Halloween and Football

The boys were on their second week of fall break this week and it was once again a busy week in the Morgan household. The highlight was of course Halloween as it is with most kids this age. Jake was the 11th Dr. Who (it's a BBC series) and Luke was a green morph.

I have to admit, I was a little worried how trick-or-treating was going to go this year with Jake's limited mobility. The pace is usually a pretty quick one with a lot of running up and down people's driveways. We knew we were going to have to take him in his wheelchair. The plan was to take him close to the house and he would walk up to the door. Just getting in and out of the chair was going to take extra time and I didn't know how he was going to hold up. We went with two of their good friends and talked to all the boys before we left that things might need to be a little slower this year. Things could not have gone better. Jake was a trooper, he and his friend Jack actually lasted longer than Luke and Jack's younger brother Randy! I have to give Todd major props too. About half way through, we realized it was getting hard to see on some of the steps and Jake was getting tired, so Todd would take the chair and Jake up the steps to people's door. (We live in a somewhat hilly neighborhood and some people have a lot of steps!) Some of the time Jack took Jake's candy bag up to the house and Jake waved from the sidewalk. It was so great to see Jake having such a good time and I was very impressed with Jack who was so patient going at Jake's pace. All in all a very good night.

We also got to go to the Air Force vs. Army football game on Saturday. We decided not to take Jake's wheelchair since we had regular seating vs. the handicapped seating and weren't sure what we'd do with the chair. We parked as close as we could and Todd gave Jake a piggyback for part of the way in. Air Force games are always a good time, the weather was perfect and it was a great game (Air Force won 42-28). As we were leaving, Jake decided he wanted to walk all the way back to the car.

I'm not sure what happened but all of a sudden Jake's walking just clicked. Since the botox injections he is able to straighten his left knee, we've spent a lot of time the past few weeks working on his stride. He's been doing what we refer to as the wedding march. He would take a big step with the left foot, then bring the right foot up and even with the left instead of taking an equal step with the right foot. Logically it made sense why he was doing it. When all the weight was on his left leg, he wanted to get the right foot down as quickly as possible to shift his weight back to his right leg. He's been doing a lot of exercises to help strengthen his left leg, weight shifting between the two and working on balance. Well something worked because all the way to the car, he had a great stride. There is still some limp due the brace, but it's the best we've seen him walk since the aneurysm. I was so excited to see how well he was walking I took some video http://youtu.be/M7FgHuvKVoE. (Luke was very quick to take his turn getting a piggy back from Dad since Jake was walking.)

It's been a great couple of weeks and it's been nice spending some extra family time together. I'd be lying if I didn't admit that part of me is looking forward to the kids going back to school this week and all of us getting back into a routine. :-) Jake is also excited to start his longer school days that include lunch and recess. I'll let you know how things go!