Saturday, December 31, 2011

Anthony's New Year's Rockin' Eve

We rang in the New Year with a raucous show at Mississippi Pizza featuring Mr. Ben and his band. 

  The joint was packed!


We partied all night!

The best part was that they used Buenos Aires Midnight, so we were home in time for Anthony's bedtime, with still plenty of time left for Mommy and Daddy to watch TV.  (Yes, we are old...)

Happy, Happy New Year!

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Sunday, December 25, 2011

Merry Christmas!

With Love from the Carsons

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Christmas Eve

Twas the night before Christmas and all 'cross the map, there lay sink-fulls of dishes and presents to wrap.
We had dinner with Grandma, there was no time to text, I listened with awe to hear what she'd say next.
Lights hung on the house and the basement demolished, I'm glad that for this week, all work is abolished.
I'll sleep through the night without making a peep, then wake up at five and watch Sesame Street.
There'll be candy and toys and maybe a ball - of the kids that I know, I'm the luckiest of all.
Thank you for Christmas, we think it's the best - gee, Mommy and Daddy sure could use a rest.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Friday, December 23, 2011

Sunday, December 18, 2011

A Magical Night

Anthony's first visit to the Festival of Lights at The Grotto!









Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Dateline: Daddy

Daddy wrote an article for the Northwest Down Syndrome Association Newsletter.  We're so proud of him!  Read it here (see page 5)!

NWDSA Logo

Sunday, December 11, 2011

Holiday Moments to Treasure: At the Christmas Tree Lot

 "What is this place?!"

"Okay, just one picture.  But then we're leaving."

Friday, December 9, 2011

New Developments

We've all been keeping busy and adjusting to the colder, rainy weather (bad).  But that also means Christmas is coming (good!).

Anthony's been gradually progressing with his walking.  His preferred method of getting around now is walking while holding a grownup's hands.  He's getting better at holding on by just one hand but it's still hard for him.  He's not shy about asking us to lead him where he needs to go.  And crawling still works fine if there's no one nearby to serve as his co-pilot.

The big news is that the Sunday after Thanksgiving he took his first independent steps!  Just a few in between Mommy and Daddy, but he's definitely on his way!

We're taking a break from speech therapy until after the new year. It's been nice to have our mornings free to do fun things instead of therapy, like going to the Children's Museum. We had a big communication breakthrough recently- Anthony started doing the hand signs to a whole lot of his songs!  His favorites are "She'll be Coming 'Round the Mountain"  (toot, toot!), "Open and Shut Them" and of course "The Itsy Bitsy Spider."  This is a good indication that he may be ready to start doing some signs.  No words yet, but the important thing is that he keeps progressing with his communication.  We have talked to a lot of parents of older kids with Down syndrome recently, and they say that their kids didn't start talking until after age 3.  Anthony's recent advances, like doing more focused playing and signing along with his songs, all are good indicators that he's on his way to speech.  We just have to be patient and the words (and walking) will come!



Another new development is the emergence of a few more teeth!  On top, he still only has the 2 very front ones and his molars- those ones in the middle have been slow in coming.  But the other day we saw one of the incisors/eye teeth poking through.  That might explain his lack of sleeping and refusal to eat anything except yogurt for what seemed like forever.  Maybe he can ask Santa for his 4 side teeth for Christmas!

He now stands a towering 34.5 inches tall.  Up 2 inches from the last time we measured him, in September.  Sometimes he seems tiny to me, but other times he seems so big.  We think he's just the right size.



His favorite toys are still blocks, balls, and books.  He's been playing with the trains and cars at school more lately.  We're told he's also been cracking himself up by playing tag with the other kids- running up to them and then laughing and running away!



That's the scoop for now!