Grad '10

Not every kid gets to graduate from camp EACH summer!  It's just another reason why Ellie is so very special.  As promised, here are some pictures of that ceremonial day...

Waiting for the show to get on the road...

How am *I* the mother of a boy-crazy 5-year-old?!  Here she is, flirting with yet another boy.  Good grief.  We're gonna have to lock that girl up!

Cheering on her sweet buddies as they receive their diplomas.

Now it's Ellie's turn!  Here come the pretty purple/pink canes!

We tried to pump Ellie up for DAYS before the graduation ceremony, telling her how AWESOME and AMAZING and COOL and FANTASTIC it would be if she walked with her canes by herself on her way to get her "special paper" from Gemma (one of the conductors).  I was so nervous when I saw her stand up in her canes, gettin' ready to head to the center of the room!

...And she did GREAT!  

Her conductor, Anne, watched closely as Ellie slowly walked solo with her canes...

There it is.  The very special paper.  The "Pidoma", as Ellie would say!

Oooh, brave girl, taking her hand off her cane to shake Gemma's hand!

Showin' it off!

And the very best part of the day is getting to see Grandma, who came bearing a whole bunch of graduation gifts!

It was truly an amazing month and Ellie once again surprised us with her determination and spirit.  It makes me dream about what she's going to accomplish next summer!

Onto August...

Hi friends!

I'm baaack!  Did ya miss me?!  With a smiling heart, I can tell you that Miss Ellie sure did!  I took off for 9 days to the Windy City of Chicago, sans Ellie and sans Richard.  THAT is why this blog has been so neglected!  I hauled 11 teeny-boppers with me, on a short term missions trip.  It was un-stinkin'-believable.  If you want details, let me know.  It was lovely to come home to smothering kisses and repetitive reminders of, "I missed you, Mommy!"s.

Of course, this blog is about Jelly B'Ellie, so I'll refrain from spewing all of my news...

My little munchkin finished her month of intensive conductive education therapy camp at the end of July and we were once again thrilled with the results.  As you saw in the previous video, she is starting to slowly (but surely!) walk solo with her canes.  This is a major milestone!  I have a whole bunch of "graduation" pictures to download, but you'll have to cut me some slack.

For the month of August, Ellie will be receiving her physical therapy at Children's Hospital (2-3 times per week), and LOTS of stretching and cane-practice from her resident honorary PTs (aka: Mommy, Daddy, Grandma, Steph, etc...).  Lucky girl, huh?

As you wait for those grad pictures, I'll leave you with a few of Ellie and her new boyfriend.  Richard is ready to sit on the front porch with his shot gun, waiting to scare Ellie's suitors (that is, if we had a front porch and if I actually allowed Richard to own a shot gun), ha!

Oh. My. Goodness. !!

Look at my baby!

LOOK AT MY BABY!

LOOK AT MY BABY!






Oh my. I don't even know what to write because I am overcome. With joy. With pride. With complete adoration.

My baby is walking with canes BY HERSELF. It is unreal!

Excuse me while I go dance around the house and scream in delight...

PS: To Becky, the physical therapist who said, "You know she'll never walk...": Um, yeah.  Not so much.  

Camp Fun

Oooh, this is so much fun!  I love coming home each weekday and living out Ellie's day through pictures.  My heart soars every time I see evidence of how much fun Ellie is having at her Conductive Education Camp.  She just melts me. 

As we can all see through the photos, it's obvious that Ellie's conductors and therapists go to great lengths to ensure her "therapy" is fun.  And while I am thankful for that, I am even more grateful that Ellie is so very tenacious and strong.  She fights through it every day.  She takes just.one.more.step. every day.  She works so very hard.  Every day.

I am head-over-heels in love.

Working hard on fine motor tasks.  Ellie lurves her some puzzles!  It takes a lot of dexterity to put the pieces together. 

H

Having fun in the Sesame Street playhouse (yes, I said SESAME STREET...Ellie's in heaven!) with her sweet friend.

Going down the slide all by herself!  Whoosh!

D

Dr. Jelly B'Ellie.

Now that her mama has to rush out of the center in order to be at work on time, Ellie is always the first one of the kids to arrive at camp.  She zips her way down the hall, straight into the classroom, where she waits for all her friends.  Precious!

 Remember playing with the parachute in the playground at recess?  Well, who said that our "special kids" can't do the exact same thing?!  FUN!

 

Brilliant!

The title of this post refers to ME, of course!

Or, perhaps I'm the opposite of brilliant, since it's taken me so long to figure this out.  Ha! 

This morning, a light bulb flashed (read: flickered) in my head and I thought, "Hey, I should give my camera to Ellie's aide and ask her to snap some 'cute shots' during the camp day!"  And, whaddayaknow, it worked out great. 

These are the sweet pictures that greeted me upon my return home from work today:

Looks like Little Miss Ellie had a pretty awesome day!  We are so grateful that Ellie's conductors and therapists turn "learning how to use your body" into something so fun.  I am constantly overwhelmed when I think about Ellie's "team" and how much they continuously do for our baby.

And a special cyber high-five to Ellie's aide!  Thanks for these fantastic pictures!  Hopefully they'll keep comin' and I can share them with Ellie's Cheerleaders (ie: YOU)....

PS: Yes, I mentioned the "w" word.  Work.  Today was my first day back to the grind.  Real life has fully returned.   Good thing I loved every minute of it (minus the alarm clock, of course)!

4th of July

In this house, we are all about dual citizenship!  So, I thought it'd be a good idea to post a couple of pictures of Ellie in her 4th of July attire, so as not to give Canada an unfair advantage.  Here she is, on her patriotic way to church on July 4th:

She's one cute little firecracker, isn't she?!

O Canada and Oh, Camp!

Happy birthday, Canada!

Ellie was a little confused yesterday when we started singing the "Happy Birthday Song" to Canada.  She said, "No, only PEOPLE have birthdays!"  It was a perfect opportunity for me, her political scientist mom, to give Ellie a little civics/history/geography lesson!

 

 Showing off her Canada Day t-shirt (is it unreal-cute or what?!)

'Course, continuing her life theme, there was no rest for Miss Jelly B'Ellie on Canada's Birthday...The little Canuck had a fun, hard-working day at The Movement Centre, where she's attending summer "camp" for the month of July.  The good thing is that Ellie LURVES it there!  We had today off (in order to make a long weekend out of the Canada Day holiday) and she was upset that she wasn't able to see her friends.  I'm so thankful for that!  It tears up my mama heart to force Ellie into therapy.  Thank goodness for people like her conductors and therapists and helpers who have devoted their lives to making hard work FUN!

Working hard, walking with her canes while at camp.  (Sorry the picture quality is suspect, but I tried to sneak a shot without Ellie seeing me...)

Spending Canada Day at camp!

Our goals for camp this year are:

*Ellie will be able to get into and out of her walker all by herself.
*Ellie will be able to get on and off the potty by herself or with no lifting from her care-giver.
*Ellie will be able to use scissors with some accuracy.
*Ellie will be able to use utensils in a "less messy" way while eating.

The theme for all these goals, of course, is "kindergarten readiness" (gulp)!  My hope is that Ellie's school aide will be able to get through the afternoon without lifting her AT ALL.  Obviously, the less lifting the aide does, the less lifting I'LL have to do at home too!  Our ultimate goal is for Ellie to be as independent as possible, which means that she'll have to learn how to use her body to do these simple "life tasks" on her own.  I truly believe it's an attainable goal; especially since ELLIE desires independence for herself too.

I'll keep you posted as to the status of these goals....hopefully, along with lots of PICTURES!