Category Archives: Lily School
Happy 6th and 9th Birthday Leo & Lily!
Happy 6th and 9th Birthday Leo & Lily! Leo stretches 3’10” and weighs 44.7lbs! Leo has been developing so much in the past year. He can eat almost everything now (that he’s not allergic to) except soupy things. He is good at holding the food himself and taking big bites out of it but now that he’s starting to lose his baby teeth, it’s a little more challenging since he doesn’t know to bite from the side of his mouth. No worries Leo, mommy will cut up the pieces of food for you!!! Some of his favorite foods are pizza, cheeseburgers, ham and cheese croissant from Starbucks haha, anything chicken, and chocolates! He also like chips and tons of different crackers and gold fishes, apple sauce and yogurt! He likes strawberries, blueberries and blackberries and looooves bananas. He still drinks pediasure about once to twice a day to keep up with his calorie intake! He also likes the mango dragonfruit drink at Starbucks and smoothies from my café!! He also drinks water like a camel haha! I’m so proud with how much he finally loves food!!
Leo is starting to read and is really good with making sounds of each letter!!! He will sometimes call the letters by the sound instead of the letter names since that’s how he learned it, which is great for reading skills! Leo can also count to 20 pretty well, we are just working more on counting objects instead of just counting to 10 or 20 each time haha. He loves reading time and listening to stories!
Leo likes making with dolls and figurines. He likes to also put them in his mouth due to his sensory needs. Leo is a huge fan of Spider-Man and all the marvel superheroes like the hulk, iron man, and captain America. He likes to stand in front of the mirror and pretend to shoot spider webs from his hands or sometimes flex his muscles like the hulk. It’s super cute!!! Leo also loves music and dancing and he’s learning more words to songs and loves to sing along to al his favorite tunes even if it’s not completely clear, it’s still super cute!! 
This past year has been so difficult for many reasons, zoom therapy and schooling is not very productive for Leo but I’m so glad to see him still making progress this past year. I’m super proud of Leo and his physical development is around a 24 month old, but he is just so smart amazing!!! He is starting to jump more, we are just working on him bending his knees more before jumping but he’s able to jump about 8 inches out!!! So great!!! He loves swimming in the pool with his floaty vest! He isn’t afraid to hold his breathe and go under the water either! He’s super sweet and very empathetic to others emotions as well. Leo is going to be done with kindergarten next week and will then be officially a first grader!! He’s so friendly and social, he loves everyone and has no stranger danger or separation anxiety haha. I feel like I say this every time but I’m so constantly amaze by all that he’s achieved and overcome! I love you so much my petite prince Leo!!! I can’t wait to see what more amazing things you will do and achieve. Happy Birthday my adorable son, mommy is so proud to have you!!!!
Happy 9th Birthday Lily!! Lily is 4’2” and weighs 51.4lbs! Lily loves all kinds of noodles, especially garlic noodles. She likes broccoli and corn and will eat pretty much all kinds of sea food, but for some reason, all other meats are not impressive to her, even the fanciest steak in town, she will not eat it with much enthusiasm haha. Her favorite restaurants are Olive Garden and Chili’s and anything with crab and noodles haha. She likes all kinds of snacks as well except she’s not into cakes. Unique child haha. She enjoys doing lots of arts and crafts and likes to draw and color. She’s getting
more detailed and creative in her drawings, she like to draw sloths, puppies, animals and her family! Lily likes crocheting and knitting and has become pretty quick and diligent at it too! Lily just finished the 3rd grade (year 3 month 9) and her end of the year math and reading scores shows that she’s at a 5th grade level (year 4 month 9)! Wow Lily, you are so smart!! Even with distance learning, she still managed to keep up with her studies and excel! I’m so proud of you my Lily pad!
Lily has mastered riding her bike with no training wheels, but also picked up some new outdoor sports as well. Lily learned how to roller skate, and now roller blading! She prefers roller blading over roller skating, maybe because I have roller blades too, so we match. She also picked up longboarding within 5 minutes! She is so fearless and I admire her bravery and her positive enthusiastic attitude when approaching new things! I need to get myself a longboard so that she and Alex can teach me haha. Perhaps I’ll have better luck with that than a skateboard maybe? She also really enjoys playing tennis still and needs to upgrade to a bigger tennis racquet since she’s getting bigger! Where did my baby go?? At least I can save her old racquet for Leo now! Lily also had her 1st communion and received the Holy Eucharist! I’m so super proud of Lily for completing her 2 years of religious education at St. Denis Catholic Church. She really embraced all the teachings and I’m so happy her hear her say that she wants to be the best version of herself possible!!! I cannot be any more proud!
Lily enjoys working on jig saw puzzles, but also word searches and spot the difference type of games! Lily likes to play board games now too. Alex and I introduced her to Catan Jr and Dominion and she totally caught on right away and had so much fun! Yay to another board gaming buddy!! Lily also likes sloths to the point where it’s an obsession like her momma, and enjoys drinking boba, especially with taro or ube milk tea! Lily likes to play with slime still…it’s a love hate relationship with me and slime… Lily also enjoys playing with Legos and putting together fun Lego sets. She enjoys building things and doing science experiments and projects as well. She’s an amazing little helper and would love helping me do things from helping me cook, bake, and even folding the laundry and vacuuming. Lily is so sweet and kind, she has a generous heart and is so mature and wise for her age. She’s growing up so fast, but I’m still so grateful she enjoys giving and receiving hugs and kisses!!! I will cherish all our snuggles on the couch together and all the enthusiastic “Mommy!” from her every time I pick her up from school. I love watching you grow into your own independent, confident, healthy little person and I can’t wait to see more amazing things you’ll do!! I love you so so so much my sweet Lily pad. Happy 9th birthday, you make mommy so proud, I love you 3000 times infinity!!!
Here’s their annual birthday videos, enjoy!!
Happy 5th & 8th Birthday Leo & Lily!
Happy milestone 5th birthday to my little prince Leo and happy golden 8th birthday to my princess Lily!! Lily measures about 48 inches tall and weighs about 42 pounds. Leo stretches about 44 inches and weighs in at 37 pounds. This year we had to experience the unfortunately worldwide pandemic of covid-19 and so the kids this year celebrated their birthday at home through zoom. I made a balloon garland and blew up a ton of golden and different blue color balloons to decorate the house as well and made them each a display cake that had all their current favorite things on it. I also made a read strawberry cake for Lily with whipped cream cheese frosting on it and got Leo a cheesecake since he cannot have eggs. The morning of their birthdays, I surprised them with a bunch of blue balloons all over the floor of their bedrooms, so that was very fun to watch them wake up to that! I had a bunch of candied bacon for their dessert as well and ordered Olive Garden (Lily’s favorite) delivered for lunch and invited friends to wish the kids a happy birthday! It wasn’t as extravagant as I planned for earlier this year but it was still perfect because the kids had so much fun and felt all the love from everyone, and that’s all that matters.
