Girls new dresser=more space for all !!

So Amber and Whitney have been sharing this small 4 drawer dresser since Amber was born and as they've gotten older-it has been more difficult to fit all of their clothes in it. As sad as it sounds-Brooke's dresser is a small rubbermaid 4 drawer stackable storage unit. So with the baby soon on it's way it was time to upgrade everyone. Move Brooke and baby's clothes into the 4 drawer dresser and find something more spacious for the bigger girls.

Here was our craigslist find:

A bigger 5 drawer dresser

Here is the dresser after sanding and paint-Thanks Joe!!

Living Room changes

So here is what our living room looked like before any upgrading: Then we painted almost 2 years ago.....

and this week look what else got upgraded....

New carpet!!!

Not exactly the color we would have chosen -

but it was so inexpensive that we couldn't pass up the opportunity.

The carpet before was original to the house-15 yrs old... white berber-yuck.

We were able to do the living room, hallway and the guest bedroom.

Next week the girls bedroom. Then we are on hold for the master and bonus rooms.

Oh well-can't complain about getting 1/2 the house done.

Next thing to do in the Living room-retile the fireplace

(wonder how long before we start that project)

Meanwhile Joe has been working on this: I'll post pictures when it's done.

My basketball and my baby

Well my NCAA tournament bracket got smashed to pieces in the 2nd round-but I promised to post a picture of "my basketball" and my new haircut..so here it is:


Here is Brooke with an icecream face--I love her expression!

She definitely is getting to be big girl.

Amber Update

I know a few of you have been as anxious as I about what the Neuropsychologist had to say about Amber's diagnosis. Today my big question was answered-but not really.

Here is the summary-it's pretty long-but really I did condense as much as I could while still explaining everything.

So he started off by saying that he had the most difficult time diagnosing her because she is a unique case. She has a few symptoms that fall under the Autism spectrum-PDD-NOS, which she would be considered very high funtioning-at the same time she demonstrates abilities that Autistic children do not have. She shows some ADHD combined type symptoms as well-but not enough to place her under that category.
The clear answer for sure is that for her language and speech delay Amber has
Mixed Expressive/ Receptive Language Disorder and Phonological Disorder.

Temporarily her diagnosis is PDD-NOS /ADHD-NOS under the Autism Spectrum-primarily because she isn't strongly anything at the moment and hopefully in the next year or two-another more precise diagnosis will be found. PDD-NOS is Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified.

The good news is that whatever she is...she has a high probability of Resolving it.
Her language once developed to the same level of her peers will ofcourse help her in all areas across the board and with this-as it's the language part of concepts that Amber scored low on. The Dr. told me that most likely by age 10-12 Amber will pretty much be a normal functioning child with very few developmental differences compared to others her age. So this was a good thing to hear-obviously any parent would want to hear news like this. Her brain receives information correctly-it's more how she responses to use that information that is her problem right now.

So from here-we continue with Speech Therapy both in and out of school and we start meeting with an occupational therapist to help Amber with her sensory processing.

The funny thing I learned today was that they had Amber tested on her Right/Left hand skill level.....so we all think she's left handed because she writes with her left..but to my surprise, Amber is highly funtioning with both on a high average and scored higher with her right? CRAZY..so pretty much she's ambidextrous, which I kind of figured-but I didn't know she was stronger with her right-weird. And her Visual Motor skills are actually really advanced for her age.

March Madness and New Poll

Okay so every year Joe and I compete against each other to see who does better on our NCAA March Madness Championships brackets. This is always a fun month and who knows..maybe I will be in the hospital watching the championship game. Anyway I always list my final four for everyone to see so that you all know who my top picks are...so here they are: Kentucky, Villanova, Kansas and Gonzaga...yes I always root for Gonzaga and Villinova every year so no one should be surprised by those picks. Anyway..in honor of March Madness I decided I will take a picture of my own basketball and post it as well as my new hair cut. I chopped 10 inches off on Saturday and so the next time I am feeling cute you will see pictures of that and my growing belly!! Til then, you can vote on my newest poll-how big will baby be??

Just a few movies I am excited about:

click on each one to view the trailers
The Karate Kid
Eclipse
RobinHood
The Bounty Hunter

Most anticipated movie: TRUE GRIT starring Jeff Bridges and Matt Damon being filmed now and as a HUGE John Wayne western fan-I really hope this wont dissapoint.
Does anyone else see a pattern of remakes here??

Amber's Speech

Next week I get the whole diagnosis report for Amber's learning delays. But this week, her new speech therapist, Janie, went over her test results with me on her language skills and I have to say I was a little excited. Amber is only 1 year behind the other kids her age in speech. When she was in preschool last year, most had a difficult time understanding her and she was 4 -speaking with the range of a 2 1/2 year old. Now at 5 1/2 she is speaking as a 4 1/2 year old. That just blows my mind how quickly she is developing her language and alot of it I feel is the choice we made to not wait a year before putting her in Kindergarten. Being around the other children her age, I'm know has helped her in so many ways. Most of her language delays now are grammar and a few pronunciation that Janie (the speech path) thinks might be because of how her lower jaw makes her have an underbite. She also said that Amber will probably end up testing out of having speech help at school because she is just over the % mark for those that qualify for it through the district. She thinks that Amber has the great quality of self correcting herself when she is wrong-she strongly thinks that this will make Amber's progresss go faster than most children. I am so glad that Amber is starting this new program to get the help I know she needs.
And you want to hear more exciting things that happened last night?? Big Sister Whitney was writing a letter to the toothfairy (she got two teeth pulled at the Denstist yesterday) and Amber sat down to write her own letter. Ofcourse she mostly wrote her name a few times and then some odd letters-but this is a child who I've had the most difficult time in getting her to practice letters and sound recognition, let alone reading. She is now understanding why she needs to learn these and last night as we went through her letter recognition worksheet-she only missed 8 out of 100!! I am so proud of her!

Fun spa night!

I hosted a girls' night out this last month and we did a spa themed night. We exfoliated our hands with a sugar scrub, then we used a pumpkin and honey moisturizing mask -after washing that off we did our nails. Also I introduced the ladies to a lip scrub that will keep your puckers nice and soft. Here are the recipes for what we used:

Sugar and Oatmeal Body scrub
1 cup coarse raw sugar or brown sugar
1 cup oatmeal (blended)
1 cup extra virgin olive oil (you can use mineral oil, grapeseed oil, almond oil instead)

*If you don't blend your oatmeal, I will warn you that this may lead to a clogged drain.
Mix together and rub all over your body then hop in the shower and rinse off.

Pumpkin moisturizing Mask
1 can pumpkin puree (the large can)
1/4 cup honey

Mix together and immerse hands in mixture for 10 minutes then rinse. I have to warn you-this was not a favorite among the women as the texture feels a bit, well slimy.

Lip Scrub-definitely a winner and so easy
make a paste out of petroleum jelly and white sugar. Apply to lips and scrub with a toothbrush. Then use a washcloth to rinse off.

So fun, so easy and most of you have these ingredients hanging out in your cupboards!!

Sad News..

My grandfather passed away yesterday and it has had me a little on the teary side today. I found out late last night and my wonderful husband game me a priesthood blessing. This was a great comfort to me. He has known how hard it has been for me because I wasn't able to visit my grandparents in california because of our circumstances the last few years. I had hoped to visit them this summer and as I had warning that he might pass soon-I kept hoping that I'd get to see my grandfather one last time before he went home. I know that it was my Heavenly Fathers' will that he is now at peace and no longer struggling with his health. I truly hope my Grandmother finds the comfort and strength she needs. She is a miraculous woman and has always been hardworking while still remaining a lady. I am so very thankful my mom was able to fly down yesterday and spend the afternoon with him before he passed. What a wonderful gift time is sometimes. I hope that we all take the time that is needed to make sure our loved ones know they are loved by us. Sorry for this post being a little on sad side-I'm not much of a facebook teller myself so I opt for my blog to relieve my built up feelings.

This weeks poll...

This one is a little more fun-Who will baby look more like: ME or JOE???

I know-pretty tough isn't it?? This is one of our pictures from our engagement-you know our younger skinnier selves. We haven't taken a couple's picture since then so that's all I had.

Sunshine and getting closer to Answers..

Today is so nice- outside the sun has been shining all day and the birds are out singing. It finally feels like spring here. I just hope it continues throughout the rest of the week. Today Amber finally got her evaluation testing done to narrow down exactly what she is having difficulties with and why. I meet with the team of Occ. therapists, neurophyscologist, and speech pathologist to discuss what she has (SPD, ADD, Austism,etc????). It will be so nice to finally get her the help she needs and hopefully with the best diagnosis. I have been trying to get this done since last fall-so I am excited. She starts speech therapy with the same center on Wednesday and I can only imagine that her progression will only speed up. The Neurophyscologist said this about Amber when her 4 hour long testing was done, "She is funny, that one definitely dances to the beat of her own drum." Which is so true-she is always keeping us laughing at the things she does. I would not be suprised if she becomes the "class clown" at school because of her personality. It's one of the things I love about my Big Red.