Kenzie IEP Meeting

Today Cyndi and I attended a meeting at the Child Development Services office to discuss the evaluations that were done on Kenzie and an IEP (individual education plan ) for Kenzie.  After going over Kenzies strengths and weaknesses goals were set by the specialists in all areas for where we would like to see Kenzie a year from now.  The good news is this means that Kenzie qualifies for services and will be going to preschool !  The recommendation for now is 5 days a week, 3 hours per day.  Of these hours 120 minutes a week will be devoted to occupational , physical, and speech therapy separately over the course of the week.

There is still some paperwork to complete before this all becomes official .. but it shouldn't be long.  Once we get exact information on when Kenzie will start we will update everyone !  We are hopeful and fingers crossed that she will be placed here in Scarborough at the Morrison Center.  We have a little bit of an in as that is where she currently gets speech therapy.  Look for another update hopefully soon.... We along with the therapists who evaluated Kenzie think this will be really good for her!

Kenzie's Birthday Celebration Part 2

Since we were traveling for Kenzie's birthday, we wanted to have a little celebration with Mammy back home and a cake for Kenzie to destroy...  We had lunch at a local Hibachi place- Kenzie loves watching the onion fire volcano!  Then we had some yummy cake (Kenzie obviously did not like it at all, haha)  and opened a few presents. 

Cleaning up Kenzie was... fun.  She had so much buttercream frosting all over her body, it was like holding a stick of butter.  She was slimy!  Afterwards there were little chunks of chocolate cake floating in the bath water!

We had a great day, but our  Florida family and friends were never far from our thoughts.  We are keeping y'all in our thoughts and prayers!

First Day of School

Tuesday was Kaitlyn's first day of school at her new school!  She loved it!  Our town is set up a bit different.  K-2 attends one of three different elementary schools.  3-5 attends the intermediate school.  Then there is one middle school for 6-8 and one high school for 9-12.  On the first day, only K, 3, 6, and 9 attend so they can get used to the school, meet all their teachers, etc.

There are about 700 students at the intermediate school which they break up into four different "learning communities".  It's kind of like there being four much smaller schools under one roof.  The whole school gets together occasionally for things like the welcome assembly.  However, most of the time they remain in their smaller learning communities.  Kaitlyn is in the 'red' community.  She will stay in that community for the 4th grade, but have the option for moving when she reaches the 5th grade.

She already feels so comfortable at the school.  One of her girl scout friends is in her class.  A friend from her dance class rides her bus and another girl who used to take dance with her attends morning and after school care.

Kaitlyn hasn't stopped talking about how much she likes school, her teacher, lunch...  She's already signed up for cross country, so she will even get to see her old Holy Cross teammates at the meets.

Her highlight for the first day though... taking the bus home!

Kenzie waiting for her big sister to get off the bus!

Vacation Part 5

The morning of our return trip, Kenzie and I wore our panda shirts.

We stopped to "stretch our legs" at Kings Mountain in South Carolina.  Just to mix it up a bit, this one was a Revolutionary War battlefield rather than our usual Civil War battlefield visit.

Kaitlyn once again went to work on her Jr. Ranger book.

Afterwards Kevin and I took turns hauling Kenzie's butt up the 1.5 mile trail to the top of the mountain.

The next morning before we made our final push to home, we stopped at Manassas Battlefield.  It just happened to be the 155th anniversary of the second battle during our visit.

She really does have unique sleeping positions!

Of course, Kaitlyn is definitely my daughter. As we were passing the signs for Hershey, she suggested we stop and "snag" a few candy bars.  Ha,ha.  We didn't.  We got home just in time for her to start school the next day.