Pat's reward

For those of you who are wondering, Pat chose an MP3 player for his substitute reward when his tablet "expired".  Daniel helped him load it up with lots of music and he can lately often be found by following the music to wherever he is.  He loves to sing at the top of his lungs, and has already worn out one set of ear plugs.  But he sure looks happy!

Missing: One laptop, very suspicious circumnstances

Some of you may know about a little mystery that we have.  When we made our first trip to Idaho with the rental truck, there was some debate about what to do with my laptop.  My decision was to leave it in the storage unit because it is outdated and I knew that without wireless internet, we wouldn't be using it much.  Pretty simple, right? 

Well the problem is that everyone who had anything to do with it has a different memory of how we stored it, etc.  And none of those memories really match.  To make a long story short, we have made several unsuccessful fishing expeditions in the storage unit, and we still can't find it. 

We thought we got lucky this last time when I opened up a taped box and found the case.  Sadly, when I opened the case, it was empty.  So we really don't have a clue what happened to it.  But now that we finally broke down and bought a new laptop, we are sure to find it, right?  At any rate, Pat will really love his new computer.  :)

Bonus clip

Pat insisted that I share this video with you because he just loves the way my head jerks back.  BTW, it really, really hurt.  He has a wicked fast throw.

As I watch these videos, I am so proud of him and can't help but think of a few experiences that we have had in the pool that made me think this day would never come.

The first is our anniversary two years ago.  We were at the pool with his physical therapist and he was working on standing up by himself in the water for a whole minute without falling over.  At one point during the session, he took two or three steps by himself.  And I started to cry because I was so amazed that he could do it.

The second isn't quite so positive.  It was about a month and a half ago and it also ended in tears, but not the happy kind.  Pat was on the side of the pool and I told him that we wouldn't be getting out of the pool until he managed to walk the 5 steps from the side of the pool over to me by himself.  I didn't really care if he managed to walk the steps by himself or not, I just wanted him to show some initiative and prove that he could at least try to do something for/by himself.  After about 25 minutes of frustration on my part, and anger on his part that I was being so mean, he attempted a few steps.  But at that point, he only made it 2 1/2 steps before he face-planted.  I remember being so upset and frustrated and thinking that maybe he would never walk.

I never would have thought he would be walking by himself for 60-100 walks across the pool in this short time.  And it makes me really wonder what we will accomplish in the next month and a half!

Pat's walk at the end of the swimming session

Notice the thumbs up at the end of the walk.

He is doing very well and I am amazed every time I watch one of these videos or watch him splashing away like a fish in the water.  You would never guess it but when we moved here, he was terrified of the water.  I practically had to threaten to throw him in head first to get him into the pool.  But the other day, he told me how much he loves swimming.  Guess he has come a long way.

Throwing the ball

Catching the ball

Videos of Pat swimming

I hope this works!  Pat has been begging my mom to come and be our videographer at the pool for the longest time so that we could show you his progress.  Here are a few short clips of what he has been working on.

This is one of his walks at the beginning of the day.  Notice how well he is doing and that he doesn't have anyone walking with him.  We tried to re-create this on land, but it did not work.  :)...   Yet that is.  :)

Looks like I will have to do a separate post for each e-mail.  Stay tuned!