Saturday, April 14th

Well--Annie has made some big strides in her rehab this week! She sat up by herself on Thursday--for about 5 minutes while OT Beth worked with her. (See the pictures.) She has been allowing more "tastes" of food--strained pears seems to be a good thing. Her facial expressions have increased significantly, and her vocalizations are more frequent and seem to be more intentional. Her Grandmommie gave her a stuffed toy elephant that sings the ABC song, and after she listens to it, she always hums, and seems to be singing it in response. And yesterday, she stuck her tongue out 4 or 5 times to mimic her speech therapist, BJ.

Intentional motor movements are so important--and we are seeing them more and more. So--this week her rehab nurse is going to talk to the team to see if we can move up her rehab evaluation and get her admitted to inpatient Children's Rehabilitation soon. Please pray that God smooth the way for this to happen. I know His timing is perfect. It'll be at least 3 more weeks in the hospital, but the intensity of the rehab will help Annie make bigger gains in a shorter amount of time.

Meanwhile--send up some praises for her progress!

Jean

But certainly God has heard me;
He has attended to the voice of my prayer.

Blessed be God,
Who has not turned away my prayer
Nor His mercy from me! Psalm 66:19-20