I asked a NICU nurse just this question, what would you want parents to know?  She shared her wisdom, and here are some tips that this 20-year veteran has. A nurse’s tips for surviving NICU.

Though this blog is called “Cedars Story” you will most often see stories from new parents the world over who have learned that they are going to have or have just given birth to a child with Down Syndrome. I feel that all of these stories are so necessary because we need to feel a sense of community.

However, if you follow us on social media either on Instagram or Facebook you will also see TONS of photos of sweet Cedar, the reason this site was launched in the first place. Many have asked that there be more of him on the site as well…so here it is. I am going to try and give weekly rewinds about Cedar and what he is up to as well.

Let’s start here, this week in review…

Cedar has become quite the master at scaling the heights of our stairs. We have to really stay on top of it though because if anyone leaves the baby gates that keep him safe in the livingroom open, he makes a beeline to bolt towards one of the exits and more often than not he can be found scaling the stairs. With 6 kids in this house you can imagine how often one of the other littles accidentally leaves a baby gate unlatched. Yup, this is a constant process.

We have noticed in the last couple of days some new skills emerging from Cedar, he has started putting hands down and standing in a sort of triangle with his butt in the air and hands and feet on the ground, each time anyone sees this we clap and cheer and I also usually go to him and help him into a standing position so that he realizes he is well on his way to being able to do this himself.

I was gone this week for a whole day (a rare occurrence for this homeschooling mama) and I got an excited text from hubby (my stand in) saying that Cedar had started signing “no” in typical 2 year old fashion, that has become a favorite word. He has begun signing “no” at almost every meal when we ask him if he is “all done”

Currently Cedar’s favorite thing in the world is to watch “Super Simple Songs” on youtube and he will literally stare at the t.v. for an hour if I let him. I have a little mom guilt about allowing screen time but at the same point, at least it is all educational and I am hopeful that he is picking up things like colors and shapes that are often sung about in the nursery rhymes. A second favorite is of course Rachel from “Baby Signing Times” though I don’t let him watch this without someone else in the room because I am always a little concerned he will pick up a new sign and none of the rest of us will know what he is trying to say.

We had a good day this week with combined Physical and Occupational therapy, Cedar met one of his goals which was being able to put a shape into the correct hole on a shape sorter. This is difficult for Cedar because it is a fine motor operation and I often see him try and then get quite frustrated because his fingers just don’t yet have the dexterity to do the job. This week he got the circle in the hole though!

We rounded out the week with a Saturday morning haircut, Cedar has been getting his haircut since he was 5 months old and I still had to hold him in the chair because he couldnt sit up solo yet. He has always done really well with trims.

Lastly, we finished up with an activity that our 4H group had at a local bounce park, Cedar loved every minute!

See you next week when we do a Cedar Saturday in review!

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