Determination

Look closely at this series of photos and you can see how, after much effort, Truman figured out how to climb onto steps taller than himself. In the last photo, you can see the reward -- the bottom of a really big tunnel slide. This kind of determination is why this little miracle is alive today.

Therapy isn't all hard work!

We've been focusing a lot on texture sensitivity with the hands, and Truman has made a lot of progress with touching foods. This happens to be shaving cream, but we also do this with yogurt, pudding, paint, and wet sand.

Now, if we could only get the kid to walk barefooted (or let us go without shoes).

Chores

Truman has a chore every night -- putting his own clothes in the hamper and his shoes in their place. Of course, learning to do chores also means learning to avoid them by running away.

Summer Fun

Now that summer is here, it's time to play in the sand, water, and the swimming pool. And yes, we do put that many swim clothes on our fair-skinned boy in addition to SPF 55. Notice the swim shoes as well since our boy can never stand to be shoeless. He would put them on with his pajamas if we would allow it.

Fish Oil

We are planning to start fish oil supplements for Truman based on some studies I've heard about it improving speech issues. We bought the Nordic Naturals with lemon flavoring others recommend, but I am unsure about dosage. I would appreciate any help any of you can provide with that.

We had talked about doing this earlier, but we decided to go ahead when we bought milk during a trip to Central Market instead of Tom Thumb and bought the Horizon Organic milk with added DHA instead of Tom Thumb's O Organic brand. Anyway, Truman has added at least three words since then -- dirt, Papa, and park and seems to be mimicing better. We have no idea if there is a relationship, but it doesn't hurt, so we're trying it.

Big News!!

Truman got into the Callier Center's SmILE Program for children with speech disorders. Here's the description:

SmILE (Small-group Intervention for Language Emergence). This group program is designed to facilitate language development in young children. The curriculum is organized by content themes in preschool routines that are utilized to provide intensive language intervention and social skills development. The program is led by a certified, licensed speech-language pathologist with the support of graduate student clinicians.

It's for two and three-year-olds with speech disorders. There are four children in each class, and he will go two days a week starting in June. There are only 12 spots in Dallas. It's part of the University of Texas at Dallas and is located at UT Southwestern Medical School.

It's not cheap, but it's not unaffordable either. We here amazing stories about this place. And, now that he is in the program, he can continue for any many semesters as he needs to. We feel so relieved about this.

On the Mend

Truman is still sick, but his fever finally broke. As of yesterday, he had energy to play, but was still at only about 30% of Truman speed. His voice still sounds awful, but he is willing to eat and drink again. But now I've got it.