Mason is...WALKING!

Over the last few days, Mason has been standing for longer periods independently and taking multiple hands-free steps near objects that he could hold onto if he needed. Last night, Mason left a chair in the middle of the room and casually walked to the couch with probably 6 independent steps. Travis and I were both fortunate enough to see it happen. It was the very first time Mason stepped out into space with nothing to hold onto; no safety net. He did great and kept his balance the entire time! Hopefully we can capture it on film soon!

Mysterious Skin Bump

Things have been going really well for Mason lately, with the exception of a mysterious skin bump on his forehead. For about a week a red spot came and went and we really thought nothing of it. A week later, it stuck and has been growing in size and getting more red for the past 4 weeks. We have visited the Pediatrician twice and have tried two treatments, but nothing seems to make it go away or get any smaller. If it doesn't improve by the end of this week, we will have to visit a Dermatologist to see if they can tell what it is.

It looks like an infected clogged pore and we have been using warm compresses to try and bring it to a head so that it can pop and drain. He is on topical and oral antibiotics right now, just in case it is a bacterial infection. The compresses are hard to do when he is awake, so the past few nights I have been doing them when he falls asleep. It looked like they might be working and it was close to being ready to pop last night. My fingers are crossed that tonight will be the night. The Pediatrician feels that once it pops and drains, it will heal up pretty fast. Since the location is right between his eyes, she did not feel comfortable lancing it at the office and was not able to manually "pop" it at our last visit.

March for Babies

That time of year is coming up again! March for Babies is on 4/25/09 in our area. Last year Travis walked for Mason and was able to raise more than $1,000 in donations thanks to your generosity.

We have set up a bit of a different goal this year. There were many people that expressed interest in walking with Travis, so we decided to create a walking team. Our team will represent CDH and will hopefully help to raise some awareness. Our goal is to get 25 walkers this year to participate with Travis and Mason. If each walker raised $100, our team will generate $2,500 for the March of Dimes, a truly special organization.

I really wish I could walk this year, but the event is only 2 days away from my due date.

Please check out our Team Page and register to join us!

Playdate

This past Sunday, we were able to get together with the Baker's. Noah is one of Mason's CDH buddies and was Mason's roomie when they were on ECMO at UofM. We have all become such great friends and have really gone through this CDH journey step by step with each other. It is great to have friends that can relate to everything that we have been through.

We visited the Baker's at their house and the boys all had a great time playing. It was the first time they were able to play together ouside of a hospital or doctor appointment.

Check out The Baker's blog, they got some great pictures!!

Pudding Therapy

Who can resist a little chocolate pudding therapy? Not our little guy! A few nights ago I made some chocolate JELLO cook'n'serve pudding for dessert. We stripped Mason down and let him "have at it". He made a huge mess and even tasted it multiple times. He really had fun with it and made us laugh, and laugh. It was such a success that we decided to have pudding therapy as much as we can now. We can really start to tell that his sensory issues are now becoming far and few between. He didn't mind getting dirty and digging in the pudding. I served it warm so I am sure that helped a little.

Pictures

I just realized that the last pictures that I posted of Mason were from Christmas! Here are some recent pics...

Posing for the camera....



Using his walker (you can see the hole in his pj's that we had to add to accomodate his feeding tube)....



Practice, practice, practice...



Another pose for the camera...

First Step

This past Sunday I met up with some other UofM CDH Moms for lunch and coffee. It was wonderful to get together with all of them and catch up. We found a great central location for all of us and we hope to do it again sometime soon!

This is just a short post that I needed to write this down so that I can reference it when I am updating Mason's baby book later...

When I came home Travis gave me the news that Mason took one step by himself about 5 minutes before I came home. He was looking out the window and then turned around and wanted to get to one of his stand-up toys. Instead of getting down and crawling to it like usual, he let go of the window and stepped over to it himself. Travis said it happened so fast that by the time he realized it and started to cheer, Mason was looking at him like "what did I do?".

Yesterday at our Pulmonary appointment, Mason was cruising some of the furniture in the exam room while we were waiting for the doc. He was standing and holding onto my legs and decided to walk over to the stroller by himself. He took about 1 - 2 steps with his arms outstretched in front of him and had a huge grin on his face when he arrived safely.

Seems like the walker is helping Mason develop his core muscles and find his balance. It is so much fun to watch him take these first couple of steps!