He really is driving a bus!

Tyler driving a city bus.

Yesterday I took the kids to "Touch a Truck". Basically it's an assembly of all kinds of trucks and service vehicles open to the kids to climb in and explore put on by a charity organization. We saw loaders, dump trucks, ambulances, fire trucks, semi-trucks, police cars, UPS truck, back hoe, and buses to name a few. After 2 hours we still didn't get to see all of them from the driver's seats. Both kids loved it despite all the loud horns. Tyler wanted to be in the driver seat and often screamed when his turn is done. But he really did well waiting his turn and sharing the seat with his sister.
In an ambulance.

We have been busy with good days the last few weeks. Other than the last week were we have been dealing with a slight cold or teeth coming in, Tyler has been a happy active little boy. GI was very happy to see he had gained over a pound since our last visit which was in the middle of all the shunt revisions. Tyler definitely is much heavier to carry now. Also his arms and legs have chucked back up and the shunt tubing down his front is harder to see. That is all due to him eating non stop. He is still a very picky eater, but he is expanding his pallet slowly. He is still very formula dependent, but I did get the ok to drop the bottles of Elecare and solely feed him his splash now. Tomorrow will be his last bottle hopefully.

Tyler seems to be doing very well neurologically too. All the weird wobbles have seemed to stop, like I said he's eating and gaining weight, and he's very busy through out the day. What is more, Tyler is starting another speech explosion. He's asking for what he wants clearly and singing songs. He love "Row Row your Boat" and "Twinkle Twinkle". He also likes to play games. Rachel has been kind enough to include Tyler in her jump rope game. Tyler and I now swing the rope for her while she jumps in front of the rope.

Really the only clue to all the shunt stuff we've dealt with this spring is a change in his vision. It's a very slight change but it seems to be affecting his depth perception and abilities to see specific details in a busy visual field. He can still see very well, show him a person on a bicycle and he wants to pedal his bike. Or when a cat wonders in he sees it and names it correctly. He's unable to find the edge of stairs safely or look at a book comfortably to find a small picture. Plus his eye wonder is more pronounce since his ventricle collapsed. We still don't know if there is still fluid on the outside of the brain putting pressure on the eye bits. He isn't scheduled for another MRI until October. In the mean time he has a development appointment later this month and then an eye appointment. Our eye therapist will be coming out to the eye appointment to explain in those technical terms how Tyler's eyes have changed.
So in the mean time we will have busy fun days enjoying the summer. The water table and the kiddie pool have gotten some hard use this summer as well as the play house that I picked up. He still loves to climb the play structure and proceed to scare the day lights out of me. He thinks it's all in good fun.