At Home in the Mountains

Today Maddy took her first steps--two little baby steps from the bookshelf to the couch. Since Maddy was born, I have read the stories about Jesus and the apostles healing lame men with new eyes and a longing that Jesus could be here today and that he could heal Maddy like he healed the lame man at the pool and on the side of the road. Today I feel like I witnessed a little piece of what it would be like to see one of those miracles happen. And Maddy, she's ready to keep going. She took her steps right as we were getting ready to leave for her physical therapy session. I told her therapist, Miss Wendy, about how she took a couple of steps right before we came. Wendy worked with her in therapy and she took two steps for Miss Wendy. I am so proud of Maddy. She has worked hard and doesn't know that she "can't" do something. Her determination is an inspiration to me. There have definitely been a lot of mountain tops, a lot of valleys, and a lot of flat spaces in Madd...

Maddy wanted to wear her boa to go to lunch with Daddy That's what I feel like I do with summer activities: go to library or DBU (better A/C than our house), eat Popsicles, play in the pool, grill to avoid cooking inside. It seems that we do the same things over and over in the summer with slight variations on the theme. However I don't feel too bad about this and its nice to let my brain atrophy for a few weeks. Anyway, even the supposedly most creative people in the world (i.e. Martha Stewart, the fashion industry, etc.) recycle themes and ideas all the time. I recently saw a Real Simple magazine that recycled a theme and cover scheme "Organize Your Life" from several years ago. I swear it was exactly the same (large flower pick on cover, same theme, orange and yellow color scheme). The only difference was the flower was a different variety. Recently, I saw an article in a magazine about the "belt purse". The article tried to convince readers that a bel...

Maddy cruising without her splints on  Officially there are still six days to the beginning of summer, but summer has already hit Dallas with a vengeance. Our forecast for the next week is pretty boring...and hot. It goes something like: 98, 99, 98, 97, 99, and so on. We hit 100 Monday. Sizzle and fry. Nap time's over Daddy  However, summer has it's compensations. We've been doing a lot of ice cream and popsicle eating, playing in the pool, and grilling out.  Also, our tomatoes have grown to gargantuan size. They don't seem to be producing much fruit. We've gotten some cherry tomatoes, but nothing else so far. our tomato trees...I mean bushes  I had a little bit of a hard time adjusting to my new summer schedule of being home all the time. I didn't realize how much I'd gotten used to the little break of going to teach class. I really like it now though. The library has a story time on Tuesdays. I've been taking Maddy to the library once a week...

Maddy and Daddy looking at the ducks in the park. Going to see the ducks has become a regular activity in the Fletcher household. Maddy loves watching them. She points out the "daddy duck", "the mommy duck", the "baby ducks", and the other night we even learned that there is a "meme duck" out at the pond. Lol! This week has been a little tamer than last week, although still very busy and maybe even more tiring. I had some kind of weird sickness we'll call the flu. I woke up Thursday morning with aches all over my body and a pounding headache. This achy-ness turned into a fever Saturday evening and I pretty much stayed in bed all day Sunday. While all of this was going on, our AC broke down (Saturday morning) and the repairman couldn't get out til Monday. So we all camped downstairs as much as possible over the weekend. On Monday I woke up with a rash over my entire body, except face and feet. I still have no idea what that was about. I...

Worn out after getting casts off and splints fitted  The first  week of therapy is down and I am worn to a frazzle. We had therapy every day except Monday. The sessions we had a Scottish Rite were extremely long but they got Maddy set up the best she can possible be. This is one way to hold an umbrella  After we got Maddy's casts of and her temporary splints on Friday we were able to have a nice weekend of taking it easy and getting Maddy used to being without casts. She is still kind of insecure without anything on her legs. We've gotten her to where she will take her splints off for a while but she wants her socks on at all times. On Friday she was crying and wanting her casts back on. Silly girl! We think her left knee especially is still pretty stiff and sore and having the splints or something on helps with the sensitivity. Maddy's "princess face" Pool time!  Maddy did not want to get in the pool on Friday at all. We were able to get her to ...