, and decide if Kevin will need any intervention, like tubes in his ears. The audiologist said Kevin is definitely hearing sounds, but the fluid could be muffling sounds, which could be what's affecting his speech. Still, we aren't sure. So, off to another specialist in the search for answers!

Indoor/Outdoor Fun

With the arrival of the nice weather, we are either at the park or in the backyard almost every day. Andrea, especially, has reached a stage where she gets bored very easily. Kevin isn't as adventurous, but he enjoys the outing, too.

Andrea likes to help Kevin when they are outside. She likes to push him on the swings, and show him how to climb up on the slide. He always gets excited when she plays with him. There is still a lot of sibling rivalry between them, especially as Kevin doesn't understand some of his actions, and Andrea gets bossy at times. Overall, though, they seem to be enjoying each other's company a lot more lately.

(In the video above, Kevin is trying to imitate Andrea jumping off her stool. It's too funny how he just kind of crawls over it, and goes "mwah!" when he makes it over, like a big grunt of effort!)