Lily learned how to ride her bike this past year and nailed it really quickly, within 30 minutes! I’m so proud of her dedication and willingness to learn, even if it may seem scary at first. She also learned how to swim, and can even do the forward stroke decently. She can float and play in the pool all on her own with no floaties, what a big girl now! Lily really likes to cook and bake still, she’s my little sous chef! She also likes to practice origami and her favorite thing to fold right now are boxes, cubes boxes where you blow into it and it puffs up into a box! She is a very social person and so staying quarantined these last few months have been quite challenging, as I’m sure is the case for everyone else right now. She does facetime with her classmates and so that helps a bit. She likes to go and ride her bike outside or go swimming or play on the splash pad to cool off and burn off some energy. Her favorite shows are The Last Airbender and The Legend of Kora. He favorite movie was Sonic the hedgehog and she loves playing Arms and Animal Crossing on the Nintendo switch. She also really likes playing with slime and watching a bunch of YouTube videos, especially of Collin Keys and he craziness haha. Lily also likes reading a variety of books, and reading to Leo as well. What a great sister Lily! Lily also donated her give jar to her 2nd grade teacher Mrs. Barnes because she said she loves Mrs. Barnes and she had so much fun in her class and wants to donate her money so Mrs. Barnes can get more things to help teach more kids. Lily, you have such a sweet and amazing heart, you impress me everyday with your kindness and generosity, I love you so much!!
Leo loves Chuck E Cheese right now and I would say it’s pretty accurate to say that Chuck E Cheese is his best friend haha. I got him a Chuck E Cheese doll for his birthday and he brings him everywhere he goes. It’s so cute to him so attached to him, and he’ll even pretend to give Chuck E Cheese his milk, and share his snacks with him as well. He also likes watching Peppa Pig, GooGoo GaGa on YouTube, Pixar’s Bao, Float, Birds and Moana. He likes to sing a lot more now and will try to sing along to random songs on the radio, but he favorite is the Happy Birthday song. He can sing almost the entire song pretty well!! Leo loves dancing to music, or even when there’s no music, and he loves to follow along to the Chuck E Cheese Cha Cha dance video. He memorizes all the words and moves and will shout along periodically the words! I love to watch his excitement when he plays the dance video, he has to stop what he’s doing and dance along! It’s super cute! Leo is also increasingly more affectionate and loving as well, it just truly melts my heart. He’ll come over and randomly gives me hugs and kisses. Sometimes he’ll ask me to give him a piggy back ride going down the stairs as well. He needs to remember to not let go sometimes but he knows to hold on for the most part! Leo really likes to climb, run around, play with swords, and baby dolls. His vocabulary is increasing and he’s able to put 5 words together in a sentence recently too! He blows my mind with how smart he is and how much he’s learning and able to achieve. He’s also able to eat pretty much everything now too, except for soupy things, he’s still working on that. He can eat rice dishes, noodle dishes, all kinds of seafood, chicken, tacos, any kind of sandwiches, he is such a great eater now! He also still loves fruits, strawberries, blackberries, grapes, cherries, apples, oranges, pears, everything! I am constantly so proud of him! The zoom sessions for therapy and school has been challenging but I’m so glad he continues to make movement in his accomplishments. You’re so incredibly amazing my petite prince Leo, I love you oh so much, and you light up my life!
Happy special milestone birthdays Lily and Leo!! I hope you both had an amazing birthday this year. This year has definitely been a challenging and different experience for birthdays, and any kind of social celebrations, but I’m glad that it doesn’t take much to make your guys happy. I’m glad that you both appreciate the little things that just feeling my love for you is enough, and that I can make you happy with what I have. You guys are my everything and I’m definitely going to take you guys on a big vacation next year when things are safe. Can’t wait for more adventures with you Lily and Leo, I love you both so much!! Your hearts, smile, laughter, hugs and kisses makes me the luckiest and happiest mom in the world. Happy golden 8th birthday Lily!!!!!!! Happy milestone 5th birthday Leo!!!!!
Here are Leo and Lily’s birthday videos, Lily riding her bike with no training wheels, and Leo’s video of his 5 word sentence! ENJOY!
Happy Birthday Leo & Lily!
Happy sweet 3rd birthday to my handsome petite prince Leo and 6th birthday to my beautiful princess Lily!! Lily weighs in at 37lbs (8 percentile) and stretches 44 inches tall (32 percentile) while Leo weighs 29lbs (21 percentile woohoo!) and stretches 37 inches tall (41 percentile). Leo is getting smart and clever and sweeter each day! He is now developing empathy and when he sees someone like Lily get hurt, he goes over and tries to give her a hug or looks at her face and tries to see if she’s ok. If he gets in trouble, he’ll know he did something wrong and start to pout and then go to try to give you a hug as if he’s trying to say sorry! He’s so silly and I just discovered he has a favorite hiding spot for some of his favorite toys. There has been some toys missing when I would clean up and put all the toys back in their designated spots, but I’ll look all over the floors and under the couch even and can’t seem to find some toys. Then one day I saw Leo put his tiny hand down the corner of the couch between the pillow and couch and pull out a toy! A HA! I found his secret hiding spot! I went to check and what do you know, all the missing toys were there! Haha, silly Leo! He likes to clean up and now and after his naps and sleep, he would pick up whatever stuff animals that he would toss over the crib, and throw it back into his crib! He also like to throw random toys into the kitchen sink too. I think he just sees me and Lily putting dishes away and so he wants to participate too, so cute!! Leo also will understand the word “hug” and likes to hug his arms and hug toys, hug anything really, and he likes to give hugs as well.
He can now sign “sleep” really well and when I tell him it’s nap time or goodnight, he will sign sleep very gently over his face, it’s so cute!! He really likes to explore now that he is more comfortable walking all over the place! He is very curious and likes to take in the environment and see how things work. Leo had a series of assessments done with the public school district for his transition from the Early Start Intervention Program with the Regional Center to the public school system. They say he’s around a 10 month to 1 year old in terms of development and that he will qualify for special needs education, and they recommended the school in Claremont called Sumner Danbury Elementary School where they have a built in therapy facility there that Leo would benefit greatly from! They even have a pool that he can do therapy in as well! The school sounds amazing for him! Leo is starting to eat a tiny bit of thicker foods. I made him a mashed avocado banana yogurt recipe and he ate it and didn’t mind the chunks in it! Fingers crossed, I hope he will start moving on to more solid foods soon! He really like sweets and lollipops and candy, I wonder where he got his sweet tooth from? Haha! But he also likes to lick lemon slices… He likes to see what you’re eating now too so I think this new curiosity with food is a huge development! I love his growing mind and sweet loving spirit! I’m so proud of Leo, and cannot be more happy with his progress and development. He is amazing in every way, and will always be perfect in my eyes! Happiest 3rd birthday my handsome petite prince, I love you so so so so so so much!!
