Today's Post is Brought to You by the Letter L

L is for Lightweight

     Laura had her 15-month check-up last week. She has only gained a few hundred grams since her 12-month check-up, which is not enough. She has severely fallen off the bottom of the growth chart. It would be one thing if she were just small, but she has barely been gaining any weight at all, which is not normal. This has actually been going on since she started solid foods. She was small when she was born, but did a good job catching up in the first few months when she was exclusively breastfed. Once she started on solid foods though, her weight gain started tapering off... a lot. The doctor has finally decided it is time to be concerned about it, and suggested we stop breastfeeding so often (she still nurses about 8 times a day) so she would be hungrier for food. He also suggested giving her two bottles of full-fat cow's milk per day in place of feedings. From what I can tell, there is no reason why she needs cow's milk when she can have breastmilk. It doesn't have more calories than the rich hindmilk, and breastmilk is produced specifically for her. Giving her milk from another species, a species whose digestive system has relatively little in common with the human digestive system, seems odd to me. Cow milk is for baby cows. And, as such, I am not resorting to that yet. She does get (organic) cow's milk a few times a week to provide variety, like any other food I give her, but it's not something I would like her having every day, let alone in place or something I can make for her. For now, I am trying to cut out her 'snack nursing' so she is hungrier at mealtimes, and make sure she takes a full feeding when she does nurse, so she gets to the fatty hindmilk.
    And on the topic of the doctor's visit... I mentioned that Laura seems to have 'lost' a few words (thank you, baby, all done, etc.) that she used to say, which seemed strange to me. He replied with, "Oh, are you worried about Autism?"
     Ahhh!

     "No... it hadn't actually crossed my mind."
     "Oh, okay, well I wouldn't worry about it for right now, then."

     Hmmm, okay great. Like I'm not going to worry after you go and say something like that! :/

     After we got home I went and researched symptoms, and alarmingly, Laura did seem to match up with a handful:

• Does not consistently respond to his/her name.
• Doesn’t follow directions.
• Seems to be deaf at times.
• Seems to hear sometimes, but not others.
• Used to say a few words or babble, but now he/she doesn’t. Okay, she still talks, but she is missing words that she used to say, which is apparently a big red flag.
• Has odd movement patterns such as flapping arms or shaking body, especially when excited.
• Seems hyperactive much of the time; is always “on the go.”
• Is often uncooperative or oppositional during daily routines.
• Seems to prefer to play alone.
• Is very independent for his/her age.
• Walks on his/her toes. (Sometimes)

      No one else seems to share my concern, and honestly, I hadn't thought of it until the doctor brought it up. Please, other moms of one-year-olds, tell me your kids do some of these things too! I'm sure she's fine, but still something to keep in mind, especially since the younger they are diagnosed, the more likely treatment is to be effective. And the other thing is, is that Autism occurs as a range of severity, so it's possible she could just have a mild case. 

L is for Laughing

     On a lighter topic, Laura has recently developed this horrible-adorable Fake Laugh. I mean, she uses it when she is happy or excited about something, but it just sounds so forced and ridiculous. LOL

L is for Lawn

BEFORE

AFTER

      Yeah, we have one now. It's sweet. L is also for Letting the Dogs in the Yard Again. Willow was soooooo happy to have her stompin' ground back.

     We still have a strip at the back of the yard that is "au naturale" (read: weedy) because the yard is sloped there and we are still hoping to build a retaining wall to level off the sloped part. So we are currently trying to teach the dogs to do their business there instead of on our beautiful new grass.

L is for Legumes

     Okay, maybe this one is a bit of stretch seeing as I'm pretty sure we didn't actually plant any species of legumes, but legumes is French for vegetables, and this weekend we finally got around to planting our vegetable garden! I'm really excited and have no patience to wait for the seedlings to sprout. We planted a few things early in the house, all of which died except the peppers. I gingerly transplanted our mostly-dead tomato seedlings, but I'm pretty sure they aren't going to make it, especially since, despite my best efforts to be gentle, Laura thought she would help by squishing and smashing the mud bombs (aka tomato soil pellets) on the ground. :/

L is for Line-dried Laundry

     (See what I did there? Two L's. If we were playing Scattergories, I'd get double points.) :)

Last summer when we were taking down the old shed, I almost got rid of our clothes line. Now, I am sooo glad I didn't! We could really stand to save a few bucks at the moment, and now that it is finally nice enough, drying our clothes for free outside is a great way to do that! And it's way better for the environment, too! Brings me back to the good old days when we lived in Australia and our house didn't even have a dryer... mmmm crusty towels <3

L is for Lack of Laptop

     This weekend my laptop spontaneously died while Marisa was using it. It is currently at the computer hospital, and though it was looking grim, I'm hoping for good news later on today or tomorrow. Please pull through, we're all rooting for you!