Eye surgery and other adventures

I think we've pretty much established that Scarlett is one brave little girl. So it was no surprise that she did just great during her eye surgery last month, but I was proud nonetheless.

Even though we had to get up way earlier than usual, and she wasn't allowed to eat anything after midnight the night before, and she had to wear a scratchy gown that made her eczema flare up, and she had to be poked and prodded by a bunch of nurses and doctors pre-op, in spite of all that she stayed calm and happy for most of the morning before heading into surgery.

Here she is hanging out in the pre-op room. These are the last couple funny-face-from-crossed-eyes picture we got before here eyes were straightened:



Just relaxing minutes before the surgery. Her casually crossed legs kill me.

The actual surgery took a bit more than an hour, and everything went according to plan. Basically, the doctor weakened the muscles in her inner eye so the outer eye muscles can get stronger and her eyes will stop being pulled inward.

The only brief scare came when Scarlett had a little trouble getting her oxygen levels back up as she came out of the anesthesia. At first they kept us in the waiting room, but after they finally let me come back and see her, she stopped crying and her levels slowly went back up. Once they were convinced she was OK, we only had to stick around the hospital another couple hours and then they let us go home!

Here's Scarlett one day after the surgery:

Her eyes were really read, but she didn't seem to be in any pain. She hardly even rubbed at them, and I was convinced she would. The doctor said we would notice a difference right away in terms of alignment, but that it would take about two months for them to completely straighten out as much as they're going to.

These were taken four days post-surgery (at this point, her eyes were just pink):



And this is one week afterwards:

By a week after the surgery, you couldn't even see any redness. We had a follow-up appointment with her doctor about a week and a half afterward, and she was thrilled with the improvement she saw. I'm really glad we did it, even though she's so young. Of course, since we are way way past our out-of-pocket maximums for the year, it was basically a freebie procedure, but I think even the hassle was well worth it.

It's funny, everywhere we go, everyone who looks at Scarlett comments on how pretty her eyes are. So if people are going to be noticing her eyes for the rest of her life, I'm glad they're going to be straight!

Here are a few photo shoots showing off her new and improved eyes:








We've done other things since my last update, too. Like Scarlett got to swing in a real swing for the first time! I took her to the Jeffrey Mansion playground in Bexley. She loved swinging, at least until a three-year-old boy started swinging next to us and then she couldn't take her eyes off him and didn't so much care about swinging anymore.






Scarlett also went to her first wedding! Jason's friend Mike got married in September, and we took Scarlett with us to the wedding part (grandma and grandpa babysat during the reception.)

We didn't get too many pictures, unfortunately, but here are a couple where you can see Scarlett's dress:




And here's Jason and I at the reception:


She's also still doing great at eating solid foods. We've made our way through most of the single-ingredient cereals, fruits and vegetables, so now we're getting started on mixing stuff together. Also she is just starting to be able to eat the little Gerber Puffs things without gagging or spitting them back out. Her favorite foods so far are prunes, pears, sweet potatoes, and apples. Least favorites are green beans and peas, both of which inspired lots of disgusted faces.

Here are some happier mealtime faces:



And finally, here are some of our best family portraits yet! Everyone's looking at the camera and we're even all kind of smiling! If only they were a tiny more in focus ...


(Whew! Promise I won't wait so long between posts next time.)

Road trippin'

Jason's Grandpa and Grandma Semro and Aunt Elizabeth were in town from Texas for the last few weeks, and we got to see them several times. First they visited us at our house, then we headed up to Toledo to see them again at Tim and Heather's house, and then the next weekend we saw them again in Michigan! We got some good pictures of all the kids while we were at Tim and Heather's.

Here's Nicole. She just started first grade this week! She's wearing a purse on her head.

Here's Mark. He's taking a break from riding bikes to paint with water.

And here's Rachel, our goddaughter! She's about 18 months old now. We hadn't seen her for quite a while, and couldn't believe how big she got!


We also took pictures of Scarlett, of course:









Her new thing is sticking out her tongue. I think part of it is feeling her first tooth, which is getting bigger by the day. And probably feeling her swollen gums, where new teeth should be popping up any time now.