The kids are growing up so quickly, I just want to bottle up their youth and innocence forever! Currently Lily is into the shows Spirited, Dr. Seuss, the Magic School Bus, and Vamporina! She really likes playing with dolls and pretending to be a shop owner and selling you groceries or ice cream or anything really. She likes going fishing and catching the fish with the giant net that’s bigger than her and putting the bate on her hook and casting it into the water as well. Lily also likes to read books and is doing pretty good at writing out sentences and sounding out words and spelling it like how it sounds. Spelling isn’t always correct but it’s a super great start for learning to write right now! She comes up with silly and funny sentences too, like “It is raining outside but I wanted to play. I guess I will wait.” Haha! Lily’s been saving up money in three different jars (Give, Save and Spend) for the past couple months and on her birthday, I said she can use the money in her Give jar to someone or something to help make the world a better place. She wanted to give her money to teachers, specifically her kindergarten teacher Ms. Edwards because she feels you make the world a better place!! How sweet is that?! So told her that I’ll matched how much she saved (and rounded up haha). I attached a video message from Lily as well! This was the wonderful response from Lily’s teacher:
“This email made me cry many happy tears! Happy birthday sweet Lily and thank you so much for your kind-hearted gift on your birthday. It means so much to watch that video and hear your kind words. It is students like Lily that make me love coming to school everyday and I look forward to seeing all the wonderful things that Lily is going to accomplish! She has such a kind heart and I am so honored to have been her teacher at QS and be the person she chose to present her Give jar to… Thank you, again, my heart is so full from Lily’s thoughtfulness.”
I’m so proud of Lily and it melts my heart to see her touch others’ hearts like she’s touched mine. Lily felt so happy when I read her the email, and her smile just lit up the entire room. You can feel the fullness of her heart, and I hope she continues to feel that throughout her life, and keep making a difference in this world!
Lily is also very into arts and crafts and has a very imaginative mind! She likes to draw and color and make things with cutting paper and gluing things together. She likes to make Leo laugh as well and feels very proud of Leo every time he makes a new sound or does something new! She’s such a proud big sister and that warms my heart as well. Lily also graduated from Kindergarten and she also got chosen as one of the readers of the classroom too!! Great job Lily!! Lily really enjoys summer school fun club at Maple Hill and she gets to do so many fun things during the week! I can’t believe my baby girl is going to be a grade schooler now, time sure flies by! Lily’s piano teacher said that Lily is really mature and is keeping up with the lessons and doing really great in class! I see a lot of a growth and improvement in just her hand positions and fingers as well. It’s impressive at how fast they pick things up at their age. Lily also loves gymnastics and her favorite thing to practice are her handstands. She’s improving a lot in that as well and is becoming more bold and daring and really willing to throw herself into the activities and give it her all! She was very excited but also reserved at first, now she jumps onto the balance beam, doesn’t even look scared of the heights, and she even climbs the rope about halfway up the wall too! Way ta go Lily pad!!! Her bright generous sweet caring nature makes me so happy! Happy 6th birthday my Lily pad, I love you so so so so so so much as well!!!
Check out these kiddies’ birthday videos!
Spring Update
Leo weighs in at 26.89lbs and stretches 38inches tall! Leo is getting better at eating with a spoon and is licking the puree off the spoon less, although the urge to do so is quite strong in him still haha. He is still very picky on what purees he will eat. He won’t be picky when it’s in the bottle but just by looking at the color and smelling the food, he will push the food aside and fight you if it’s not his typical plain applesauce. He is walking so much better, and he can finally get up to standing all by himself without having to hold onto something! He can also climb down the stairs very proficiently now as well! Soon he’ll be running and jumping all over the place! I already have the bandaids ice packs ready haha. Leo is starting to understand signing more and is better at signing “thank you” and “all done” as well. Sometimes I’ll blow him a kiss and he will do it back to me! I have been taking ASL classes to in hopes of furthering along Leo’s communication abilities with signing. I printed out cheat sheets and taped them on the walls to encourage and motivate Lily to learn with me and so we all can sign together as a family! I’ll often see Leo looking at his fingers and he will try to move them and make different shapes with his fingers and wave them around as if trying to communicate with me, so I really feel like signing will be his primary language as he’s trying to learn to speak verbally. He still hasn’t said any words with purpose or intention yet, although he likes to say “ball” a lot but he says that for everything so I doesn’t really count haha.
Overall, Leo remains happy and sweet as always! He loves giving hugs and he’s finally not needing a bib anymore from all the drooling in the past! He is getting so tall that his pants needs to be size 3T, but his waist is so small his pants sometimes slips down haha. Leo still likes to put all his toys and Lily’s toys in his mouth, and he’s still so amazed with zipper tags and likes to just flick them back and forth. He would lay on the couch and just play with that all day long! He loves being thrown in the air, he’s a dare devil. He likes swings and slides as well. He still doesn’t like when things/places get really loud. He is still an amazing sleeper and has such a calm and sweet demeanor about him. Since he’s walking now, he can enjoy so many more things when we go out! I took the kids to the Museum of Illusions, Candytopia, and game places like Neofun and Round One and he loves exploring and checking everything out! He is always a super cute bright ball of joy!!
Lily is getting smarter and sweeter each day, she’s growing up way too fast! Lily weighs 35lbs and is 44inches tall! She has a very big appetite and loves to eat veggies (spinach, cabbage, carrots, and broccoli) and tofu, and a bunch of crackers and snacks, yet she burns off all the calories in a flash! She has a very happy spirit about her and is so intuitive and thoughtful, I cannot be more proud of my baby girl. She is also now super good at showering by herself. She’s also able to make her own bed every morning and is starting to learn to vacuum the house as well! She’s been taking piano lessons for the last month. She’s definitely trying really hard, some of the concepts aren’t as naturally easy for her to grasp, but she’s trying and with some extra practice at home, she’s getting more and more confident with it. I’m very proud of her for not once wanting to give up, and her determination to keep focusing and trying. She also loves her gymnastics lessons which she has twice a week. She has so much fun and has been selected gymnast of the day 3 times now! She gets a nice little ribbon and gets to ring the bell at the end of class to announce her achievement to the whole gym! She’s almost ready to move on up to the next level once she gets more comfortable with doing hand stands and cartwheels! She also had her first jog-a-thon at school and did 26 laps!! She had so much fun jogging around and was cheering on her friends to come and go go go! She also forgot to get her lap marked off a couple times too haha. She knew that the more laps she did, the more money she would raise for her school for better supplies and opportunities. So she knew she was jogging for a cause and she tried her very best not just to have fun, but to help as well. I’m so proud of her and her great big ball of athletic energy!
