Texas Children's Visit

Once again we are left amazed and astonished at how Good God really is and how he blessed us with a beautiful and healthy little girl. We had our visit with the Craniofacial Team at Texas Children's Hospital in Houston. We met with Dr. Stal, plastic surgeon. He examined Maddie's lip and palate and was extremely impressed with the quality of surgery that she received in China. He stated that her palate surgery looked great and was functioning properly. Her lip surgery was good, as well, with very little scaring. He stated that with such a good surgical outcome initially, we have the option in a few years (around age 4 or 5) to refine the look of her lip and make it even prettier. Laginappe. So here's the plan from a surgical prospective going forward:

- 4-5 years old - possible lip revision (to reduce the appearance of scarring)

- 8 years old - bone graft (I have to do a little more research on what this surgery entails - I know that it will place a bone where she has a void. I have time so I will research this fully before age 8)

- 13-14 years old - fix her nose.

She also met with a team of Speech Therapists. They performed an evaluation which in short, consisted of Maddie saying several different words found in a book, such as "Bird, Yellow, Purple, Truck, Duck, etc." Maddie threw in a few of her own words and sentences - like "Where is it?" as she hid the book (a game we frequently play with her) and her response of "I don't know". Needless to say, The Speech Therapists were extremely impressed. The Lead Speech Therapist stated that she had NEVER seen, in her career with Texas Children's, a CL/CP child that could talk as well as Maddie does. She was able to hear consonants and vowels in her speech that were appropriate and on target for her age. She re-confirmed that Maddie's palate is functioning properly. She heard no "Red Flag" areas and did not recommend any action for her now. We will follow up with the Speech Therapist in the Summer to re-evaluate. This will give Maddie a chance to continue to develop her speech now that she is in school.

What amazing news!!! We are extremely excited to hear that she is on target with speech (so far) and no surgeries required for some time. Woo Hoo - Praise GOD!

I have included some beautiful pictures from Easter Sunday. What a wonderful day we had with Maddie and our entire family. My sister made her cute outfit and she wore it like a rock star! lol We all took great pleasure in watching Maddie hunt for Easter Eggs. Every time she found one she had the same sweet expression on her face. We got the girls a trampoline for Easter and boy Maddie has sure enjoyed it. Her "Jump, Jump" was a hit. She continues to badger the kids every day - all day long to take her Jump Jump. It's so cute to watch them all out there having fun together!