bath time...

the sign for bath is two fists rubbing up and down on your chest...camden signs bath at least five times a day...he gets two...and this is how it goes...

who is that?

bath time for giraffe...it looks eerily as though he is drowning said giraffe (but he is really just giving him a drink)try to get as many items in lap as possible, at one time ...mad face (upon request)happy face (upon request)...and look no support!line all bath toys back up on the ledge...i don't want to get out!!!!the end.

buddy walk...

we started here...signing time concert!

...
cam's buddy max came to say hello...
we started the walk...(there were lots of peeps there! we were lovin' it!)thirty seconds in camden decided he was done...cue tantrum...
but we finished!!!!
~
a big thanks to all of our sponsor/donors this year!

we wish we could have stayed a little longer and gotten some more friend time in...but the little was in desperate need of a nap, oh toddlers.

back to school...

we started a new intensive speech therapy program with early intervention through our school district for camden last week....only, i am the one sitting through a two and a half hour class on wednesdays for the next three months. yes that is right, i have gone back to school, to learn how to better communicate, and essentially be as good of a speech therapist (without actually being one) for cam as i can be.

the program is the hanen program, and we just started it, so i would love to hear experiences, if any of you have them? so far it's good, the classes go by quickly and i love that it is offered through the school district! (which means we are saving on private speech therapy for the next three months) and no one can really complain about that! it has been interesting, so far, to see different ways to communicate with kids and to understand a little better how best to interact with camden at each stage of development.

i am excited to see how camden reacts...

ps...we just got home from california...and we maybe miss it...thanks for playin' in the sand with me grandpa!

did he just...

you have to watch it clear to the end...there might be a big surprise!

it is amazing how every new step is its very own milestone, i am loving it.

shhh....

bedtime has become my favorite activity as of late. don't get me wrong, i still have the moments where in frustration i hand the little man off to dad because he just isn't having it...but i would say about 90% of the time, it is my favorite time of the day.

it is the time of day where camden's attention is all on me, which is increasingly rare, since his toys are where it's at these days. it's just me and him. at seven sharp camden signs bath and so up we go to lounge in the water...bathtime is followed by jammies at which point camden signs "brush teeth" and proceeds to do it all on his own! after mommy gets the real scrub time in with his teeth we read a book and camden points out all of the amazing things that are happening and jabbers away as if he is the one doing the reading...we proceed to do a the "wiggle dance" to get all of our bedtime wiggles out...he loves that part and belly laughs the entire time....and then it is onto prayers where the little man proceeds to bow his head and fold his cute little arms and then peak up at me several times throughout only to be reminded to fold his arms again in a whisper, which he immediately does. after prayers camden snuggles right in and we sing songs and he practices his talking, usually in a whisper until he knows he has it...last night he said dog...twice! and i love watching his little mind work for things, the shapes he mimics with his little lips, the smiles that creep over his entire face, the light in his eyes. it is our time to talk things out, to share our day, to giggle ourselves to sleep, and i love it.

but nothing compares to the soft shutting of his eyelids, the slowing of his breath, the loosening of his grasp, the sweetness of a baby fast asleep and the reminder that no matter how big he gets...he will always be mine.

team camajama...

yes, it is that time of the year again! buddy walk 2011 here we come! please hop over to camden's fundraising page to help us support our utah down syndrome foundation and feel free to sign up for the walk and join in on the fun while you are there!

thank you for all of your love and support!
love,

the bush fam

push it...

cam has been experimenting with the push toy for a little while now, but he has gained more and more confidence with it and so i shot my first video of his newest venture!

i promise i'll be better...

i have been neglecting the blog lately. we have been busy, yes, but really, it is because as of late i haven't really felt the need to write. you would think that would be an "0h no" moment for me...what is different? why can't i find anything i feel inspired to write about? so the oh no came this morning...and i sat down and pondered a minute...and then i realized that it isn't an "oh no" moment at all...because for the last eighteen months i have been inspired by the pain of a diagnosis, by the realization that a diagnosis means very little, by the beauty in the life i thought would surely be so very different than the one i had envisioned for myself just a short while ago, and it has been good and fulfilling and awe inspiring and life altering...and now it is my normal. i am thankful for the last eighteen months, they have changed me in so many ways i couldn't even acknowledge every one, i am a different person now, i see things in a new light.

