Adventures in Casting

The last time Gabe was casted, we decided to document it for posterity his classmates so they understood how Gabriel got his cast...I thought I would share a few of the pictures with all of you :)

First Gabe's PT, Brian, stretches his ankle and muscle to see exactly how much range of motion he has. He had 8 degrees of motion in this picture (18-20 is normal)


The casting process begins...a big cotton sock to protect his skin from the plaster


The plaster is put on-the worst part of this for Gabriel is that Brian (or whomever is doing the casting) has to push on his foot/ankle to get it into the proper position to stretch out that muscle. They obviously cannot measure him while he's in plaster, so they just push as much as they can and hope they get a good stretch


Now for Gabe's favorite part, the colors! The top layer of his cast is fiberglass; it's lightweight and colored. He usually chooses either orange and blue or red and black (Bears and Blackhawks-he's Geo's son for sure!!) This time, however, he got black and orange for Halloween (they were out of blue and red ha ha)





and now we're finished; I tried to get Gabe to sit next to Brian for a picture together, instead they decided to make funny faces at one another :) Mr. Brian is fabulous, we're so lucky to have him as Gabe's physical therapist!! In case anyone was wondering, Gabe ended up gaining 10 degrees of motion after three days in his cast-back to normal!!

Casting Call

Yesterday Gabe got his cast off! He has gained six degrees of movement, which is completely normal. His PT wants to do another cast but is going to wait another week or so to put it on him. He has two blisters from the cast and we are going out of town, so we'll see how he measures next week, hopefully he hasn't lost more motion!

Mr Gabriel is a *bit* sassy as of late. Today he was outside and his ball rolled under the porch door. He said "Hey, girl [meaning me] please get that ball. YOU girl! open that door!" He also refers to George as "my husband" even when talking about something he and Geo have done together, before it was just to me about something Geo and I had done. :O What a goofy kid.

The kids have been enjoying the sun the last few days. Yesterday we went to the "rocket" park (it's a park with a huge rocket ship slide) and when we walked in there was a pretty boxer puppy sitting by a bench with his owner. SarahAnne immediately fell in love and started to walk toward the dog, pointing at her, saying "mine mine mine" We pet the dog together, her name was Rosie, the dog gave her a kiss and SarahAnne turned around and walked back to see Gabe. It was very cute. Tomorrow we are meeting up with some friends at another park to hopefully wear our children out enough that they'll nap tomorrow afternoon ha ha.

George and I are both hoping this weather holds on thru the weekend...it's just been glorious. Gabe and I planted some sweet peas and morning glories...I've been rotating them to get good sun and one batch has bloomed already...however, I'm not sure if they are the peas or glories...the other side didn't do ANYTHING .I am hoping they are the morning glories, I am pretty sure they are actually, based on the leaves. I love morning glories and plan on putting them into a planter that will allow them to grow all the way around my porch so they are the first thing I see when I look out in the morning. We are also going to attempt some patio tomatoes as well, we'll see how THAT goes.

Have a lovely evening everyone :D

Spring Time Fun

Gabe and SarahAnne have discovered something fun to do on these windy April afternoons...pinwheels! We picked some up at the dollar store (of all places) and they have been having a blast with them. I wish *I* were that easily amused ha ha.

Gabe had his new cast put on Tuesday. He keeps asking for us to "take off my green boot" (it's a green cast-NEON green-what was Geo thinking?!) He's been a pretty good sport about the whole thing, but pants are a big issue-he only has a few pair that fit over the cast. Thankfully it's warm enough for shorts during the day.

SarahAnne is a complete and utter dare devil. She was out on the patio this afternoon with Gabe...and decided it would be a great idea to stand on a chair...it was like slow motion watching her fall off-I could see her falling but couldn't do a darn thing about it. She has a fat lip and I have a blood stained t shirt. *sigh* She was fine after about two minutes of nursing and cuddling...and went right back outside :O Crazy little monkey!

Hope you are all enjoying the gorgeous spring weather...