Back to School

Do we know what we are letting ourselves in for: Meghan's first day back to school in 9 months!

August Days

Speech therapy involves electrical stimulation to weak muscles
Speech therapy also requires drinking juice through a challenging straw to increase the strength of the tongue and cheek muscles
We had the Clarence Girls Swim Team over here to celebrate Shayna's 16th birthday

A trip to the New York State Fair in Syracuse, finds Cameron ordering a cheeseburger at Dinosaur's BBQ

How did we get so lucky to see Mitchell Musso perform his latest music. Meghan enjoyed the show, the rest of us managed to survive, barely!

Brianna's 16 Birthday

For Brianna's 16th birthday, we invited 15 of her closest friends for an evening of swimming and games.

The favorite game was the frozen T-shirt game. A shirt had been frozen into a block and it was a race between teams to see who could un-freeze their shirt first, and get it on a team member. Hands are desperately trying to melt the ice from the shirt, but fingers can't take the cold for long......

Lillie and Maggie were the 'lucky" wearers of the frozen T-shirt

Being good team-mates, Brianna, Austin, David and Corrine try to warm up Maggie as she wears the frozen shirt!

Later, the boys move to the basement for a game of darts.

While the girls challenge each other to "Just Dance" on the Wii

End of summer plans

Meghan hasn't had much of a summer, but we squeeze in a few additional activities:

Of course, there's the trip to the Buffalo Zoo, with Riley (And Mason, Austin, Jake, KC and Nick)

And we do OT 3 times a week. Meghan loves Mrs Biondi coming, as she always has a new game--such as "Pick up Monkeys"
Science is pretty interesting with Mrs Wehrelin, especially when they do density experiments.
And of course, we must celebrate our 13th birthday. We did a video scavenger hunt that was awesome. Meghan has wonderful friends. Bottom Row: Mally, Meghan, Riley. Top Row: Jenn, Morgan, Amber, JennaLee and Lauren.
And what is a birthday without Mom's famous ice cream cake? (Actually, Brianna is the designer of the cake....and it's a winner.

Girl's Camp: Finally...Fun, Friends and Fresh Air

Brianna and Meghan went to a church Girl's Camp at Seneca Lake, NY. Meghan was in the Second Year / lavender shirt group (girls aged 13). Of course, camp was fabulous because Mallory and Riley were there! Each evening there were planned activities. Tonight was Friendship Activities and camp song night--they really do sing the silliest songs!

During the day, they met in their certification groups and learned special survival skills, outdoor cooking skills, first aid, fire building and nature awareness. Their leader, Beth Slazak, taught them about meteorology and cloud formation--now they are creating their own clouds using a match, ice, shading and water.

Being physically fit enough to hike is another element of camp. Here, Meghan's group are preparing for a hike. Her leader was Beth (bottom right), her youth leaders were Amanda and Michelle (top left) and Hannah and Bre'ann (top right). Obviously Meghan couldn't go on the hike, so Amanda and Meghan were driven to the waterfall / lunch area where they made jewelry while everyone else hiked.

Brianna (second from left, bottom row) was the youth Leader for the 3rd years. Their hike was a 3.5 mile creek walk. Here, they stopped to write in their journals about how nature affects them.

This is perhaps my favorite photo. Although I was at camp with Meghan, I did not hover. When I didn't need to help Meghan, I assisted the kitchen staff. Riley and Mallory made sure that Meghan went everywhere with them. Who could ask for better friends than those who link arms with you and guide you through the rough spots (and the long grass and the gravel roads)!

Learning to cook over a camp fire is one certification requirement. Brianna was in charge of cooking the chocolate cupcakes over the fire. The batter was cooked in a hollowed-out orange rind and they turned out to be delicious!

Each evening, there were different activities. Wednesday night was skit night where each cabin of 12 girls do a parody of a famous story: Our cabin pulled Cinderella. The girls re-wrote the skip, with plenty of humorous parts for everyone. But Prince Eric needed muscles, so we found a foam mattress topper and sculpted a new body for her/him, with Sharpie marker abs, of course. Mallory was unnerving as the wicked-step sister and refused to let Ange-rella end up with the Prince.

But the mega-star was Riley: She just looked way too cute in her little pink swimsuit cover-up while charading as the Wicked step mother. So we took some leftover foam from Eric's muscles, and duct taped it as padding to her jeans, creating.....well........an image that stayed with Riley for the rest of camp!

During the skits, a lightening storm hit the camp that was menacing. The rain was so loud on the metal roof that the leaders had to talk to us in small groups in order to be heard. A few people had 3G devices with doppler radar showing an intimidating storm that would last for about 3 hours. The leaders were beginning to be concerned for our safety in this metal barn with no doors. Some of the younger girls were becoming frightened. The youth leaders, with approval of the adult leaders, lead us in a hymn, How Firm a Foundation, followed by a prayer. Within 10 minutes, the lightening and rain had stopped, allowing the adults to transport us by car, back to the main Lodge. Amazingly, the doppler radar showed that the storm had moved about 100 miles west of the camp, within those 10 minutes. It was a faith promoting experience for everyone.

