Cedar Saturday

Cedar and baby goats…oh my!

This week was sure eventful on our small little farm. We have Nubian goats and this was the week we started having babies. Unfortunately, one mama decided that one of her twin babies wasn’t going to make it and she rejected the baby. Well, you guessed it, we began bottle feeding and caring for a baby goat this week, in the house. So, if you are counting…that’s 6 kids, 1 dog, 2 parents, homeschooling and caring for a baby goat. WHEW!

I honestly didn’t think that the little goat was going to make it because she was cold when we found her and she was so weak she could not stand. We gave the goat some molasses to get her perked up again and then gave her strong doses of vitamin B to help before starting to bottle feed her. Another factor that I think helped with her recovery was that our Golden Retriever decided that she wanted to be a goat mama (she had a litter of pups just 6 months ago so she knows all about being a mama) and she has now taken over the majority of the goat baby companionship.

Cedar was introduced to the goat baby and this was the reaction we saw…prepare for cuteness overload.

We incorporated animal husbandry into our weekly homeschool lessons, and I think it was better than any public school field trip the kids could have taken.

Cedar had Occupational therapy and Physical therapy this week, this is our usual and our therapist did an amazing creative hack that I think any of you mamas with babes still working on 4-point crawling can appreciate. It was so simple but so brilliant, she simply used a pool noodle, you could also use a piece of cloth, to help hold Cedar’s tummy off the ground to get his arms and legs going in the correct motion for crawling. Cedar fought a little less this week and you can also see some more of his therapy as he stood unassisted for a bit (though I don’t think he realized what he did).

We have been so blessed that the outpatient facility that we use allows for co-treats. That means that when you see the two women in the video at the end, one is our physical therapist and one is our occupational therapist. These ladies work seamlessly together and while Cedar is doing tall kneeling, or sit to stand excersizes with PT, his OT is working on more fine motor skills as he grabs the balls or other toys. This kind of co treatment is a lifesaver as it allows for Cedar to have to go through less therapy and also allows mom to only have to make 1 trip for both therapies!

This week we also started working on some speech therapy. We have done this off and on since Cedar was younger but our main focus has always been physical therapy as Cedar has said a few words, mostly does well with feeding, and is learning signs. I hear Cedar using lots of appropriate babble with both vowel and consonent sounds and that coupled with the words he does have the ability to say and associate (mama, dada, ball, up, dog) are very encouraging to me that he will develop speech. Like everything else, it is VERY normal that speech development and language aquisition take longer for children with Down Syndrome.

This week we attended a speech therapy session and Cedar showed off some of his signing skills…he really likes to sign “cracker” and as you can see, this is a tactic he has started using at home when it is time for bed.

Until next week… if you want to follow us throughout the week, we post daily snippets on Instagram and Facebook be sure to follow us!