Speech Therapy Consultation

This morning we had our initial consultation with Early Intervention. It was about an hour long meeting here at the house where we basically just talked about the concerns of the doctor, where Audrey is with language, gross motor skills, fine motor skills, social skills, and problem solving. Each section was scored on a 10 point scale, with the highest being 60. She scored 60/60 on all but language, where she scored 40/60. The two sections she did not score any points on are 2 and 3 word sentences ("GO HOME" "I GO HOME"). At this point she's not saying any verbs, so she didn't score any points on those.

Playing Trucks

Overall, the meeting went very smoothly. Audrey showed off her skills, I made a list of words that she's saying (up to 28 now, about 10 more than 2 weeks ago), and the counselor made notes about all of Audrey's other skills. This session was just an intake assessment to discuss what to expect and for her to get an idea of Audrey's language development, and we are currently scheduled to go in and do a two hour formal assessment in a month. If, after that assessment, Audrey is deemed 25% or more delayed (putting her at the speaking level of a 15 month old) then she will be admitted to the program and we will be eligible for services.

At this point, the counselor said she would be very surprised if Audrey is deemed eligible for the program, and most likely we won't even be moving forward with the 2 hour assessment next month. She has to take the information she gathered today and look over it with the speech therapist and the other program coordinators to evaluate what they think Audrey's needs are. She said she is impressed with Audrey's skills overall, and by the time next month's evaluation comes around, Audrey will probably be speaking 2 word sentences. I'm hoping we will receive the call by the end of the week saying we don't need to come in next month.  I'm ready to stop worrying about her! I feel like ever since the doctor mentioned that she might be behind in her language, I've been stressing about it and pressuring her to talk more, which I do not want to do.

So for now I feel like I can relax a bit since I have gotten so much reassurance from everyone that she's speaking just fine. I'll keep everyone updated when I found out anything else!

First Braids

The other day as we ate breakfast, I couldn't help but stare at Audrey's crazy hair and wonder what I could do to tame it. She wears pig tails and pony tails some days, other days I wet it and brush it straight, but mostly I just let it curl up naturally and hope it doesn't frizz too badly.

So I decided I would try something new and attempt a braid. Her hair parts funny and doesn't go down the middle, so one braid was bigger than the other. I've also never done a French braid before so it was a little sloppy looking, but still turned out cute on her little head.

I can't wait to get more practice as her hair grows!