and so here i am, on a tuesday and so many things have come and gone in the last month or so, an anniversary (five happy years, and one stronger couple because of them), a half birthday, vacations, milestones, life. and i am inspired every day, in so many ways...it is my new normal.

so cheers to happy families everywhere! the little inspirations in daily life...
and to finding ways to fit the time in to write about them.

blocks...

we have been in california for a week...so i have been quiet in the blogosphere...but i thought i would throw out a few videos of our trip today...

"cool"...

today i got a phone call from my mom...on the other line i heard this:

"will you please tell your brother (he is 14) that there are other backpacks that are cool besides jansport, they have so many cool backpacks everywhere and all he wants is a jansport."

i was instantly brought back to my teenage years...and i felt for my brother, knowing that my mom had argued the same thing with me...

"tonya, this shirt is cool, i bet half of the girls will be wearing this shirt..."
"no mom, it's not, and no one will" (which was true)

and so i replied to my mom this way:

"mom, get the kid a jansport, they are cool, he won't be cool without one..."

and she replied:

"why would he care about what is cool? he should get what he likes, why would you want to be like everyone else?"

and i replied, " mom he can figure out his likes in other ways, just let him be cool". she gave in.

i hung up the phone, and then i thought about it...

my mom always pushed me to think out of the box when i was growing up, she didn't go to my school, she didn't always know what was "cool", but she always encouraged us to think in our own way, and not how everyone else does...

because of this, i may not have had lucky jeans growing up, i may not have always been the coolest of kids on the block...but i was able to grow into myself. and i am thankful for that.

so thanks mom, for not always letting me get what was "cool" and helping me to figure out my own "cool"...even if it wasn't always on purpose, and even though i may not have talked to you for a day here or there.

so here is what i called my brother back to say: "tanner, i know jansports are cool, and you are safe if you get one, but i also know that the coolest of kids decide their own cool, even if it isn't always the popular thing to do...so get what you like, cool or not, as long as it is what you like."

thanks mom.

lessons...

today as i scrolled through my usual blog rolls, i read through a post from a mother who has an adult child with down syndrome...as the mother described daily life with her child she mentioned what she would have told herself, twenty years ago...

when i think back to camden's birth and what i would have told myself then, right now it is all about acceptance. this mom, twenty years later, had moved past that and onto the reality of daily life...she said "slow down". it took me back a little...because i felt at first like i was working toward that, learning patience in his milestones...but i never really thought about slowing down even our daily life...and as i thought about it, it dawned on me just how personal this lesson was for me.

i am a fast paced person, i talk fast, i move fast, i drive fast, i am always in a hurry, rushing here or there...and on a full day i find myself getting frustrated with my own rushing, i get frustrated with camden when we have to leave and he is taking forty minutes to eat a full meal...and i noticed that on the days i try to pack in twenty things i feel more accomplished, and i wonder, is that really what it is all about? or maybe, it is ok that we just hang out all day...spend time with each other, work on our motor skills, or just play...because maybe it isn't about rushing to fit a quantified number of things into one day, but more about the quality of things that we fit into a day.

i needed to learn how to slow things down, not just for camden, but for myself, because what is life worth anyway if we are consumed with merely filling it? so why not slow down, and fill it with what matters?

i am thankful for my son, every day it is more and more apparent just how perfectly he was made just for me.

transitions...

beside the fact that camden tried to bite his therapist this morning due to unwanted completion of a task (he wanted to take the rings off, not put the last one on), we had a fairly productive day...

we are currently working on getting camden to use a spoon, he has the pincer grasp down and can self feed with his fingers (when he doesn't throw whatever it is on the floor) but hasn't fully transitioned into using a spoon quite yet. his speech therapist recommended using edible things that can also double as a spoon to start out, and having camden dip them into a yummy treat...his favorite combo, vanilla pudding and biter cookies...i think it is working great!


we also give camden a spoon to explore with at the same time, and today he took it out of the pudding and put it straight into his mouth! yay!

