Cute Stories, My Birthday and Sleep Study Preparation

I am sitting in the family room right now...drinking my iced latte, enjoying the fact that both my boys are outside playing nicely with each other! (I'm not too happy about the fact that Logan was pounding on his door to get up this morning at 5am, despite the fact that the sun on his night light hadn't appeared yet...but that's another story!) They have really enjoyed this 'cooler weather' since our 103 degree record breaking weather here in the Seattle area this week! But, believe me, even that hot weather did not stop the boys from playing outside!

We had another good week! (I'm hesitant to say that statement for fear that I'm going to jinx what we have going on here) I honestly believe that these good weeks are a compilation of Carson's medication being titrated to an optimal dose for him, the good weather (since the boys love being outside) and no preschool this summer. Now the boys are still going to daycare, Carson is just not attending his developmental preschool, since they are closed for the summer. He loves preschool, but it does introduce two big transitions into his daily routine and transitions are very tough for Carson!

Dad even mentioned that Carson's behavior was getting better and I commented back to him with what I thought were the reasons. His response was "or he's growing out of this" and I just chuckled to myself. I just thought to myself, "No honey, I don't think you grow out of this in a couple of weeks, but you can believe what you want. Don't think for a minute that we are going to stop his medication!" It's interesting how we all have our own perspectives to life. It's really not about who is right or wrong...it's all in how it is perceived and handled! I'm OK with that!

Monday was my birthday! I had kind of forgotten about it until my hubby said "Happy Birthday" to me while I was in the shower! I had to work on my birthday, so as I was getting the boys ready for daycare, I told the boys that today was my birthday. Carson promptly began calling me "The Birthday Girl!" It was very cute! Even when I dropped the boys off at daycare, Carson gave me a hug and kiss and said "Have a good day Birthday Girl!"

I arrived at work and it was same 'ole, same 'ole work! Then a guy arrives to the pharmacy window with a vase of flowers and a balloon! I took a look at him and said, "Oh, those are for me!"

"How do you know that?"

"Well, today is my birthday and I bet those are from my hubby!"

"Well, I guess you guessed correctly!" They were beautiful! Thanks hubby!

Later that evening, I fixed a birthday cake. Have you ever added a can of diet soda to a cake mix? Well...it's a good Weight Watchers technique I have learned. Just add a can of any diet soda to any cake mix, mix it all up and bake per box directions. Voila! It's very moist and delicious and much less calories than adding the oil and eggs! So, after dinner we had birthday cake topped with cool whip and raspberries/blueberries! Yum! We all had birthday candles on our cake (per Carson's request) and we all took turns singing happy birthday to each other! It was very cute! The boys both gave me a birthday card and daddy gave me a present! (speakers to enjoy my computer music outside!). All in all...a good birthday day for me!

Both boys went to daycare again on Tuesday and I was home on Wednesday. After I picked up the boys from daycare on Tuesday, I was telling them that they get to stay home with me on Wednesday and Carson started to cry.

"But mom, they are having pajama day at daycare tomorrow! I don't want to miss out!"

"Oh really? OK Carson, I guess you are going to daycare tomorrow! And Logan, you get to have mommy all to yourself tomorrow!"

So on Wednesday, I took Carson to daycare and which pajamas do you think Carson chose to wear? He chose he two piece FLANNEL LONG SLEEVED pajamas! Yep, he did! It took me all morning to convince him that he was going to be hot with those jammies on and he was dead set on wearing them...until we got to daycare and he got out of the car!

"Mom, can I put that T-shirt on that you brought?"

"Yep, you can!" WHEW, I thought, as Wednesday was predicted to be the hottest day EVER in Seattle!

Logan and I had a nice day together! He ran a bunch of errands with me and then we had our speech therapy appointment later that morning! Our speech therapist walked into our house and you could just see the look of relief and smile on her face as she says, "Oh Kari, you guys have air conditioning?" Poor thing...she goes from home to home providing speech therapy services to folks and I can only imagine how hot some homes truly were!

On Friday, Carson got to stay at home with mommy all by himself! It is very nice to be able to give them some one on one attention! It just isn't the same when you have to share mommy's attention with your brother! And, believe me...they are highly competitive for mommy's attention! We had Carson's occupational therapy appointment early and then we were off for our tour of the Mary Bridge Sleep Center. Carson has his sleep study on Sunday evening and I was on a mission to prepare him for this event! Thursday evening, I made a story for Carson about all the steps of the sleep study process, so he would know what to expect when we actually went for the study. I gave it to him that morning and he was very excited to have 'his own book'. He spent a lot of time just looking at the pictures! I just let him look at it on his own and didn't read it to him until we were at the Sleep Center.

If you are interested in viewing the 'book', you can download it at one of the following links:
Word document Format
Power Point format

We grabbed our Sleep Study Book and were off for our personal tour. We met our Child Life Specialist (CLS) and one of the sleep center technologists there. I had previously spoken with Robyn, the CLS and we planned on what we were going to do with Carson. She brought Carson his personal 'sleep buddy' which was a white fabric stuffed doll. She also brought markers for him to color his 'sleep buddy!' He was all over that...coloring it from head to toe, front and back! We let him get comfy in the room (the actual room that we would be sleeping in) and then we slowly introduced the 'stuff' and read him the story. He got to touch the electrodes that would be placed on his head, face and body. He thought it was pretty cool to put them on us, but wasn't too interested in putting them on himself! We did a lot of 'medical play' and just let him get comfy with everything that was going to happen to him. I was really proud of how well he did with this process. We continue to read the book and talk about this test and I'm hoping that he will be able to make the leap from 'having it done to others' to 'having it done to himself!' We talk about it all the time, so I'm hoping that he will be comfortable with what will happen on Sunday evening. Keep your fingers crossed and say a little prayer for us on Sunday evening!

Well...that was our week in a nutshell! Let's hope for a cool and pleasant weekend! Hope you have a nice one as well!