Brianna and Maggie, during the storm. Without the flash of lightening, it was pitch dark at 8:30pm.

The Second Years were in charge of Flag Lowering one evening. They had been taught the protocol earlier in the day and were racking their brains to remember the details.

There is a specific way to fold the American flag and the girls were meticulous in their treatment of it.

Meghan's friends at camp, from left to right: Mally, Katie, Meggie and Riley.

Each girl was awarded a Paper-Plate award from the Youth Leaders. Meghan was awarded "Miss Sunshine" for always being positive, upbeat and "smiley" in all situations.

Riley was awarded "Bootylicious"....she will never live down her Skit performance!

Mallory earned the "Mother Hen" award.

Trauma Day is always an interesting event. The Youth Leaders have a make-up artist "create" an injury on them, and they have to "act the part" of the injured girl. Here Maggie is unconscious with a bright red face. What is wrong with her?

They decide that she has heat exhaustion (they were right). So Mally drags her into the shade but no one in the group checks to see if she is breathing first. So they "kill" her. (Mally argues, "But she was breathing for real, I saw her stomach moving!") Minus one point for their group.

This was a car accident and the girls missed the internal injuries but they proved they knew how to treat surface wounds. The winning group kills the least amount of people!!!!!!!!! Our group only killed 2 people! Not too bad............... is it?

The last day, our small group from Amherst: Molly (camp leader, Riley, Helena, Meghan, Brianna and Tasha).

Brianna's Youth Leader cabin #9. Top to bottom. Rachel, Danni, Brianna, Anna, Amanda, Sister Baroldy and Maggie

Improvements

Meghan's favorite event: Family Dinners with the cousins. (Meghan is holding Nora while Brianna chokes Mallory and Cameron hangs with Grant)
Eliza, Meghan and Mally enjoy a dessert of ice cream sundays. (Could this be why she likes family dinners.......no vegetable juice, or green smoothies?)
It was Grant's birthday, and Cameron chose "Speed Racer". The two boys crept off to the house to play with the car. Cameron swears that he was just helping Grant with all the twist ties! Sure, Cam!
Did we ever think that Meghan would have the ability to play frisbee with her Dad? Her balance has improvement dramatically......notice we have removed the brace from her leg. The brace was helping her to lift up her left toe but it was causing other ankle/calf muscles to atrophy.
Okay, so when we do a little too much, there's nothing better than a mid-day nap in our chair!
Sunday nights are the perfect time for family games. Here's an ongoing tournament of 3-D Blokus. It usually turns out to be a competition between the 3 kids--each one of them has engineering aspirations.
While we are playing games, Bandit is ripping apart his toy. DON'T LOOK SO INNOCENT BUSTER!
Meghan and Riley have been planning this day for 6 months: Opening day for Twilight's Eclipse. Meghan is Team Edward and Riley is Team Jacob so there's no competition.
Meghan and her friend Lauren Scanio sell pizza for the Clarence Swim Team at Day in the Park on July 3rd.
July 4th party at our house. Meghan is thrilled to take Baby Oliver into the water. Oliver's mom is close by because Meghan is still only using her right hand.
More Baby Oliver....I think that he was the highlight of the party for Meghan.

More Therapy

Tim, a Massage Therapist whose hands have a gift for finding blocked energy, works on the muscles in Meghan's left foot. Tim accesses neuro-muscular points that send messages to the brain. Basically, Tim wakes up the muscles, so that Mark can "torture" them.
This is Pam, Meghan's Memory therapist with Buffalo Hearing and Speech Center. They work together on a Brain Fitness Program that helps neurons in the brain to fire successfully. Meghan goes to Memory each morning from 9am-11am. This is the dialogue:
"Let's go Meghan"
"Where are we going?"
"To Memory"
"Oh yeah, I forgot."
"I know, that's why we're going!"
Meet Justin! He is Meghan's Speech therapist with Buffalo Hearing and Speech.

Meet Penny. She is Meghan's cuddle therapist!

Cameron and Brianna had a youth party here last weekend. Here is Sam trying to make the biggest cannonball in pool history. In case you wondered, Sam is 18 years old....not that it matters!
A little payback.......................Brianna was "talking smack" to the Austin and Kyle, so they ganged up on her and threw her in the pool with her clothes on! Don't worry, they got permission from me first.
Dinner was roasting hot dogs around the campfire. Don't tell Mom, but Meghan is making a spider dog!
What is happening.......Meghan is now eating a melted S'more. This is a rare occasion indeed.
This is Terri, my spinning teacher. She tells Meghan that she is every bit as tough on me in class, as I am on Meghan during therapy. To thank Terri, Meghan brought her a glass of breakfast juice: Pineapple, carrots, beets, asparagus, romaine, cucumber and kale. Terri is healthy enough to enjoy it too!
Saturday June 20th: Seminary Graduation. Having woken up for church at 5:30am, all year, Cameron and Brianna receive their awards: Perfect Attendance and the Thomas S. Monson Gospel Scholar Award (for memorizing scriptures, reading scriptures and writing a report).