9 Months

Sadie turned 9 months on Thursday.  We had her 9 month appointment with the pediatrician and she checked out great.  She is 40th percentile for height and 30th percentile for weight (up from 25%).  She also got clearnace to start eating table food!  This was a stressful day for me because I just kept thinking about what I would feed her.  No more just grabbing some baby food off the shelf without thinking....now I have to prepare (ie-cook) healthy meals for her. AHHH!  Luckily I have great friends who helped calm me down and gave me a list of easy and healthy things to offer her :)

In other news, we got Sadie out in her swimming pool over the weekend.  She really didn't have much interest in it.  As you can see from the last picture below, she is trying to swim OUT of the pool.

Sadie is also cutting her first tooth.  She has been pretty cranky so let's hope that this one comes in fast and the others aren't as bad!

Gymboree

Grandma Bessinger took Sadie to her 1st Gymboree Session.  She LOVED it.  Here are a few pictures!

A Few Adjustments

Sadie had another sound booth test on Wednesday (#4).  She is starting to be a pro at the localization game, as she did a great job turning her head to all the sounds.  The audiologist was very pleased!  Sadie's results were fairly similar to her last test, however, her hearing at higher frequencies was a little worse than last time.  I had a feeling this might be the case, as after we adjusted her hearing aids based on last week's results, I could tell Sadie wasn't hearing as well with her aids.  It took several times for her to respond to the "sssss" sound.  Normally she responds right away.  So based on my feedback and the results of the sound booth test, we re-adjusted her hearing aids and made sure that Sadie was hearing those "ssss" sounds before we left.  And we got the great news that we don't need anymore testing for 3 whole months! That will be the longest we have EVER gone without seeing our friends at Midwest Ear Institute.  I'm not sure I will know what to do with my extra time!  My luck, we will lose or break a hearing aid and have to go back in before the 3 months :)  Overall, I think Sadie is well on her way to having access to all the sounds she needs to start language development.  Happy Day!

And as always, here are a few pictures from the past week :)

Such a pretty face :)

Momma's Alma Matter!!!

Sadie in her rocking chair that Grandma and Grandpa Lovins got her!

We have Thresholds...

Sadie had another soundbooth test again today.  This one proved to be very productive, as they were able to obtain some hearing thresholds for Sadie.  It looks as though Sadie's hearing loss for her left ear starts at about 55db for low frequencies and goes to about 65db for high frequencies.  For her right ear, it starts at 70db at low frequencies and goes to 60/65 for high frequencies.  Normal conversation is around 60db.  Her hearing aids are supposed to get her near the 15 db range.  These results are very close to the results of her initial ABR as a baby.  This is great news because that means her hearing loss hasn't progressed and gotten any worse!  We are going to have 1 more soundbooth test next week to ensure our results are consistent.

In other news Sadie has been doing a great job with her mmmmm sounds (although she still sounds whiney when she says them).  She has now gotten to the point where she is impatient when saying her mmmm's and I cannot get the food on the spoon quick enough!  I guess I need to work on that :)  Oh, and if you aren't careful, she will try and eat off the spoon when you aren't looking.

Here is a quick pic of Sadie from this weekend with her Grandpa Randy:)

Bye Bye PT!!

Today was a great day...Sadie was released from Physical Therapy!!!  Her torticollis (head tilt) has been corrected and she is doing all the prequisites to crawling.  The Physical Therapist still recommends doing some exercises with her to ensure she maintains her flexibility, but we are able to do those on our own.  Great work baby girl!!

Mmmmmmmmmmmm!

Sadie had speech therapy with Shannon last night (her normal ST is on maternity leave).  It was an interesting session and she taught us some great, albeit difficult, things to work on with Sadie.  The newest scenario we have to practice is getting Sadie to say "Mmmmmmm" when she wants more food.  This is not an easy task.  Here is how it goes:

Mom (holding the spoon of food in front of Sadie):  "Mmmmmmmm"
Sadie:  Crying b/c I won't let her have it
Mom:  "Mmmmmmmmm"
Sadie: Mad and screaming
Mom:"Mmmmmmmmm"
Sadie: Still mad and screaming
Mom: Feeding Sadie

Repeat for the entire jar of food.

This was exhausting.....however, towards the end, Sadie did start saying "Mmmmm."  Now....to clarify.....she was very whiny when she said it, but she still said it.  Shannon said if we did this at every meal (3 times a day), that it would take probably take 1-2 weeks for her to grasp this concept and start doing it on her own.

While I am excited at the prospect of Sadie imitating the sounds I make, I have to say that it is difficult to hear your baby cry.  And the therapist was very up front that it is only going to get harder and we are going to have more screaming/crying.  I can't wait! :)  I know, however, that the end result will make it all worth while!  So, if you are interesting in visiting the Lovins household.....I recommend not doing it around mealtime for the next few weeks :)