Justin & Amy West Blogs

January 2011

We started the year with Tyler's 1st birthday celebration. Literally.  His birthday is January 6, but because of traveling plans we had his small, intimate party on January 1.  As is a tradition in my family, I made his birthday cake.  I LOVE the picture of Kyle and Tyler, as if they are the mob boss and his right hand man, eyeing the cake!

Shortly after the birthday party, Justin flew to Las Vegas for the Consumer Electronics Show (CES).  I drove myself and the 2 kids to New Mexico to visit my sister (that was a LONG trip!).  I had a list of McDonalds with playplaces and I stopped every 1.5-2 hours if the kids were awake to let them burn some energy.

 Once we got to New Mexico, we enjoyed relaxing with my sister and brother-in-law as they had just gotten home from Brazil.  My sister had a large rubix cube that she made for a Halloween costume that the kids enjoyed playing with, and I got a shot of my little monkeys eating bananas!

 After a day or two Justin flew from Vegas to ABQ, and we picked him up and went skiing. It was my first (and most likely last) ski trip ever!!  Unfortunately, after trying the "bunny" hill several times, I took my first trip down the easiest green hill and managed to twist my knee in such a way that I was able to bruise my tibia (as I found out several weeks later).  At any rate, I was seriously injured, and will most likely never try downhill skiing again.  On the bright side, Kyle seemed to do a GREAT job skiing!

We had a great time visiting with my sister an brother-in-law in New Mexico!  We went out to eat a few times, and at one restaurant Kyle took it upon himself to take the pictures: On the way home from New Mexico (2 adults to drive and take the little ones into bathrooms and rest areas this time), we stopped at the big McDonalds over the highway in Oklahoma.  Normally, this would be fairly uneventful, except for Justin's cheeseburger. Awesome.

Once we got home, I went to work trying to get the disaster of a downstairs room converted into a play room for 2 reasons, only one of which was known to Justin at the time.  I really wanted to get the majority of toys out of the rest of the house and put into one place.  The second reason was so there would be a place to put kids during Justin's SURPRISE graduation party at the end of the month (I will talk more about that later)!

So, Kyle has been very difficult to understand.  In 2010, I had him evaluated by First Steps.  They informed me that his problem was articulation and they do not deal with articulation.  I had him evaluated by Scottish Rites (a Masons charity), and they accepted him into speech therapy, but there was a HUGE waiting list.  When he turned 3, I went to Early Childhood through the public school system.  In order to evaluate him, they put him in 3 weeks of a "diagnostic classroom" where they could evaluate and observe him for problems.  In the long run, he did not qualify for Early Childhood because he was capable of making the sounds that normal 3-year-olds can make, he just often opted not to. Shortly after their conclusions, Scottish Rites had an opening and he has been in speech therapy ever since and has been doing great!  This picture is from his first day of the Diagnostic Classroom (Preschool).

Tyler LOVES soft blankets!  There is one brown blanket that we have that is very soft, and he rubs on it like a cat! It is incredible.

Although Justin graduated with his Masters in December, I threw his surprise graduation party on January 29.  He knew we had some friends coming from Kansas City, and then he went to see a "guy movie" and when he came home we had a house full of people. Congratulations, Justin! We are all proud of you! 

The morning after, we had some air mattress fun!

Here are some final January pictures: