FREEDOM!!!

With help from a classmate, Shelby liberated herself from her cast today (2 and a half weeks ahead of schedule). This was supposed to be a non-removable cast. So much for that.

Needless to say, she was very pleased with herself, and was in an exceptionally fine mood all day.

We have another appointment on Wednesday to re-cast her.

dinner with the Alexanders

Trip and Bill were childhood friends. They are still friends today and we are lucky to all live in Asheville together now. Bill's wife, Laura is great and I think it is pretty neat that our kids are becoming friends now too.

Harding and Sofi

All the children ganging up on Uncle Matt

Maya is one of the few kids that Shelby will allow to hold her. Notice the beautiful braid in Maya's hair? A very talented lady did that. ;)

Thanks for a fun evening and delicious dinner Laura and Bill!

Covington visit

Last weekend, after Saturday school (yuck), we loaded up the car and drove to Covington, GA for the 25th anniversary celebration of Mr. Billy's (a.k.a. the Reverend William B. Wade's) ministry at First Presbyterian Church. It was a whirlwind of a weekend. We had a wonderful dinner at the Wade's on Saturday night and saw many dear friends. We spent the night at the Krieger's and enjoyed catching up with them and watching Harding follow Ian and Anderson all over their house. We went to church Sunday morning, had lunch at my great aunt and uncle's house, then returned to church Sunday afternoon for the Mr. Billy celebration service. I was one of the speakers (along with my sister and my long-time friend Emily) and was incredibly nervous, but we did just fine and it was great being back at our home church and seeing so many people who have been influential in my life. If interested, here is a great article from the Covington News about Mr. Billy:
A quarter-century of service

On the way back, we drove by the house I grew up in to show Harding. It looked beautiful and I was happy to see kids playing basketball in the driveway. I hope they didn't notice me taking pictures from the car. I loved growing up in this house and seeing it brought back some great memories.We also drove by the two houses that Trip grew up in (his parents built both of them on their own), but I couldn't get a good photograph. Good times. What a nostalgic weekend!

MLK Weekend

I just downloaded pictures off of my camera and realized I have some blog catching up to do. We were supposed to drive down to Atlanta for Chris's birthday, but the whole city was covered in a sheet of ice. So Chris, Grant, and their cute baby Riley brought the party to us and we all spent the night at my mom and dad's house. It was nice relaxing and getting to hang out with sweet Riley. I love being an Aunt!

Here, Harding and Riley helped my mom empty the dishwasher.

Harding's mission in life is to make Riles laugh.
My mom got a train cake pan for Christmas. This was our first attempt at decorating it.
Chris, why don't you guys just move to Asheville? We miss you!

Constraint Therapy, Round 2

About a year ago, Shelby had 3 weeks of constraint induced therapy (CIT). In layman's terms, a cast was put on her favored right arm to force her brain to learn to use the left arm. It was amazingly successful and Shelby started using her left arm for the first time during that three weeks and continued afterwards. Here are the blog posts we did about it:
http://shelbyfrances.blogspot.com/2010/02/constraint-induced-therapy.html
http://shelbyfrances.blogspot.com/2010/02/constraint-therapy-update.html

Anyway, Trip and I have decided that Shelby is ready to do casting again. Her left arm has gotten stronger and she isn't fisting her left hand nearly as much as she used to. We're hoping to accomplish a couple things through this round of CIT with Shelby: develop some fine motor skills with the left hand and learn how to play bilaterally.

We are really looking forward to seeing Shelby increase her strength and skills with that left arm and hand during the casting period. However, I am not looking forward to dealing with Shelby's frustration and wrath over having the cast on! She can be pretty stubborn.

Oh well, she is ready for this therapy and the cast goes on tomorrow. Shelby will have PT or OT every day during the three week period. We'll keep you updated.