enjoying THESE days

I keep feeling like fall is right at the end of my finger tips and is just about to slip away from me and turn into this bitter, cold hell. So I am trying to take full advantage of every nice day left, before we are locked away in our house for many months. I love being outside and playing and just taking in all the fresh air, and I'm glad that my girls love it too. It's nice to be able to go out and run around aimlessly, scream with all your might and make messes that just don't require any picking up, because hey, we're outside!

Sophia is going to get another winter of synagis shots like she did last year to help prevent her from RSV. We're going to try and go in next week, and beat the rush, since her shot is already here and ready for her. This will probably be her last year to get the extra protection, but since she's been off her O2 for less than 6 months, she still qualified to get it again, and since the insurance is willing to cover that $1,000/shot, we're going to take it and hope we make out like last year, major cold, flu and RSV FREE!!!! Both the girls will get flu shots on Nov. 6th and hopefully Jayden will get the nose spray, because last year was a real shocker when SHE had to get a SHOT.

Our Buddy Walk is less than 2 days away!!!! Randy is telling me that we should be okay from the chance of rain they are talking about, and I just hope he's right. I'm not really feeling it being out there walking in the rain, but I'll do it if I have to :) I was so glad that we jumped right in last year and participated in the Buddy Walk, seeing as Sophia was only 4 months old and packing a pretty heavy load. I've heard a lot of people say that they wouldn't have been ready for the Buddy Walk that soon, but we were excited about it then and even more excited about it this year. We had an amazing support group last year, and again this year is going to be even better! We really do have amazing friends and family and we are so happy that we are going to get to spend the day celebrating Down syndrome with all of them!

Something that I remember the doctors talking about early on that they look for when they suspect a baby may have Down syndrome is a single crease across the palm of one's hand and a larger gap between the big toe and the second toe. The single crease is called a SIMIAN CREASE, which again is one crease acroos the palm instead of 3. 1 out of 30 people have one crease and it can also be called Single Transverse Palmer Crease. In people with Down syndrome, the chances of having one crease instead of three are greater, approximately 69% have the single crease on one or both palms. There is nothing wrong with this characteristic, nor does it cause any problems. It's simply antoher variation to normal.