Lily is learning to read really well and can read a lot of books all by herself now! She’s really good at sounding out the letters and putting the sounds together to form the word. Her favorite subject in school is still math, but I’m glad that even though writing and reading isn’t her strongest, she’s still enthusiastic about it. She really like Dr. Seuss, Elephant and Piggie, and Pete the Cat books! Her favorite shows to watch is currently Sofia the First and Pokemon! She likes to play with slime, dolls, and do lots of arts and crafts. Lily loves to help me cook and her teachers and aftercare teachers tells me she’s always such a great helper at school as well! Lily really likes the movie The Greatest Showman right now, and loves most of the songs from the movie. She has a mature taste in theater, it’s nice to be able to share common interests with her like this. Lily still has her happy go lucky spirit and is such a kind and sweet little girl. I love it when she would just randomly come up to me and give me a big hug and kiss and tell me she loves me, she melts my heart! She’s always thinking about others and I makes me really proud that she’s such a loving positive force in this world. 
Enjoy of of these videos of the kiddoes!!
Gratitude
Gratitude, it’s not happiness that brings us gratitude, it’s gratitude that brings us happiness – Unknown.
It’s been awhile since I’ve updated this blog so this will be a very long one…so brace yourselves haha. For Halloween I made Lily a Wonder Woman dress along with the leggings, arm bracelets, and a shield! Lily likes wearing her dress to school and going out and just for any ordinary day and it makes me happy that she loves it so much! She tells her teachers and that I made her dress for her and she just has such a big smile on her face too, it makes me feel happy that she’s so proud of my work for her. I made a cape for Leo to be Captain Underpants but it was way too cold for that costume, so He was a last minute Batman Pumpkinpants haha. Lily loved her costume and I bought her some Wonder Woman books before hand and so she loves the story of the amazing amazonian princess and brought the book while wearing her costume for her literary parade at school! Lily also had her first field trip at Quail Summit to the Santa Ana Zoo. She loved seeing all the animals and she said her favorite were the butterflies and monkeys. Lily really likes going to school, morning care and after care (aka Fun Club) and she’ll complain sometimes that I pick her up too early (5pm isn’t really that early…). I’m glad she gets so stimulated at school and is making friends with kids of all ages! Every time I come to pick her up, all the big kids know her name and always run to give her a hug before we leave. That’s so sweet and heart warming!
I had the honor of having our family photos taken by the super amazingly talented, and kind soul, Lisa Holloway. Here are some of the many favorites from that session. I will cherish these memories and I am so grateful to have these beautiful kids to call mine.
Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it. – William Arthur Ward
Lily really enjoys all her extracurricular activities after school. She has Jazz Dance, Baton Twirlin & Pom Pom, and Tennis. Her absolute favorite is tennis and she always ask if she can do it everyday! At least she gets to do it twice a week whereas all the other classes are just once a week. I’m more burnt out taking Lily to all those classes than Lily is haha! I’m very impressed with Lily on how quickly she learns and picks up choreography as well. She only attending 3 classes to learn her choreography for her Jazz Dance Recital, her normal weekly classes are just for learning techniques of dance. From just those 3 classes alone and lots of practice, she was able to dance through the whole routine for the recital and wasn’t even one bit stage fright or nervous!! She’s so great and better than I’ll ever be!! =) She also remembered her entire routine for her baton twirling parade and did so amazing well too! I’m so proud of her and all of her accomplishments! Leo is getting better at eating purees but he will still have days where he just doesn’t want to eat. He expresses lots of interest in music. He really likes the piano and likes playing with my keyboard and banging on drums. He has a special technique where he uses his mouth to play the keys at the same time as his cute little fingers too. The look of focus and concentration on his face when he plays the keys are just too cute and priceless. Every time I try to play on the piano, he usually comes zooming over and pushes me aside and takes over haha. He is signing more and more each day. He’s really good at clapping his hands for “good job”, he knows “open” and “close” really well, and understands “more” and “head/hat” as well. He’s getting better at waving bye more consistently too. He is a super fast crawler, and he loves to climb all over the place now. He likes to climb and sit on top of the kid’s table, on top of the couch, on top of anything he can climb onto really. He loves stairs and even though he doesn’t know how to climb down, he is fearless. He is able to take 3-4 steps on his own when you prop him up, and he is getting really good at walking while holding 1 of his hand. I really feel that the hippotherapy is helping him a great deal with his core strength and balance and over confidence in himself and his physical abilities.
It was so windy! This was the best selfie I can get of the three of us!!
Thankful for my two joys of my life!
Christmas blessings with my loves! Lily is understanding more the joys of Christmas and really enjoys getting into the holiday spirit. Lily got to go shopping at her school Santa’s Workshop for a whole week and she had a blast buying fun little toys for herself and Leo and even aunty Leilani! She has a lot of fun picking out gifts for her teachers and friends and she even said she forgot to buy me something and has the saddest look on her face. I told her it’s sweet of her to want to get me something but I told her all I need is her and Leo =). Leo loves playing with Leo and he seeing her playing the iPad and would like to imitate her tapping on the screen. He’ll see me working on my laptop and would come over and tap on the keyboard too. He’s so cute and is trying to imitate us and it’s great to see him observing and developing mentally like that. Leo is always so super happy, and Lily is the best person to make him laugh. He loves being thrown in the air, looking at silly faces, and is strangely amused with the window blinds haha. He also likes crawling into tunnels and small enclosed spaces, maybe it’s just safe and cozy in there for him, but he likes sitting in closets and the princess tent as well. He doesn’t like wearing socks for some reason so they don’t stay on his feet very long, the only way to keep them on is to put shoes on him. Apparently, he feels that socks should go in his mouth, not on his feet… Leo is super social and loves being held by anyone and everyone! Leo recently had a hearing test again and they couldn’t get any concrete readings on his hearing, but they did say both ear drums weren’t responsive, so we will have to take him to an ENT for further investigation. He also had a GI appt at Choc and for now, we just have to keep trying to feed him solids, there’s not much else we can do except continuing with therapy. He’s gained 1 pound in the last 3 months so at least he’s still growing and that’s the important thing. Lily loves to be a helper when Leo’s teachers come over for his therapy sessions, and she really pays attention to everything Leo can do, and likes to tell me all his developments with such pride! I’m so happy to see them together and so happy. My heart is and full and warm because of them. I’m so grateful for my greatest gifts in the world, I would not be the person I am without them. I try to give them the best love and care I possible can give them, to show them how much they mean to me, and I hope the feel my heart. I love you Lily, Leo and my angels!!! Can’t wait to see what 2018 adventures awaits us!
