Nora Word of the Week - "More Tea"

NORA PHRASE OF THE WEEK "More Tea"
The past 2 weeks, Nora has experienced a language explosion. It is quite amazing, as she puts two words together without cueing. For example, she now says, "Tea, peee" for "tea, please". Or "more mamma" or her rendition of "no, Stuey". Finally, I am starting to really see her language really pick up. For many months there, we were in a language doldrums, with fairly slow progress.
2 weeks ago I started her on fish oil supplements...this was from a recommendation of a friend's sister, who has a son going through similar speech delays. I read in the book, The Late Talker, how fish oil supplements have shown to dramatically improve language and motor skills in children where they are delayed. The fish oils help fill in the myelin which is lacking on the nerves in the kids with apraxia. They don't know why some kids are born deficient in the myelin.

In any case, I see big improvements and the tablets can only help her! I know my friends may think I'm "out there" for trying something alternative, but after doing the reading, it made sense to try it. I figured i'd give it one bottle of the supplements and if I didn't see any improvement, I wouldn't waste my money on another bottle. So far, I'm mightily impressed. The therapists today at infant learning said they see big differences in Nora's ability to put different sounds and words together. At times when Nora says more complex things, I just want to cry with delight. It is so wonderful to see all the little connections in her brain come together and see her be successful with speaking. At times tears literally well up in my eyes and I whisper to Patrick, "Hon, did you hear what she just said?". It is an exciting time for all of us.

TAGALOG progress
My tagalog progress has been slow this past month. Tonight I did my first lesson in weeks, and it went amazingly well. I remembered most of what I had learned in the past month. Phew! No major loss of knowledge from several weeks off.
At the clinic I am getting braver about speaking small greetings to patients. I LOVE the sound of the language. Tonight as I plugged along through the lesson, I was reaffirmed in my decision to learn tagalog as I get lost in tempo of the words....

NEW RECIPES
I am hooked on cooking new recipes. It is getting easier and easier to cook up new meals. Yesterday afternoon I went to Safeway with Stuey, picked up ingredients for several new recipes. After my arrival home, I made Sour Cream Rye bread, Spicy Stewed Potatoes with Spinach and Buttermilk and Ultimate Black Beans. The Rye bread was made in the breadmaker and had all sorts of cool ingredients in it like sour cream, balsamic vinegar, coriander...just delicious. I've definitely grown to like Rye bread more over the years. This was my first time making it.
The Spicy Stewed Potatoes and Spinach dish was made in the cast iron skilled-small cubed potatoes cooked for 15 minutes with tumeric and topped with spinach and buttermilk/cream. Good flavors with cilantro and chilis mixed in. It went fabulously with white rice and the black beans dish.
Stuey wasn't a fan of the black beans dish-I think I need to learn more about how to cook beans to reduce their gas producing properties. He was up every 3 hours last night with gas attacks. I was quite tired this morning.

BABIES, BABIES, BABIES...
No, I'm not pregnant!
3 friends are due with babies this week. My friends Marias and Katie are due today and tomorrow. And on Thursday my friend Julie is having a C-section in Anchorage. My friend Chistina had a baby girl over a week ago.
What an exciting time. These are second children for all 4 of these moms and I can completely empathize with the journey they are about to undertake in the next few months to come with toddlers and new babies. It is a hard time...my memories of Stueys first days at home are full of Nora walking around the house crying, me barely able able to function from exhaustion. Then it slowly got better. I think it didn't really get better for us, however, until Nora started speech therapy, as that helped us bridge the communication gap which was occurring and leading to much frusturation.
Many parents of kids with 18 month age gap said, "the first year is hard, then it gets easier..." I kept telling myself, just get to 1 year, just get to 1 year. And sure enough-its getting easier! We're through the worst of it. Yes, there are still hard days but the physical dependency of hard nights, non stop nursings are in the past. I'm glad to be done with the baby phase and I enjoy Stuart more and more every day as his personality blossoms. I enjoy the fact that I have energy for myself, my husband, my work...I'm finding a balance once again. Its been an interesting journey this past year and I'm glad I had Patrick to laugh and cry with. He definitely has a good sense of humor and helped us keep our wits about us during the more challenging hours.

Zoya