SMILE

We could use some smiles like these around here. Thank you for all the thoughts and prayers. Hudson is doing great. He officially starts speech therapy tomorrow morning. We hope that he is going to be talking up a storm in no time. Hudson will have the Audiology exam this Friday. Hopefully we will know more about his hearing next week when we get the results of the exam.

I am so appreciatve of all the support. It means so much to me.

For now, enjoy these sweet smiles.

imperfection

I first want to apologize for the lack of communication with friends and family the past couple of weeks. Things have been a bit crazy around here. We have enjoyed having my Aunt Mary and my cousins Melissa and Rebecca here in Austin this past weekend and this week. We had a wonderful visit. Both Melissa and Rebecca are pregnant. I could not be more thrilled for them. They are embarking on an incredible journey. I know they will both be wonderful mothers. I cannot wait to welcome Baby Hills and Baby Martin into the world and into our family at the end of summer.

Last week on my birthday we got some disappointing news about Hudson. Hudson's teachers at preschool called us in to discuss some concerns they have about Hudson's language and speech development. While is is talking more than he ever has,they feel he is not picking up language as quickly as the other children in the class. It was really hard to hear this and we immediately called the Doctor to get some more information. After a great visit with the Doctor it was decided that Hudson would benefit from speech therapy. The Doctor also recommended a hearing test just to make sure that he is hearing the same sounds that you and I hear. So far this week we had the speech therapy evaluation and hope to have more details about the speech therapy plan by the end of the week. Hudson will go in for the hearing test next Friday.

While we are encouraged that whatever is going on with Hudson is correctable with speech therapy, it is difficult to watch your child struggle and to feel completely helpless. I have been really down on myslf because I have been feeling like this is somehow my fault and that I have failed Hudson. I have to keep reminding myself that I did not cause this and we will do everything that is recommended by the Doctor and Therapists to be sure that Hudson gets the help he needs. I wanted to share this with those who read my blog. I hope that you all don't have to go through something like this but if you do, know that your feelings are completely normal. I feel that as parents we prepare so much for the birth of our child(ren) and the first year of their lives, but we don't do anything to prepare for the difficult times and the next 17 years of their lives. I guess as parents we think that our child(ren) are gong to be perfect and they will never have any issues but this is not life or reality. Brad and I are so grateful and thankful that we have been blessed with such an amazing son (who is still perfect in our eyes). We also feel very blessed that he is a healthy boy who just needs a little extra help in learning the fine art of communication.

I hope that we will have more answers next week once we have the official results of the Audiology exam and the speech therapy evaluation. I will try to share once we feel the time is right. So again please accept my apologies for being a little distant and unavailable. I am trying to spend all of my free time with my little guy.

Thanks for listening to my rambling.

The Most Magical Place on Earth

WARNING: Disney Picture Overload

We had a great trip to Disney World. Hudson had a great time. I took a ton of pictures!Hudson's faorite part of the trip was meeting the cast of the movie "Cars". and he loved the race car ride. Now I just need a vacation from my vacation. After Disney Brad and Hudson headed back to Columbus to visit family so I have had a much needed weekend of rest and relaxation. I am now ready for them to come home (good thing because they get home in a few hours).

Enjoy the photos from the trip.