This weekend we drove up to Frankenmuth for some more family gatherings. The main event was Jason's Grandpa Klement's 90th(!) birthday party. The next day, we stopped in Imlay City so Scarlett could meet the other side of the family -- Jason's Grandma Mann, his Auntie Linda and some of his cousins. It's a long trip, so we divided it by stopping in Toledo again on the way up. The drive home was about five hours straight through, and a little tough for Scarlett. But overall, she did great on her first big trip, especially with all of the parties and new people.

Great Grandpa and Grandmpa Klement.





The Semro clan.

Scarlett is always sticking her hands in my mouth these days.


And here's Scarlett snoozing the day after we got home. We were all pretty wiped out! We had a great trip, but I'm definitely looking forward to a couple weekends of relaxation.

Meeting milestones

We have been working with a physical therapist every Saturday morning since May, and Scarlett's made lots of progress with her gross motor skills.

What we're most excited about is tummy-time. Scarlett has gone from absolutely refusing to be on the floor (she would scream and scream on her tummy or back) to finally, finally being able to not only tolerate tummy time but enjoy it. She can push herself up with her arms now, and hold her head up high, too. We all worked very hard toward this goal, so I'm very proud of Scarlett. Yay!







She's doing great at sitting up, too, and she can sit in the middle of the floor with no help from us for about five minutes or so before falling over now.


We also finally got started with solid foods this month. I tried at first making my own baby foods (mashing bananas, etc.), and she wasn't enjoying it too much. But then the other night I tried a regular old jar of sweet potatoes and she loved them! She ate half the jar no problem.

And we finally got around to fixing our video camera, and this is the first video we made of Scarlett. She's bouncing around in her new seat. Enjoy!

Scarlett's first video from Shelley Mann on Vimeo.

Almost eight months

Scarlett is nearly eight months old now. Oh my goodness. It's been a good couple of months. She's doing lots better with things, especially with eating, which is such a relief. She hits her daily goal almost every day now, and has been gaining weight quite nicely. Next up, solid foods! Ha. We shall see how that goes.

She's also made good progress during physical therapy. She finally seems to like being out of her bouncy seat more than she likes to be in it. She loves being on her back and rolling around, and she's able to be on her tummy for longer and longer stretches. She can roll from her tummy to back and back to side, and is very close to figuring out how to roll back to tummy. We've also been working on sitting, which is I think her favorite skill so far. Here are some pictures of her showing off her new talent.




Here she's sitting on my lap biting on her thumb. She has one tooth so far (but doesn't like to show it off) and she's working on some new ones. She also still has crossed eyes a lot of the time, but she's scheduled to have surgery to straighten them the first week of September.





Scarlett has also been talking up a storm these days. She can make lots of new noises and sounds. Her favorites are mamamamama (sometimes just mama) and baba.

Mom. Are we done taking pictures yet? I mean, come on.

A guaranteed cheer-baby-up activity is looking at ourselves in mirrors. But you have to be very excited, like I am here. That's the only way it works.

And, all tired out. We've reintroduced the swaddle, and it works wonders in calming her down and helping her fall asleep. Now that she's eating better, our newest daily annoyance is eczema. She gets so, so itchy and scratches like mad. So the swaddle helps to stop scratching fits (we also use no-scratch mittens a lot), and we're trying various creams and soaps and detergents and foods and trying to figure out what makes it better and worse. I just made an appointment with a dermatologist today. Yay, more doctors!

Feet.

Out and about

Scarlett is getting a lot better about going new places and meeting new people. Which we're very happy about because for a while she was not only refusing to eat when we weren't at home but also refusing to let anyone hold her besides me or Jason, which made life difficult for everyone.


She's been to Cracker Barrel twice now, including this weekend when we had lunch with our old friends Nathan and Sarah DeArman, who were in town from Reno. Jason, Nathan and Sarah all met while working at Cracker Barrel long ago, so we went for the nostalgia. Here's Scarlett waiting patiently while we all eat.



The DeArmans: Nathan, Caleb and Sarah. Their daughter is due in October!

The Manns. Who knows what Scarlett's looking at.

This time, she's looking at Caleb!

A couple weekends ago, we took a quick overnight trip to Fairfield to see Grandma and Grandpa. Here's Scarlett playing with great grandma Mill.

And here we are singing her favorite song, The Wheels on the Bus.