Update on the quest for sleep...

She slept all night long. In her own bed. By herself.
Steve said, "I hope she's okay" to which I replied, "Don't say that.Don't say that.Don't say that." all the way down the hall till I found her still snoring away. Thank God! Talk about panic.
This girl's a mystery. Why would last night be any different than any other night? We went for a wagon ride, had a snack, laid down with her till she fell asleep - happens in a similar fashion every night. Maybe it's because it's raining - and who doesn't like to sleep when it's raining? Let's hope this is a new trend - because I could sure get used to sleeping more than an hour at a time. The other night I got 5 straight hours and thought I was a new woman. What would 8 be like? And more importantly, what would the impact be on Lola's seizure activity if she wasn't tired all the time? That would be the best part...

New look and some tough love...

Okay, so I realize this background's a little busy, but I stumbled across it this morning and it's called Lola - so yes, I had to add it. You'll get used to it. Hey, it may keep you awake!

So Lola's in boot camp this week. We've got a problem with her sleeping. Steve has been sleeping in Lola's room, in her single bed, with Lola. There's the first problem. Steve's not a small guy, and Lola loves to put her back against the wall, and jam her feet into his spine. All. Night. Long. Did I mention he's been staying with her since January? Not ideal. The reason he's been sleeping with her is because she was having seizures in the night. How could we just tuck her into bed for the night and go down the hall for eight hours to our bed? Anyway, now she's not having seizures at night, and we all need to get some sleep. When we were on the island, she slept horribly. When I woke up one morning to find Steve had slept on the couch all night, he told me that my snoring was so bad that he had to leave. Me? Seriously? Anyway, so me snoring in her face can't be helping her out in the sleep capacity either (sometimes I sleep with her to give Steve a break). To top this all off, she's spoiled. That's right...spoiled. We attend to her every whine, whimper, and yell. We know how frustrated she is having such limited communication skills - it's got to be rough. So we jump whenever she makes a noise..."Do you want a drink? Do you want to go outside? A snack? A book?" Yeah. Repeat this all day long. So at night, this continues - we don't want her to cry in her room alone. So last night, we started operation tough love. Lola slept from 9 until 1:20 - then she pounded on her door. I didn't go in....yes, it was rough. Remember doing the same thing with your child when he/she was a baby? The whole cry it out thing? Well, it's just as bad doing it when your child is four. And has a seizure disorder. And can't tell you why she's up. sigh. Anyway, she banged on her door for about 20 minutes, then I heard nothing. I waited a few minutes, then stealthily (is that a word?) crept into her room. Lo and behold, she was asleep back in her bed! She didn't collapse in a heap at her door. She did the smart thing and went back to bed. She did the same thing at 3:30. At 5 I sent Steve in when she woke up and he stayed with her until 7.
So that's how day one went. Not bad?

Backyard Lola

Check out that stair-climbing form! Holy smokes - talk about stride!

Yeah, so she has two sets of bangs - we're growing some out. Don't judge me.

I'm going to have to zoom in on this one because it's super cute. I'll see what photoshop or something can do for me.

Missing Bubby...