Gratitude is not only the greatest virtues, but the parent of all others. – Cicero.
Enjoy these videos of the kiddies!! They are growing up so fast, I’m glad I’m able to have these videos to look back on and relive those memories!!
Lily Starts Kindergarten!
Lily had a great first month of Kindergarten at her new school in Diamond at Quail Summit Elementary School! She is in Ms Edward’s class and she is also in the morning and after school Fun Club since my work schedule doesn’t allow me to drop her off and pick her up during normal school hours. Lily is doing some extracurricular activities that’s offered by her school (Robotics, Programming, and Mad Science), and she’s doing some activities that I signed her up for through the community center (Jazz Dance, Pom Pom/Baton Twirlin, and Tennis). I wasn’t sure if all those activities would be too much for her, but at LePort, she did about 3 activities after school each week and so I figured if any of this is too much, or if she doesn’t like any of it, then I won’t sign her up for it in the next session. So far, she loves all of the classes!!! Her favorite is tennis! When she first came to the tennis court for her first lesson, she was super excited because I got her a new tennis racket and balls, but then once the class started, she froze and started to cry and didn’t want to do it. I think she was probably intimidated by the tennis court and everything looking so unfamiliar to her. I decided to do the warm ups with her and held her hand and jogged with her around the tennis court. Then she stood in line and once she swung the racket for the very first time, she had the biggest smile on her face and she instantly loved it! She had so much fun and was running to get the balls and even asked me if she can play till night time! Haha! I’m so proud of Lily for trying new things and giving tennis and chance and now fulling embracing the sport!
Lily is doing so well in class too! On the first day of school, Lily received two stones to put in the classroom jar, and you get the stones by doing something good or behaving in class, etc. Once the jar gets filled up, then the class gets a popsicle party! She also received a Quail Coin on campus for helping another student and listening to the rules. The Quail Coins go into a big jar at the school office and once that fills up, the whole school gets a party! Lily was so excited to get homework too, that she even made up her own homework assignment at school on the first day haha. I told her that I put all her color pencils, markers, pens, erasers, etc in a box in her backpack so that she can work on her homework in after care if she has any. She was so excited that during recess, she just asked the teacher for a piece of paper, wrote her name on it and drew pictures and put stickers on it and said that’s her homework. She’s so cute! She didn’t have any homework the first week of school, but once she did start getting homework, she’ll do it right away when we get home and she’ll finish the whole week’s assignment in one day! So the other days we just practice reading because she insists that we do homework! That’s my girl! haha.
Lily also got selected to be the first Star Student in her class! She kept telling me that she needed pictures for her poster, like the one her teacher has in class, so I gave her some photos but all week she said they didn’t have time to work on their posters. That Friday when I picked her up, I saw the poster in her cubby and saw she was chosen to be Star Student! Her teacher told me that Lily’s a joy to have in class and that she chose Lily to be the first Star Student because she felt that Lily would be a good example to the class for being Star Student. So all of that week, she gets to be line leader, help serve lunch, pick the book to read aloud in class, and get first choice for other activities! Lily also got chosen to be the first Student of the Month in her class as well! She will be presented with an award this coming Monday, and it’s a surprise at the first school assembly too, so I can’t wait to go see Lily get her first award! I’m so proud of Lily, she is transitioning so well to kindergarten and all the new activities! She’s making lots of friends, and knows all the teachers names that she interacts with. She even wanted to make a birthday card for one of the after school care teachers because she heard it was her birthday soon! She’s such a sweetheart! Lily even told me not to pick her up so early because she was about to do her homework and that she was going to play soon too haha. I love her spirit and her desire to learn!
Right now Lily loves to help me cook dinner and she can almost do everything herself! She can chop and crack eggs, she can even turn on the stove and everything! She’s very enthusiastic about serving the food when we’re all done too! I also took the kids to the Museum of Ice Cream and she had a blast exploring the exhibits and trying all the different ice cream and candy samples! She’s very happy spirited and has a very kind heart. She’s always looking out for Leo and always telling everyone how much she loves her baby brother! Everytime I bring Leo to drop her off or pick her up from school, or even bring Leo to her after school classes, she always point Leo out to her friends and teachers haha. She’ll take a break in her tennis class to come over and give Leo a kiss! I fills my heart seeing how much she loves him! I love you so much Lily, I’m so proud of you!
Leo is growing up so much! He’s definitely getting taller and he’s moving really fast too. Leo is getting much better at eating purees from the spoon. Sometimes he’ll fight it and not want the spoon in his mouth, but he’s improving and he’ll stick his tongue out to lick the puree when it’s on the high chair tray too. He’s getting better at closing his mouth around the spoon too, it’s not completely sealed when he closes his mouth but it’s definitely an improvement! Leo enjoys watching his big sister Lily play tennis and is fascinated with her baton twirlin class too haha. He likes being outside and getting pushed in his trike. He also loves the water! He will see the bathtub and instantly try to climb inside. Leo is also doing really well with speech therapy. He still isn’t purposefully talking yet, and the only audible word he really says is “ball”, but he says “ball” for everything… He is trying to make more sounds though, and he’s trying to use his hands to sign and communicate with us! He’s sometime signs “more” and “dog” and “all done”! He will tap his head when you ask where his head is too! We are still working on the rest of his body parts but this is huge progress! I’m so proud of Leo and I really feel like sign language will be super helpful for him. I’ve been watching youtube tutorials on signing as well so I can really use it as a primitive language for Leo.
Leo loves playing with toys that makes sounds, especially drums, the xylophone, and banging toy pots and pans together. He really likes playing with the door jam and making it going “boing” all the time. He still loves the mirror and would just sit in front of the mirror laughing and squealing at himself. He is his own entertainment haha. He also likes to chew on nerf gun bullets and keep it in his mouth and crawl around the house with it. He is still drooling but it’s improved a lot! He also is getting pretty good at listening, when I tell him no and not to do something, he will stop and go do something else. He’s clever though and will sometimes try to hide and figured that if he can’t see me, then I can’t see him haha. He doesn’t know any other directions for the most part but he’s learning and slowly understanding! He had a recent OT evaluation and they said that he mostly ranks at a 10-11 month old in terms of physical and mental development. He scored at normal age range for some skills, but the lack of certain skills pulls him down a bit. It’s sad to hear, but I just see how much he’s growing and improving and I cannot be more proud of my little man! 