(ps. don't mind the fact that the cranberries are on in the background, and i may or may not have been humming along...haha)

tiny hugs...

camden and i have caught a summer cold...who catches a cold in the summer? apparently we do. and although i despise being sick myself, and hate even more the thought of the little one miserable...i do love the extra cuddle time. camden is a fantastic cuddler...he will stop what he is doing and come over and just snuggle...if he is tired...he wants to cuddle...if he sees me crying he stops everything, comes right over and wraps his little arms around my neck ever so tightly. this morning was no different...camden woke up from the sniffles at four a.m. and rolled around on mom and dad's bed until he was ready to go back to bed...about an hour later i felt a little hand on my shoulder and opened my eyes to find my little guy snuggling right in, his head touching mine...so i wrapped my arms around his tiny frame and pulled him in...we slept soundly, together, until eight a.m. when he woke up and rolled into me with a giant smile. there really is nothing better than waking up with that smile of his.

an apple orchard...

thanks to our good friend, natalie, we finally got some family photos done...and i love them so. i was going to wait until monday to post anything but i just can't help myself...so, here are my favorites...

a big thanks to natalie bate and square photography.

weekends...

this is how we start our weekends...

father's day
that's right...my own chair...
parks...

zoos...fourth of july barbeques...
and the occasional lawn mower race...
fireworks! what!?
happy to report that after the initial boom shock, camden sunk right into the awe of that fire lit sky.

red, white and blue...

as we celebrate today i can't help but be ever so thankful to be able to live in the nation that i call home. for the rights that we have been blessed with, for the opportunities, the freedoms that those before us died for...for the men and women who have given up their homes, their families, their lives to secure for us and others a life worth living.

i am proud to be an american...but most of all, i am thankful.

happy fourth!
(pictures coming soon)

there are moments...

there are moments on this journey that make you stop, dead in your tracks...moments that touch you, that make you silently reflect and think about just how and why you are on this journey you find yourself on every day. why it was you chosen. moments where things fall into line, when you are at the right place at the right time. things that would have never happened had you not been chosen to take on this new path. people that you meet, and you can feel this swelling inside, the quick paced beating of your heart, because you want so much to wrap your arms around that new mother and tell her that it will be wonderful, breathtaking and inspiring. so when you meet a couple, just a little half way through their first pregnancy at a barbeque, for a friend that either of you hardly ever see...a couple whom after finding out that camden has down syndrome, bursts out to you, whom they have just seconds ago met, that the baby girl they are carrying might have down syndrome too...it makes you stop and realize that this is part of it. this is all part of the journey now...and that somebody else is walking you through each step that you take...because just how much coincidence really happens in life?

and regardless of whether or not that baby girl, still growing and changing, does have down syndrome, this couple needed you at that time, and you needed them. i am thankful for these moments, they always seem to happen at a time when you needed someone to wrap their arms around you and remind you that this path is wonderful, breathtaking and inspiring...

just because...

i know my blog is overrun with video clips these days, but i can't help it...
~
the toughest thing about having a 16 month old who is the size of most 8 month olds (or younger) is finding developmentally appropriate toys that fit his tiny frame...but every once in a while we get lucky...this was a christmas present from a certain pair of grandparents and i am happy to say, g and g bush, that he now loves his truck! (click here to see how cam first responded to this now treasured gift)

every day i love him a little bit more...i don't really know how that's possible.

simon says...

while in the produce aisle at the grocery store cam looked to the side, folded his arms and bowed his head, so mom looked to the side and there it was...an older gentlemen pacing the aisle in search of some vegetable his wife had no doubt sent him on a hunt for, with his arms folded across his chest, i immediately started to laugh and then from behind heard another patron begin to laugh..."what a good mimic cute one" she said as she walked by...

~
he is definitely becoming our little mini-me with all of his mimicking and i can't help but fall in love with this newest obsession of his. it is truly amazing how each stage brings something even more magical than the last.

the world upside down...

ignore the shaky videographer...pretty sure looking at the world upside down is cam's favorite thing to do these days...

and i have to throw in his awesome signing and speech skills too!

and ignore the tv in the background haha i was obviously not paying attention...