Don't Turn Your Back

This is what you will find if you leave the kids in the living room for a second to check on supper just around the corner in the kitchen....
Bennett is a climbing fool!:) You can tell he definitely wants to put his new skill to work as he is constantly climbing our 3 sets of steps. We put a gate on this set today so that I can actually leave the room to finish supper if I need to. He is getting so strong.

We went to University of Iowa Hospitals today to see a pediatric endocrinologist. These are the specialists who look at growth hormone levels, your thyroid and other glands. We were super impressed by the doctor that we got to see. She was so gentle with Bennett and open to our questions. She feels that Bennett does not have a growth hormone problem because most of the time babies with growth hormone issues are proportionately small, but she says that Bennett has "disproportionate growth" where his legs and arms are shortened. This is what the previous doctors felt as well.

She feels that he is doing very well as he is following a growth curve of his very own. When she measured his length from belly button to foot and belly button to top of head, it was about where it should be (his belly button right now should be at around half of his height), so that is great news. She tested 8 different things today- I know I can't name them all but many of them were just basic vitamin-levels, like calcium, phosphorous, and vitamin B.

Again, we know nothing, but I don't think I'm supposed to know anything. Bennett is Bennett, just the way that God made him, and he is doing really well right now. We will just take one day at a time and if we eventually have a diagnosis, that great, but if we don't, I'm fine with that too!

Also, I have now realized that I haven't posted month pictures of Bennett for 2 months now. I'm horrible!! Maybe next month, but I still wanted to update you about other things he has been doing lately:

What he is saying: ball, trees, Dada, bye-bye, hello

What he is eating: EVERYTHING- we have yet to find anything that Bennett will not eat. He is still nursing once a day in the morning, but otherwise he eats whatever we eat- even steak with barely two teeth!:) He really likes to feed himself and uses a fork when he is feeling patient enough to work that hard!

How he is sleeping: Great! He sleeps through the night and takes 2 naps during the day. We still get concerned about how tired he gets so quickly at times- this is something we talked to the doctor about today. His physical therapist shares that concern as well. Bennett's endurance is quite short, obviously when he is working hard in physical therapy this is understandable, but even when he is just playing he needs frequent breaks.

What he likes to do: Bennett likes to climb stairs. I can't think of anything else.

Just kidding!:) He likes to play with cars and blocks, he loves to take anything he can "in and out", he loves to follow his brother around and bug him- I'm serious, I really think he knows that he is bugging him and does it on purpose!:), he loves to be really silly- this is hard to describe, but hopefully I will catch it on video someday soon, and he loves to ride the blue dog- see below:

And this is after falling off of the blue dog and Ethan immediately stealing a turn:

We are so blessed! Take a look at our video bar ont the side too, I added a couple of new videos today- the one of Ethan putting on his own pants cracks me up even though it is sideways.