Leo will soon be starting Hippotherapy where he’ll get physical therapy through horse back riding lessons! It’s a great way to increase core strength and gain balance and coordination! I really hope Leo will enjoy it and hope that this can eventually be a great hobby for him! Leo is always so happy and easy going. He is very chill and super fun to hug and squeeze and kiss! When it’s time to brush his teeth, he opens his mouth now and is really good and not biting the toothbrush too much, and doesn’t resist me brushing his teeth anymore. He also loves books and music. His favorite song is still Twinkle Twinkle Little Star! He really likes stuff animals, mostly so he can chew on their tail or their nose haha. He likes to sleep with a blanket and hold onto it while sucking his thumb and then falling asleep that way. He also is getting really good at cruising now. He can climb up the stairs and couch very easily now and he knows how to safely climb off the couch now too. No more diving head first into the ground from the couch haha! It’s really cute when Leo crawls really fast, he would tuck his head down and then dart off! That’s when you know he’s determined to get somewhere fast. Whenever the baby gate at the stairs is open, he’ll see it and climb up the step and sit one step behind the gate and sit there and chill and see the room from a higher view point haha. He’s so funny! He’s getting better at taking steps and walking with assistance. Sometimes he can just hold only one of my hand and take a few steps too. He’s definitely getting close to walking on his own, maybe he will be able to by Christmas! Leo is so sweet and happy-go-lucky boy. I love you so much Leo!!
Happy 5th Birthday Lily!
Happy 5th birthday my precious princess Lily! Lily is 33 pounds and is 43 inches tall! She is a super happy go lucky kid and is very sweet and compassionate and kind! Lily loves to draw, paint, and write. She loves working with puzzles and mazes and counting up to 100 too! She also enjoys singing, especially the songs she learns from school, and she really enjoys her extracurricular activities like Tajik Karate, yoga and now Gym/Dance. She was doing hula, which she really enjoyed too but they don’t offer it in the summer. She likes running around and playing in the water and sand at the beach. She also likes to cook and bake and she has a very big imagination too. She’s super creative and anything is possible in her eyes; that’s one of the many things I love that about her. Lily is very thoughtful and really thinks about others. The other weekend, Alvina was over for lunch but she was upstairs putting Chloe to bed, and Lily wanted to bring Alvina some water in case she’s thirsty up there! How nice of her to think of Alvina! She also had her first trip to Hawaii as my birthday gift to her for her milestone 5th birthday, and on the plane, she used her airplane blanket to cover my arm and said “so you don’t get cold.” She’s such a sweetheart! She also got a hair cut and chopped off about 7 inches of hair, and has a matching hair cut like me! She told all her friends and teachers at school how she’s donating her hair again and even told me that there are kids who can’t grow hair, as a response to why she’s donating her hair. She’s so sweet and I love that she takes pride in helping others!
Lily also graduated from preschool on her actual birthday as well. She didn’t get to go up and get a “diploma/certificate” though because at LePort, you have to complete 3 years of primary class to “graduate,” but that 3rd year is equivalent to kindergarten. Since Lily will not be going to kindergarten at LePort, I considered it her graduation regardless haha. She still got to participate in the song they performed at the ceremony. It’s nice to see her come out of her shell a little bit. She gets really shy and doesn’t like to be the center of attention, so in a group setting, she tends to do better! I also got her a lei and folded her a butterfly out of money, which she thought was very cute!
On the trip to Hawaii, Lily already knew about leis and kept asking for one when we landed! So I went to a local flower shop and got her a nice real orchid lei and a tea leaf one for Leo! Lily got to go to the Dole Plantation, the Polynesian Cultural Center to see a luau and show, and participate in the Dolphin Quest where she got to feed, pet, and interact with the dolphin! She wanted to dress up like Moana in Hawaii so I made her a Moana dress and necklace with the heart of Tafiti and she wore it on multiple days during the trip! I’m glad she loves my handmade things! =) She loved the beach and shopping there as well, and said she wanted to stay in Hawaii forever! She kept saying “aloha” and when I returned the car rental, she said “bye hula car!” haha. She’s the cutest! She is super easy to travel with, she always kept her hand on the stroller while walking outside, and she never wandered off and listened very well! She ate really well too and had no trouble adjusting to the time difference either. She loved the hotel and got to sleep in a queen size mattress all by herself too. She had a blast for sure! Lily is so good at sleeping as well, she still takes a nap when she’s home and she can almost give herself a bath all by herself too. I just make sure she’s completely clean but she does pretty well for the most part!
I can’t believe my baby girl is 5 years old now, time definitely flies by. I threw her (and Leo) a birthday party at home and made it a unicorn theme since she loves unicorns and rainbows right now. I went all out for her milestone celebration and got a bounce house, balloon twister/face painter, and a photobooth! She had such a blast and gave all the guests a big hug when they showed up and a big hug good bye! She saw me working on the cake for a few days, and she was so excited and really wanted to eat it! She was majorly bummed when I told her she couldn’t and that it’s not real…She didn’t quite understand but she eventually got over it haha. I’m so grateful and humbled by the person she’s becoming and my heart is overflowed with love for her. She is very generous, thoughtful, silly, funny, and oh so happy! She is also very clumsy and tends to fall and hurt herself (and others by accident) a lot, but I’m afraid that’s my quality that got passed down to her…haha. She’s just so excited about everything that she can’t contain it in her tiny little body haha. I’m so happy to have such a beautiful little girl both inside and out as my daughter. I love you so much my Lily pad, happy 5th birthday!!! Can’t wait for more adventures and memories to come!
Click HERE are more photos from Lily and Leo’s Hawaiian vacation! Enjoy these videos of Lily!
Happy 21 Months Leo!
Blessed shirt is from the amazing Summer & Skye Shoppe at summerandskyeshoppe.com!
Happy 21 months my precious Leo! Leo weighs 23lb and 3oz, stretches 33inches tall and has a head circumference of 46cm. Leo has a recent GI follow up and he is growing just fine! He just now has to take MiraLax (8.5gm/day, powder mixed into his milk) instead of the lactulose medication. He is still on the Periactin to help increase his appetite. He has to come back in 3 months, and if he’s still not eating solids yet, then they’ll have to go in with a camera to see what’s going on physically in his esophagus and tummy. His results finally came back in from the EEG and I’m happy to say that his results came back all normal! He is not likely to get seizures and his head shaking isn’t abnormal and is nothing to be concerned about! He is such a trooper, he is such a strong little boy, I cannot be more proud of him! Leo is crawling much faster now, and pulls himself up to his knees very easily now. He is exploring the world on a higher level now that he is getting more stable and can stay upright a lot more. He really enjoys the pull up bar and gets such a kick out of seeing his handsome face in the mirror! Leo is very vocal and likes to squeal from happiness, but he is also explore lots of other sounds now too. He is so happy and chill, he makes my life so much better in so many ways. He is also starting to bite onto things (everything but food…) so hopefully he will start to eat solids soon! He is very curious and very tough and amazing! I can’t get enough of his cute little face, but please stop drooling soon Leo…it’s getting quite out of control…haha. Happy 21 months my petite prince, I love you so much!!!
