Maya's Journey Home: Sunshine and Fun!

We just got home from sunny Florida! It was a fun & exhausting trip. Keeping up with Maya on the beach and by the pool had us all running in circles. She absolutely loved the ocean…just like her sister and brother. The condo we rented was in Hollywood right on the ocean. I attached some photos of the view off our balcony plus some of the kids enjoying their vacation. William wanted to throw his football nonstop. I was ready for John’s arm to fall off from passing it to him so much. Madeline took Maya swimming a lot and got her comfortable in the water. We had some huge waves a couple of the days so the kids were able to body surf and use the boogie boards! They had a riot. We also managed to collect some great seashells to put in a glass jar at our cottage. Will became the pro at finding the unique shells. I think the only bad thing that happened on our vacation was when Maya fell in the pool. She was playing with Will pushing him off the side. She put a little too much effort into it one time and bam; she went in! Luckily we were sitting right in front of her. I jumped in and John then pulled her out. She coughed up some water and cried a little bit in my arms, and then amazingly, she wanted to go back in the pool. This time she wore her life jacket! I swear my heart stopped beating when I saw her fall in! On another note, we went to Key Largo one day to hang out. Not a whole lot going on there so we went on to the next island, Islamorada. We ended up finding some family owned “Sea World” type establishment. It was hotter than blazes but we still had fun seeing huge sea turtles, colored fish, nurse sharks, alligators, sea lions, parrots and a fun dolphin show. Maya loved the talking parrots. As much fun as we all had, it was nice to get home. I think we all missed our beds. Maya missed her toys. And of course we all missed Lola who spent the week being spoiled by grandma and papa.

I want to update you all on Maya’s cleft palate too. She did pop a small hole in the back of her mouth. Her surgeon expected that because of her age and how large her cleft palate was. He said she probably did it with her tongue. Other then that, she healed up great. She missed her crackers and chips, but we got through it. Dr. Shaheen is going to repair the small hole in a couple months. It won’t be as long or complex of a surgery as the first time, but she’ll have the same recovery…liquids and soft diet. UGH! We had her speech evaluated and she’ll be going to speech sessions 2 days/week for about 30 minutes per session. The speech pathologist doesn’t foresee any problems with Maya’s speech because of her ability to repeat everything we say and how far she has already come with her language and speech skills.

We’re looking forward to some warm weather arriving in Michigan and opening up our cottage. Seeing how Maya was around the ocean and pool, I think I’m going to keep a life jacket on her permanently while we’re up there. Happy spring everyone!