Namine
Namine Olivia Eiche was born on July 15, 2008 with a double-inlet left ventricle heart defect; Pierre Robin sequence, a condition that resulted in a regressed jaw and a partial (U-shaped) cleft palate; caudal regression syndrome (also known as sacral agenesis), which damages the growth of the tailbone and legs, also giving her clubfoot; and scoliosis.
-
Making our own Christmas stockings
Today was a craft day. We made our own Christmas stockings!
-
Handmade purses
Jessica and her sister Melissa made purses from old jeans for the little girls in our lives: Namine and her cousins Olivia and Eva.
-
Sesame Street Live
My mom treated Namine to an early Christmas present: taking her to a showing of Sesame Street Live. She loved it.
-
A good day
Jessica went over to her sister’s today to lend a hand with Christmas presents. (I plan on waiting until the last minute, especially since Jessica already “accidentally” found one of the presents from me and Namine).
-
Our Thanksgiving
Both Jessica and I are introverts. We are more comfortable with a small number of close friends, we don’t like parties or loud noise (for my part, except for music – but usually with headphones on or by myself in the car), and we treasure our alone-time. Namine exhibits many of the same qualities.
-
Namine walking at therapy
Since getting the okay from her cardiologist to resume physical therapy in her walker, Namine has continued to improve. She is up to walking for ten minutes in her walker, at two minute intervals with thirty-second breaks in between.
-
Familiarity breeds…
Contrary to how the saying goes, Namine has nothing close to contempt for her palatal prosthetic. Quite the opposite – she’s willing to put it in, and is doing quite well with the every-other-day plan prescribed by the speech pathologist.
-
Cleaning and independence
We cleaned the apartment over the weekend. It’s been quite a while since we cleaned – heck, since we had time to clean – the apartment, but very nearly top to bottom, we did it. All three of us. Namine did her part, too.
-
MRSA, MRSA, go away
Come again, some other… never. Yeah, let’s go with never. Namine’s pediatrician called us; the culture they took last week on her MRSA infection – or what was left of it – came back negative. This is great news, a step toward getting her taken off contact isolation status.
-
Trip to the mall
We have a prescription for Namine’s glasses. We get our glasses at the VisionWorks in the mall, so it made sense to get Namine’s there, too. We also just so happened to have one a free train ride, so we decided to make a day of it.
-
Namine in her boat
I love Namine’s imagination.
-
Nightmare turtles
Some days ago, Namine woke crying from a nightmare. I was still awake, fortunately, so I was able to rush in almost immediately.