Liam is having the time of his life - truly the best summer ever. First he got to hang out with Grampa Ed and go to the zoo, science center, and have every second of his day occupied with things that he wanted to do - then he spent a week in Whistler with Daddy - climbing walls, bike parks, hot tubs, gondola rides, movies - see a pattern? From there he went to stay at a cottage with all of us plus Aunt Pubba, Uncle Lipper, and Zac and Jared (who are the coolest kids ever according to Liam). After ten days of starfish, crabs, fishing, paddleboats and swimming, he flew to Ontario with the Lippers. He spent a week swimming, going to the beach, being spoiled by Grama and Grampa - playing chess, going to movies, swimming, learning to tie his shoes, and eating ice cream cones, etc. Now he's at Camp Olympia, which is a sports camp that I spent many a summer at as a kid - it is an amazing place in Hunstville, Ontario, and currently several members of my family spend a week (or the entire summer) each summer coaching at the camp (Grampa, Grama, Uncle Daryl, Aunt Faye, Uncle Lipper, Aunt Pubba, Uncle Mike, Trevor, Jared - with Chrissy and Kelsie working all summer as counsellors). Liam is having a blast - he's doing Baseball this week, and his coach is Uncle D. He's enjoying running from place to place, getting to go to the Tuck Shop three times a day ("and you don't even pay any money - I just say "Jared Lippiatt" and I get whatever I want!"), ringing the bell for dinner, playing badminton, watching movies, hanging out with kids his age - heaven for Liam. He doesn't miss us at all! Lola, on the other hand, misses Bubby terribly. Whenever we say his name, she freaks out and cries. This morning, she went into his room (usually off limits...but we're trying to air out the paint smell) and put her face down on his bed - she stayed there for about a minute, then sighed deeply, got up and walked out. So sad! She'll be happy to have him back.

While Liam's been gone, I decided to spruce up his room. And by "spruce" I mean "gut". It took me a day just to clean and sort every little piece of crap he'd collected. He now has a cool bike themed room, which makes Daddy a wee bit envious. We're waiting for the pics of him on his bike in Whistler to be developed, and then we'll frame those and hang them by his bed....then it's done! Pictures to follow once we get the photos hung.

Lola's had a good week. Her big seizures have disappeared (almost afraid to say that) - she's still having drops, but they are less intense, and usually following/preceeding sleep. She's sleeping better at night too, which could help too. She goes for ivig tomorrow - hoping it only takes one poke. Lola's been working on going down stairs on her own, or with a little bit of help. She now walks downstairs holding onto the railing, or onto my hand. She's been working really hard on this skill - she's getting there. She's also started to use her "helper hand" in a more purposeful manner. She's always used her right hand to support her weight, to help her climb on things, etc. but she won't use it to read a book, hold her cup, etc. Lately, she's been trying to read books standing up, etc. and we can see her right hand sneaking over to help - it's amazing to see!

Steve has been spending hours each night working on the Western Cup (aka Lola's bike race) - it's going to be quite an event. We will be heading up to Kicking Horse on August 26 for the weekend. Steve has arranged for the event photographer to spend some time photographing Lola, which is so cool. She also has a photo shoot with Uncle Sean next week - in the canola fields. I hope she cooperates!

So that's what we've been up to. We miss Liam so very much, but we know he's having much more fun in Ontario than he would be here. sniff.

The Life of a Moviestar....

Back from the Coast!

We did it - we survived a plane ride (just me and Lola), a car ride, then a ferry ride, another car ride - before arriving at our final destination on Vancouver Island. The flight was interesting - I thought it was a good idea to put Lola in her carseat on the flight - wrong - so little miss seatkicker just had a closer shot to the middle of the guy's spine who had the misfortune of sitting in front of us. Also sitting in front of us was the President/CEO of Westjet. What's funnier about that is the line-up of people who came up to complain to him about this that and the other. Seriously, life's too short. Anyway, Lola was pretty unhappy most of the flight. I shared her misery because as we were going through security, they decided to take my shoes and undo my pants (because I know I look like a coke-addict/unibomber - but seriously) - then Lola decided to take off through the airport. My pants almost hit the ground - never wearing those baggy cargos again! The woman was like, "Uh, you can't leave yet" as I took off running after a screaming Lola. Sigh. So once I got her into her stroller, carseat hooked onto the back, carry-on bag - oh yes, and once my shoes FINALLY came through the x-ray machine - I think I was sweating bullets. Steve and Liam met us at the other end and we bolted to meet the ferry - the one we wanted was full, so we enjoyed a delightful two hour wait on the hot tarmac.

We got to the cottage and got set up and waited for the Lippers to arrive. They had a hellish 12 hour journey to get there too. Anyway, it was an amazing week - kids got to fish/swim/play in the sand/collect starfish and have fun. Lola thought Stella (my sister's puppy) was pretty funny - got some cute shots of those two.