Train Ride

So to take advantage of the "short" fall weather we usually have up this way in the north i decided to do something really fun for Matt that i know he would enjoy. I knew they had some train rides to take in the fall and thought it would be super fun. I researched and they no longer have them out of our town BUT they did have one a little ways away from our town. I booked it. How could i not?? Matt is SOOO in love with trains. Anytime we see one or hear one its a constant "choo choo" till it is no longer in our sights our we don't hear it anymore. I personally have never been on a train ride other then super small ones so i was excited too!!! It took a little bit of a drive to get to Ione WA but the scenery was so worth it. A little windy road but i have never been in that area before and Ryan was there to point out all the places that he has worked. Man do i give him credit for hiking up so many places. Although they are super beautiful i guess they dont call it work for nothing. We got there and boy let me tell you. For Matt to be that close to a train...HILARIOUS!!

(although the pic doesn't show it he WAS really excited)

He was so well behaved on the ride. Sat patiently on our laps. It was really cute because every time we went over a road or whatnot they had to blow the whistle and Matt would look around saying "choo choo" like he was looking for the train so i was constantly telling him we were ON the train. (I doubt he understood but oh wells). It was soo much fun!! We decided to sit in the closed car and boy am i glad we did. It was still a little chilly but not as cold as it would have been if we were sitting in the open car. So much to see along the way......

Dam along the trestle we stopped on

Matt and Ryan

Matt and Mom

I think this will be a yearly tradition since it was so much fun. I know after awhile it will probably get old to him but it will still be fun at least for awhile.....until next year!!!

Matts Eye

When Matt was born it took him almost a week to open his right eye. He would open it a little but it was never fully open like his left eye. We always called him our "Right eye Jack" as a joke among us. As he got older we went to a kids eye Dr in Spokane because his eye was always droopy and noticeable. You could see it in pictures and you could tell just by looking at him. We saw his eye Dr every 6 months to keep an eye on the progress. It seemed to be getting better as time went on and was only worse when he was really tired. But the last time he went it seemed to actually be getting worse. The droop was noticeable all the time now. It was more droopy then his normal and just didn't seem to be improving with his age at all. She wanted to see us in 4 months instead of our normal 6. Well Matt went in on Monday and his eye is worse. His droopiness has now go into his line of vision. Since he is having trouble seeing his eye has now turned into a lazy eye and his brain is starting to slowly not use that eye. We have to go and see them again in two months. In those two months we have to patch his eye for 1.5 hrs everyday. Everyday i have to put this eye patch over his eye that is a hastle to try and put it on. Once its on he'll only cry here and there and doesn't seem to mind it that much. You could tell his has a problem with his vision in his droopy eye because the first day he had the patch on he was bumping into stuff all day. It wasn't so bad and he was really exited to finally take it off. I'm glad that he hasn't tried to take it off yet. Once he does it will be bad news bears....until then.

So when we go back in two months we are crossing our fingers and praying that it works. That same day after our appointment we meet with a plastic surgeon for his eye to lift it. I'm really hoping that the patch works!! I don't want to put him under again. He had a really hard time coming out of it and both times he had breathing problems and we had to stay overnight both times. It wasn't fun and it was horrible to see your child's O2 dip down into the 60 and 70's. After the anesthesia wore off he was totally fine and his O2 stats were great. I would just rather not go through all that again. She said that we can all go over that the next time we come in.

2 Yr Appt...and a month full of appointments

Matt had his big 2 yr appointment on the 23 of September. He now weighs in at 27 1/2 lbs...WOO HOO and is a whopping 33 1/2 inches long. He is tall and skinny just like his dad but hes growing so that's the most important part. Since Matt's insurance went up ALOT because he is still at 100 for the risk factor we DC'd his prevacid since we haven't used it since March and now that hes past the 25% for his weight we DC'd his pediasure as well. He likes to drink regular milk and its rare that he will drink all of his pediasure so i don't find this to be much of an issue. Hopefully these two things will make it go down at least a little bit. As for his speech...its coming along but insurance doesn't cover it anyways so i don't see what the issue would be with that. He still has his droopy eye and yes it is getting worse. He actually goes in on the 11th again to see how things have changed since 4 months ago. As bad as it sounds I'm really hoping they will patch his good eye or something. It wasn't so noticeable before but now it is pretty bad. As long as he can still see i guess that's the main thing but by golly I'm a pro-active person....i like to deal with things before they get bad bad so i don't see what patching it would hurt except improve the muscles in his week eye right?? He doesn't go to PT anymore either but i didn't think insurance covered that either so really I'm curious to see what issues afford him to still be at the highest risk factor 100!!!!. Other than that hes healthy as a button.

This month Matt has some really exciting things going on!!! He is going to READY!!! For kindergarten through the school district that teaches parents things to do with their kids to get them ready in the coming years so they are not behind once they get to Kindergarten. I'm really excited to see all the new things to do with him and what we can do as parents to make him become a better and more prepared little person. Its a pet peeve of mine for parents to have kids them pretty much do NOTHING with them so by the time they get ready to go to school they really have no idea what they are doing and struggle the whole time. I've seen this happen first hand and its really sad. So I'm excited to be on top of the ball with this one. ALSO Matt gets to go on his very first TRAIN RIDE!! Its a fall excursion ride put on by the Lions Club in WA and its just a quick little ride from Ione WA to Metaline Falls. I'm super excited since Matt freaks out any time he hears a train or sees a train. I cant wait to see what his little body will do once hes on the train for reels.

Other than that it looks like fall is upon us and the dreary weather has started. I'm sure we'll have some nice awesome days of fall but its starting to rain and that's just plain no fun.