Faith's Mom's Blog

Adaptive Equipment for Children with Cerebral Palsy Faith in her stander, a common piece of adaptive equipment for kids with cp

Janu"weary" in North Dakota Since we are in the deep freeze here for a couple of days, I thought I would repost this article I wrote last January. Thankfully, these below zero temperatures aren't going to last long!

Yesterday, I had to get out of the apartment. While some people are real homebodies and could stay inside for days at a time, I am just not one of those people. Faith seemed like she too needed to get out and told me she wanted to go shopping. I thought it was a great idea but as soon as I mentioned getting her dressed, she decided she no longer wanted to go out since it involved getting out of her comfy pajamas. So, I ended up going solo which was probably better anyway since the weather was not all that great. While shopping at Target, I found some really cool "Little People" Alphabet blocks. Faith loves playing with blocks and these were big and looked like they would be easy for her to take apart. An added bonus was that they had the letters of the alphabet on them and they came in a variety of bright colors! Today, Faith didn't have school so we got out the blocks. One of our favorite things to do with blocks is to see how high of a tower we can build. We got all

Burrr, it's cold out there! Twenty below with the wind chill - so glad I didn't have to walk Faith down the hill this morning and she was able to enjoy some warmth on the bus! Which, by the way is working out great for us. I guess when she's on there, she just giggles and laughs the whole time. The other day the bus driver told me he wished he had her for another 4 or 5 more blocks just to hear her giggle! Besides the bus being a big hit, we have some more exciting news. Faith is going to be one of the stars this year for the Great American Bike Race (GABR)! This means she and her friend, Tanner, will be helping to promote the big event which takes place on April 9, 2011. Faith will be on TV, the radio and will be featured in Medcenter One's magazine all to promote GABR. So once again I will be looking for riders for Faith's team. I may try to get two teams together so that's 20 riders. Let me know if you want to ride! We will also be doing lots of fundraisin

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Faith is growing. It's been two years this month that she has had her current wheelchair and now it's time for some major adjustments. Since first getting her chair, she has probably grown five inches in her trunk alone. She's ready for a new seat and a new backrest and also a new harness. Another thing she is growing out of is the orthotics she wears on her feet. Soon, she'll be fitted for a new pair but in the meantime, she had some extensions put on so that her toes wouldn't be sticking out of them! She's also ready for the next size up in diapers, but oops! They don't make anything bigger than a size six so we've been trying out some extra small children's briefs that seem to fit her well. I must say, I would love to see the day she no longer has to wear any type of diaper or brief and this summer might be a good time to see if she can be potty trained. I know of other kids with cp who were trained around 8 years old. Hopefully her muscles wi

For kids at school in Bismarck, today marked the official end of Christmas vacation. But for Faith, it wasn't just any ordinary back-to-school day - she started the New Year off by taking the bus to school! It was her first bus ride EVER! I could tell she was a little nervous this morning about her big adventure. We waited downstairs in our lobby for about five minutes then it was there - the big orange school bus. I rolled her outside and turned her backwards so they could get her situated onto the lift. When the lift began going up, Faith began to relax and even smiled. Faith getting loaded onto the bus Once she was in the bus, they locked her chair in place and I hurried down to the school to meet her. As I hoofed it down over the snow-covered sidewalks, I was thankful that today was the day Faith started taking the bus - it would have been difficult to get Faith over the sidewalks with all that unshoveled snow. I barely made it to the school before they began to unl