almost 3 months after the casts came off...

Well, we had our 1st "real" follow up/progress dr's appt in Minneapolis yesterday. Everything went well and Ethan showed his stuff off to the doctor and nurses. We saw lots of smiles from everyone and the doctor was impressed with where Ethan was at. There was still some concern about Ethan's crouch and bend but...as long as we can maintain and things don't get worse, we'll be okay. We go back in January and we'll see how he's doing whereby at that time we'll discuss new braces (hopefully shorter) and other ways to keep his hamstrings stretching with his growth. Outside of the dr's appt, we have seen confidence and happiness exuding from Ethan. He has walked up and down 25 steps by simply holding the railing vs. sliding down and crawling up. He has attempted to take independent steps and keeps trying to do more and more. For the most part, Ethan's walking full time with crutches now and unless he's feeling tired (or a tad bit lazy), he opts to walk. School is going well for all the kids. They have started playing Soccer with the HOPE Inc group and they are all gearing up for Halloween with costumes already purchased and ready to go. The boys are loving football this year and ironically Ethan is drawn to Tim Tebow and religiously cheers for the Jets...and now that his legs are healed up he's getting pretty good at Tebowing too. Connor is still hung up on his MN Vikings... and me...well, despite the ridicule, I'll forever be dedicated to my Cowboys, James just cheers for whoever and Ash--well she opts to not cheer for anyone as to a 7 yr old girl Football is dumb...(her words-not mine) Ahhh...life is fun... well to wrap it up...Our challenges are far from over but they are fewer now than they were 2 years ago. We are truly thankful for all of our blessings and thank you all for your continued thoughts and prayers. Until later, Lisa