The Jones Girls

On Tuesday I took all 4 girls to Children’s Hospital for Amanda’s 6 month follow up appointment with Dr. Joan Wright.    This was to check on Amanda’s progress with her thumb since her surgery in September of last year.

The Dr. says she thinks Amanda might need another surgery to rotate the thumb bone to make it more in an “opposed” position.  She also wants to loosen the tendon/ligament in the new thumb to allow her to bend her knuckles of her new thumb.  Currently Amanda is not able to bend the knuckles of her new thumb.   Then Dr. Wright wants to transfer some tendons and ligaments from one part of her hand to her new thumb.  She said that Amanda would really benefit from this procedure.

We have another appointment in 4 months which is on October 20th.     We will confirm if we will do the surgery.  If we do the surgery, I would elect to do it right after Christmas and have the major recovery time be the 2nd week of Christmas break.     Amanda will be in preschool in the Fall and she will be out for the 2 weeks of Christmas break.

I trust Dr. Wright’s reommendations.   Her outlook on orthropedic surgery is to be the least invasive and offer the best quality of life for the patient which is exactly the same thing I want for Amanda.

Amanda was fitted for another new brace that she wears at night.     Amanda is using her hand really well and uses her new thumb about 50% of the time .   We are hoping this surgery might offer Amanda better movement for her new thumb.

Amanda has a hard time pulling down her panties and pants when she goes to the potty.   Most times I have to helpher.   I starte giving her a reward system to give her more encouragement to use her new thumb and centralized hand to pull down her panties and pull up her panties.  She gets a Skittle candy every time she successfully can pull her panties up and down.  So far it has been a successful reward system and she is trying each time now to pull down her panties and pull up her panties.

Here is Maryssa’s progress with potty training – nothing.    She doesn’t quite get it yet and has no interest in the potty chair.   I have to get her potty trained before preschool starts in September so I will be working diligently this summer getting her potty trained.

On a happy note though, she only goes through 2-3 diapers in a 24 hours period.    I am thinking  I will start working with her this week and get her up and running.

Maryssa is going to be my baby longer which is ok for me!!    I know she won’t go to college in diapers so this will all come in the right time for Maryssa.     We love you our adorable and precious Maryssa!!

I haven’t had to purchase any diapers in almost 3 weeks.   I only go through 1-1/2 packages of pull ups a month for Miranda and Amanda.   So my diaper bill is FINALLY going down!!   Woo hoo!!

Miranda is now interested in going pee pee and poop in the toilet.     She still loves her potty chairs, but I would say once or twice a day I might see her on the toilet.

I saw something hysterical a few days ago .   Miranda came to me and said mommy, I pooped!!  So I went into the bathroom to empty out the potty chair.   Guess what I found!!  Not one, not two, but all THREE potty chairs had poop in them!!   Miranda puffed out her chest and proudly said, I pooped in all 3 potty chairs Mommy!!    I was cracking up so hard.  I had to take pictures.    

Miranda wears panties at the house during the day.  When we are not home, she wears a pull up but has not had an accident yet in her pull up.   At night she wears a pull up and she still pees in her pull up at night.  So she will still be wearing pull ups at night, but maybe during the day when we are not home I will try her wearing panties and see how she does.

I have a really cool travel potty chair in the minivan and they love using it.    I usually have them use the potty chair in the minivan before we go into the store or to the park.    I bought this travel potty chair when I was potty training Savannah when she was 2-1/2 and it was so helpful.    This is a link where I purchased the potty chair so you can see what it looks like.    http://www.onestepahead.com/catalog/product.jsp?productId=361755&cmSource=Search

Way to go my beautiful darling Miranda .  We are so proud of you precious!!

Amanda has not had any pee pee or poop accidents during the day or night.   She wears panties during the day at home.  When we are not at home, she wears a pull up just in case.    At night she wears a pull up just in case she has an accident in the middle of the night.

For the past week her pull up has been dry in the morning.  She is completely dry!!   So we are making a huge step and starting to have her go to bed with panties.    

In the next week I will see how she does wearing panties outside of the house.  If she can stay dry, then I think she will be fully graduated and considered fully potty trained.

I am so proud of our precious Amanda.    We love you so much sweetheart!!!

Yesterday I had a meeting to go over the results of the evaluations for Amanda and Maryssa with Ronita Van Vliet, Mrs Crabtree, the school psychologist Wendy Myers, Amanda’s caseworker for Early Start Services-Laura Beech and Maryssa’s case worker for her early intervention services-Melanie Bakken.

The results were that Amanda averaged 3.3-3.7   years developmentally.  She does not need to attend not qualifies for special education   The school district and Early Start wanted to do a global evaluation on her because of her disability of her club radial hand.  No concerns academically or developmentally.   Just continued OT for her right hand and arm.

Maryssa’s results were 2.1-2.4 years developmentally with a delay in receptive language.  Her expressive language has been catching up and I contribute my hard work with Maryssa and Maryssa currently receiving speech therapty once a week at the house.  Maryssa will continue to receive speech therapy twice a week for 3 minutes each session at Jordan Elementary School.     Maryssa did not qualify for Ronita Van Vliet’s special education class that Savannah had been attending these past 2 years.    Maryssa would have needed to be delayed in more than one year of just receptive language.    So I guess this is good news for Maryssa!!  Yay!! 

