The Jason and Shelly Turpin Family: Our Week

My happy smiley boy during Speech. I evaluated him based on the developmental scales for the blind and his speech is currently sitting at 4 to 6 months. Not cool when you are days away from being two years old! I talked with all of his therapists and his TVI, and we have come up with a plan. It involves “total communication”, a fancy term that means using more than speech to communicate. We have ordered through the school and federal quota funds some amazing tools from the American Printing House for the Blind. Our request has to go through Austin and the Texas School for the Blind, so I’m hoping around Christmas everything will arrive. Everyone feels that Brother is smart and that augmented communication will not be his norm, but hopefully with all of this support, he will be able to turn the corner and start communicating!

Sammi spent Monday on a field trip to Texas A&M. It was such a neat opportunity for her to be able to go and see the campus and have a tour. She loved all of the talk about traditions and the sense of family. She has started to notice all of the A&M signs around town that proud alumni put up. Glad you had a good time Sammi!

Because she’s adorable

These two love to play ball, rolling and taking it from each other. LOVE seeing them being friends!

My crazy Bell – she still fits in the sink at five years old. She was having a great time on the swing set. And she has finally, four months post op, starting to take some steps again!!

Huge – I hemmed Joy’s pants. With Down syndrome comes a long torso, but shorter arms and legs. As Joy would say, “I did it!” I watched a YouTube on it, and then hemmed her pants for school. Only about a million more shirts and pants to go!

These two putting on a concert for us!

Terrible picture, but Brother got a new Braille book – yeah! He is just so cute!

It was a sick week. We passed around a bug. Every single day I had one person home with me.

This girl – while she was home sick she watched DC Cupcakes all day long. Personally I couldn’t work in a situation with that much drama going on all the time! She loves the cupcakes and what they do. The next day I had to get my poor finger checked out - I did a number to it back in August and still can’t bend it. I realized that I pass a gourmet cupcake shop on my way. So for $3.50 I bought a cupcake (really?! Do you know how many cupcakes I can make for that much?) for my little girl who is always helping and loving. She was delighted!

Just because her hair was cute that day and it won’t be much longer that she’ll let me put bows in her hair.

Joy’s scribbles – if you look closely there are some letters emerging!! She is so proud of herself. I thought this was such a cute seasons chart with Joy’s hand. She is so adorable when she sleeps.

Sammi got a new shirt from her Path class. That field trip really made a difference in her life. She came up to me later and asked me about going to A&M. Could she do that? The angels were singing in the background! How exciting that her eyes were opened to possibilities and she was willing to look at them. Unfortunately, A&M doesn’t have her major. But what a huge thing for her to even concern leaving Houston!

Our Joy is looking so grown up and so tall lately!

Friday at 6AM found Lizzy and I at the hospital for a procedure. She has had a cyst on her hand since May. It bothered her enough to mention it to me occasionally. I would always tell her that we would talk to the doctor about it at her checkup (Feb). Well, it hit me that our insurance is going from bad to worse come Jan 1st, so we better get this taken care of. Her pedi sent her to a surgeon. Her surgeon removed the cyst on Friday. Sweet Lizzy was brave and so cute. Kids come out of anesthesia so differently from each other. Lizzy was so confused – when she went to sleep she was in an operating room surrounded by nurses and doctors, when she woke up she was in a recovery room with a recovery nurse and me. “How did I get here?” “Where are the doctors and nurses?” And she kept crying asking if she could go back to sleep. She was so precious! I was so proud of her – she kept asking for the OR nurse, Taryn. She wanted to thank her. Evidently Taryn held her hand until Liz was under and she wanted to thank her for that. Sweet girl. Lizzy is spared any embarrassing photos because I left my phone at home.

Feeling well enough to make bracelets. That night Lizzy was able to have friends over. Glad she was doing so well!

Just for fun, Jason and I went out to Lowe’s and dreamed of a remodeled kitchen. We chose our cabinets, backsplash and counters. It would be beautiful! Now I just need a ton of money and somewhere else to live while they do it! It is fun to dream!

Saturday morning the Ball cousins met at the temple for baptisms. Very cool to see everyone in the temple. Cameron, you were missed – get better!

The girls wanted their normally positioned pictures as well. Since the three of us go once a month, Sammi really likes looking at the pictures of the different months as the seasons change. Oh, and Jessi told me this week that she is planning on serving a mission – yea, what a great goal!

Kris and Zachary stopped by. He really is such a cute little guy! Thanks for the visit Kris!

The piano recital – it was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was one of the those times that my special needs world and my “typically developing” world flew into each other’s faces. Sitting perfectly still and silent for two hours is impossible for the best of us. Add an extra chromosome and forget it! Typically this is a divide and conquer event – one of us watches kids while the other participates as the proud parent. Not possible tonight as Sam had a Choir performance to get to before the piano recital was even over. Bottom line, the girls played well, Sammi was able to make it to her performance and have fun there, and it’ll be a long time before I bring my babies to another piano recital!