Lily is as sweet as ever! Lily speaks very eloquently and I’m always impressed by how quickly she picks up new words and her level of comprehension. She’s very observant and very intuitive and compassionate as well. She is a little burst of happy silliness and her laugh and her smile is truly contagious! She loves going to the beach still and playing in the sand and running around and playing on the swings. She likes to help me garden and water the plants and then prune some flowers and put them in a vase inside our home. She likes to cut some flowers and put them in her hair as well, so cute! She loves doing arts and crafts, drawing, coloring, painting, cutting, gluing, all of it! She also recently got to visit the spaceship Endeavor with Khoa and she had a blast and picked out an astronaut barbie as her souvenir! I hope you aspire to do big things, I know you will be amazing at whatever you dream to be! I also found out that Lily got accepted to the Dual Language Immersion program at Walnut Elementary School! Space is very limited for that program and so I’m excited and feel very lucky that Lily got in! She will be learning Mandarin! Maybe she will be tri-lingual…? haha. Here’s hoping! Anyways, I can’t believe my little princess will be in kindergarten this fall! Until then, she will soak up the last several months at LePort! It’s such an amazing school and she’s growing up to be such a wonderful, smart, sweet little lady! I am always so proud of you Lily, you are my love, my light, my everything!
Happy 20 Months Leo!
Happy 20 months old my little prince Leo! Leo weighs in at about 23 pounds and stretches about 33.5 inches long. Leo recently had an Electroencephalogram (EEG) scan (where they send tiny electrical impulses to brain to measure brain wave patterns, activity and responses) to see if it’s functioning like how a child his age should function and respond. I won’t get the results until another week or so, so stay tuned! Leo is getting much better at crawling and can go greater distances before falling onto his belly. He is also getting much quicker and stronger at climbing up to his knees. Leo still hasn’t made much progress when it comes to eating solids but he sure is putting almost everything into his mouth, everything except FOOD! I try to trick him and put some puffs on his high chair tray along with some toys and he’ll play but will lick everything else except for the puffs! What a clever little boy. He’s gonna be trouble later on! He’s getting bigger though, drinking about 7-8oz of formula each feeding, 4 times a day. He is making lots more different sounds with voice and loves (really loves) to squeal high pitched noises of excitement when he’s happy! He likes to blow raspberries and get drool EVERYWHERE too. I feel like he’s starting to purposely drop things now too because he’ll drop something and then look at me to see my reaction. Also, whenever someone asks Leo where mommy is, he’ll look at me! Yay, my baby boy knows who I am! =) I love you so much, happy 20 months, keep on shining and growing strong!!
Also, I am participating in a virtual run on April 29th called the Chromosome 18 Starfish Dash for my Leo and created a team page for him. Help me support Leo’s journey with Tetrasomy 18p and the Chromosome 18 Organization and Society! If you would like to participate and donate, click HERE. If you can’t donate at this time, then please help me by spreading the word!! Thank you so much for all your love and support for my precious Leo!
Lily gets more and more amazing each day. She recently had her progress report at LePort and here’s what her teachers had to say about Lily, “Lily is blooming this year with her bright smiles and animated conversations with her teachers and peers. She is making new friends of different ages, both younger and older. Her interest in engaging socially seems to be great importance to her and yet it sometimes inhibits her concentration and makes working on her own a challenge. However, when Lily is engaged in something she enjoys, usually in the company of a classmate, she can work with concentration. She has now started to seek out new lessons with enthusiasm and takes pride in developing skills such as writing! Once Lily has mastered a lesson, it is wonderful to see her enjoy repeating it, and some activities she revisits daily. Recently she has consistently been verbalizing her thoughts and feelings with confidence and is working diligently toward refining her penmanship, using the Metal Insets and taking her time to write correctly formed letters and numbers. Lily also continues to trace the Sandpaper Letters carefully, revealing a greater retention and knowledge of the shape, sound, and lowercase cursive symbol for all the letters of the alphabet. We look forward to seeing her long-term recall of letter sounds so we can work more in-depth with her on the Moveable Alphabet, an important work highlighting sound blending. We are thrilled to see Lily gain openness to taking on some new and challenging tasks. Well done Lily!” It’s so wonderful to hear all the great things about Lily and how she’s learning and growing into a beautiful smart lady! She even impressed me by pointing our some states on the map like Texas and California, and even all the countries on earth, except she couldn’t remember the name “Australia” but that’s pretty difficult to pronounce at first. I cannot be more proud of my Lily pad!! I love you so much Lily!!
Here’s some video fun of the kiddos!
Happy 18 Months Leo!
Happy 18 months Leo (sorry I’m so late on this post)! Leo weighs 21lbs 8 ounces, stretches 2 ft 8 ins, and has a head circumference of 48cm. Leo had an appoointment with his neurologist, Dr. Lily (good name!) Tran, and she ordered an EEG scan to see how susceptible he is to getting seizures and seeing if any of his delays are due to that rather than just muscle tone issues. She said he has low muscle tone but it’s not AS bad as we think, she said she’s seen a lot worse. She also stated that since he hasn’t started pointing at things, he is showing signs of autism but we won’t really know until he’s 3 years old. Also, he’s not hugging or giving kisses yet so she feels there’s also social delays, so he just needs to have more therapy to work on those developments. He will have a follow up in 8 months and once insurance gives me authorization for his EEG, he will do that. So I just have to wait for insurance to get the authorization for it so that i can make the appointment for that. He also had his hearing test and did various tests and he’ll pass in certain ears in certain tests and then fail in others and so overall it’s inconclusive, so he will have to retake the test in a couple months. If they still can’t get conclusive results, then they’ll have to put him under to do a more accurate brain wave activity test for his hearing. Leo also had his GI appointment and she prescribed him medication to help increase his appetite, taken before bed on Mondays-Friday with breaks on the weekends. He also needs to increase his milk intake since he only gained half a pound in that last 3 months and she feels he needs to gain more weight. She said that if he doesn’t start eating solids by his 2nd birthday, then he will need to do an upper endoscopy where a camera goes down his esophagus to rule out eosinophilic esophagitis, reflux esophagitis or gastritis. She wants to make sure that his food allergies isn’t causing any irritation in his esophagus that might make him turn away from eating solids. Overall, Leo is so happy and is growing beautiful. He is army crawling a lot faster and I feel like he will full on crawl soon! He is clapping his hands a lot now and likes to squeal a lot too! He really likes interactive toys, but he also likes the tv remote control and my hair haha. Despite all his hardships, Leo is so happy, I cannot feel more lucky and blessed. Happy 18 months my petite prince Leo!!!!