So, tomorrow I will confirm registration for the triplets to attend preschool together at Presbyterrian Hills Preschool near our house.   They will go Tuesday and Thursday mornings beginning in the Fall.

This morning I was busy getting the girls all dressed up to look pretty for Savannah’s preschool party to celebrate her graduation from preschool.  I was rushing around-making deviled eggs, baking a chocolate cake and making Rice Krispy Treats all this morning.   I didn’t have much time to think – I was too busy just DOING.  I didn’t have any time to realize that today was going to turn out to be a very emotional day for me.

So we all piled into the car and drove to Savannah’s preschool.  It was a huge extravaganza.   Her teacher, Mrs. Van Vliet, told me this was the biggest party she had ever had in the history of her teaching her class.    In the past few months she has had 25 students, 12 in her morning and 10 in her afternoon.  Savannah was in her afternoon.   Mrs. Van Vliet invited the parents and siblings of all of her students.    I would say the attendance was about 50-75 people.   It was so much fun!!

My girls played with all of the other kids.   They ran around, climbed on the jungle gym and laughed loudly as they went down the curly shaped slide.  

One little boy, named Ian, had a crush on Amanda,  He was holding Amanda’s hand and taking her everywhere he was going.  It was so cute.   He said that Amanda was his girlfriend.  I video taped him talking to me saying that Amanda was his girlfriend.  For kicks I told him to speak in the camera and to tell Amanda’s Daddy that he was Amanda’s girlfriend.  Cliff is going to laugh (I hope) at that!!    Then a few minutes later I noticed Ian was holding Miranda’s hand and he said Miranda was his girlfriend.    Then a little while later he took Maryssa’s hand and took her everywhere he went and called Maryssa his girlfriend.  He was definitely smitten with the triplets!!   Apparently, Ian is the youngest of five kids and he has 4 older sisters.  No wonder!!  LOL!!

I took lots of pictures.     I am proud to say that Amanda and Miranda used the preschool toilet and they didn’t have any pee accidents!!   They are fully potty trained…woo hoo!!  Savannah that it was so cool that her sisters were using HER preschool toilet.  She was a proud big sister and showed them where the little stool was to help them up the toilet.  So cute.  My 4 girls!!

Cliff showed up at the end of the party.   He took a really nice picture of Mrs Van Vliet and me.  Mrs. Van Vliet (whom I am friends with and call her by her first name, Ronita) started tearing up and then started crying on each other’s shoulder.    Savannah has been with Ronita for over 1/3 of Savannah’s life and has been a huge part of mine too.     I had a lump in my throat and an ache in my belly.   I was so sad to be leaving Savannah’s preschool.    It would be my last time ever driving my daughter from that classroom.    We had said our good byes.   

All day I have been feeling a bit lost, depressed and weepy.   I know that I will feel better in a few days and begin looking forward to embarking on Savannah’s huge next big step – planning and getting her ready for Kindergarten in the Fall.

Savannah, my dear love, my first born, my true miracle.  I love you so much and Mommy and Daddy are ever so proud of your accomplishments these past 2 years.   You have done a fantastic and amazing job learning, growing and turning from our toddler into our girl.

Love, Love, Love you!!!! xxoxoxoxoxoxo

My babysitter and now dear family friend, Christine, and her friend, Nicole went with us to a carnival yesterday.  We went to the 23rd annual Summerfest in Brea.  It is a gigantic carnival.  They host top notch free entertainment.    Terry Fador  performed at the carnival last night.  Hhe won Grand Prize Winner as the most talented for America’s Got Talent on NBC.  He is a ventriloquist, singer, comedian and celebrity impressionist.  A true genius and an overnight sensation who now has his own Las Vegas show at the Mirage.   This man is a brilliant entertainer and he brought the house down last night.

The girls got hungry for dinner, it was 7:30pm,so I grabbed some hotdogs and we had dinner while watching the show.  It was so much fun!!  I can’t believe it was free!!

By the end of the show, the girls were ready to venture over to the vibrant twinkling lights where all of the fun games and rides were.    There were so many fun little toddler rides for the girls to ride on.  Each ride was $12 for all of the girls to go on.   I let them go on 2 rides.   I received a discount from the administration of the carnival.  They saw my 4 girls and just knew it was going to cost me a fortune and donated $36 worth of tickets so the girls could go on 3 rides.   Then a man overheard me telling the girls we ran out of tickets and he gave me 24 tickets so the girls could go on more rides!!   It was just amazing!!  God was shining down on us and showering us with so many blessings!!

We stayed till the carnival closed which was till about 10pm.   The people that run the rides let our girls go on the rides for free.    Again, I was amazed by such generosity.    

The man who gave us the free tickets is a DJ for a local radio station.  I met his wife and we hit it off.   We agreed to exchange email addresses and plan a Disneyland play date.  I emailed them today to see when they would like to go and to thank them for the tickets.

Last night just felt my heart with the Holy Spirit.  I felt God’s Love all around me.     Even in the tough times we are having right now, God gives me special gifts like what I received from such generous people yesterday!!