Lily is a giant ball of sunshine! She is so sweet and caring and super smart! She has such a happy spirit and gets so excited about the little things, it melts my heart. She is always so sweet and attentive to Leo, and understanding of him as well. Lily is getting more excited about her Tajik karate classes and likes to demonstrate what she learns at school for me, and her gymnastics as well. She likes to show me her punches and kicks and her tumbling skills! I am also so proud of her at her LePort Christmas Show, where she actually sang most of the two songs! She sang a snowman song and Jingle Bell Rock! She told me Jingle Bell Rock is really hard but come the day of the show, she knew most of the words and sang proudly too! I cannot be more proud of her!! She is so artsy and crafty too. I like seeing all her art projects that she does at school, and she’s getting pretty creative and more advance in her drawings too. She’s going from rainbows and blobs to actual people and things now! I can’t wait to spoil her this Christmas with so much holiday cheer!
Happy 17 Months Leo!
Happy 17 months my petite prince Leo!! Leo weighs 21.5lbs, stretches 32inches long, and has a head circumference of 19.5inches. Leo has a minor cold right now and has a stuff nose and it makes it difficult to drink his bottle but he learns to take breaks for air. He still isn’t taking in solids but he did open his mouth a couple times with the OT when she tried to feed him some rice cereal, so that’s great progress. Leo still can’t crawl but he’s getting better at tucking his legs under him and will rock back and forth, so he’s almost there! He also is almost able to sit all the way up from laying down as well. His core and legs are getting stronger each day. He’s able to stand while supported now too! I remember just a few months ago he was completely like jello or spaghetti when you would try to hold him up to stand. Leo is such a fighter and I cannot be more proud of him!! He is always so happy and smiling all the time. He likes to squeal and babble a little bit too and he tends to say “mom” and “mama” but I’m not sure if it’s purposeful but it’s still something to be excited about anyways haha. Leo likes to play with Sophie the giraffe, and likes to explore all different textures of objects. He loves mirrors and like to look at his handsome cute face! I love you so much my petite prince Leo!! Happy 17 months old!
Lily had had a very eventful month! She (and Leo) got to go to Mickeys Halloween Party at Disneyland where she had a total blast! I feel like she’s really enjoying it more now and loves all the amazing parades and fireworks show and the kid (Lily) friendly rides. Her favorite is It’s a Small World still and she remembers it from last year too! Of course she greatly enjoyed all the candy she as well and special thanks to Ann for making her super cute and awesome tote bag to carry all her trick or treats in! She also got to go to a local harvest carnival and play some games and enjoy some snacks and festive activities as well! For Halloween this year, her and Leo had a matching costume photo op where she was Rey and Leo was BB8 from Star Wars the Force Awakens! Thanks Skye for letting us borrow your costume! At her school Halloween parade, she was super excited to wear her Cinderella dress made by yours truly! She requested to have that dress made months ago and she’s so excited she can finally wear it and show it off to her friends. It makes me happy knowing she likes my stuff and it makes me feel like she’s proud of it especially when she wants to show her friends! The kids also had a blast at the pumpkin patch with Skye and Summer as well! They also went trick or treating with their cousins Aidan, Brooke and Cameron. Lily did really well and if she got scared of a house, she just stuck back with Anh Hai Mike and waited for the kids to come back and continued onto the next house! I’m so proud of you Lily!! Lily is so smart, sweet, and loving, I love you so much my little Lily pad!!
Happy 16 Months Leo!
Happy sweet 16 months to my sweet little prince Leo (sorry for posting this so late Leo!)! Leo weighs in at 20lbs and stretches about 31 inches long. Leo is getting so much stronger each day and constantly making progress in his developments. He had his GI appointment and the doctor prescribed him some medication to help with his chronic constipation. She said that he needs to clean out his colon and he has to be on this medication everyday for about a year to get his system use to going number two once a day. His colon is probably enlarged due to the constipation and holding it in for days at a time, so he needs to allow himself a lot of time to get his colon back down to a normal size. She thinks that maybe if he poops more regularly, maybe he won’t have a tummy ache (even though he doesn’t see to be fussy about it, maybe his tummy has been aching) and maybe this will cause him to want to eat and try solids. Overall, the medication is working and he’s still not taking solids, but it’s going to be a process. The OT said she’s never met any non g-tube that’s be this orally defensive before. I hope you start to learn to eat solids soon Leo because food is SO enjoyable haha! Leo did have a great accomplishment though and that he’s starting to hold his own bottle during feedings! He’s not confident yet, it’s more like me propping his hands up and holding his hands in place, but it sets the motion and he would hold it for a minute or two by himself, and sometimes he’ll even tip the bottle up himself to get the last of the milk as well! He is also tucking his legs under him more when he’s on the floor on his tummy, and he’ll rock back and forth sometimes in that position too. It seems like he’s really wanting to crawl soon, fingers crossed!! He’s also getting stronger at standing. Sometimes he’ll pull himself upright but he still needs a lot of assistance and support when standing, and he’s still pretty stiff, but he’s improved a lot just in this last month. The two PT sessions a week now really helps! He also does this ridiculously cute thing where he’ll put his arm up and his hand on his forehead whenever he’s tired or doesn’t like something, and if he really doesn’t like something then he’ll pout, but it’s just so super cute I cannot resist his doe eyes when he does it! All his baby steps are huge leaps in my eyes and I cannot be more proud of my petite prince Leo!
Lily just so bright and sweet as ever! Lily is learning a lot at LePort and even though her Spanish class isn’t offered this quarter, she is still reciting numbers and words she learned and is very proud of it! She is always super silly and likes to use her giant imagination and create lots of elaborate stories during playtime. She is very loving and sweet to Leo still and still continues to give him lots of hugs and kisses and is still so good at making him laugh and smile. She also had a recent school field to Zoomars Petting Zoo in San Juan Capistrano for the first time and she had such a blast! She loves riding the school bus and she really enjoyed all the animals! She liked feeding all the guinea pigs, goats, and pigs, and she even got to brush a goat’s fur. She also conquered her fear of horses/ponies and rode on a horse with no tears at all! I am so proud of her and she even had so much fun and waves hello to me several times during the ride. There was giant corn kernel pit at the zoo too and she loved making corn angels in it haha. Lily really likes songs on the radio and is singing along to them more, I love her sweet soft little voice! She still has a slight accent when she says certain words, it’s pretty cute and unique haha. I don’t know where she gets it from…but it’s cute regardless! She’s so silly and always bursting with so much sunshine and happiness, you just help but smile and love her even more. I love you so much my precious princess, my Lily pad! Keep on shining oh so bright!!
