One of the questions my family and I get a lot from our newly diagnosed friends is, "will my kid be normal?"  Well, as my Mom can tell you, with any kid, NORMAL is a relative term!  My big brother Carter is a real crazy!  I learn from the best!  Each of us may accomplish things on a different calendar but I want to encourage my buddies to never give up!  Practice, practice, practice and communicate any way you can!  It makes a kid feel good when people get what you are saying.  With the deletion, I heard rumors that one word phrases were the best we were going to get from me.  I'm almost four, but I can now string words together and often have whole conversations where some words are easily understood and some are like "fillers" so that the rhythm and cadence of my speech pattern in like what I am hearing from others.   Popular phrases I like to say now are:

• I don't like it
• No thank you
• Help me mom
• I love you
• I miss you
• Look what I got
• I did it
  
• I'M GONNA GET YOU (frequently said right before chasing and tackling my brother, which I do all day, every day.  We laugh and laugh but Mom doesn't like our wrestling matches.  SHEESH!  Will someone tell her this is what NORMAL looks like?)

I've also been working really hard on my grasp, my coordination, and how things go together and work.  What seems like easy tasks are pretty tricky for a little guy like me when my hands want to do the "pincher grasp" thing.  But check this out, I am getting the hang of it!  Coordination has its benefits.  I can now wake up at 2 a.m. and turn on the "Frozen" DVD all by myself!  Gotta love it!

Howdy Pardners!  How have y'all been?  Me?  Well, I've been doing some amazing things and learning more and more every day!  In fact, I have learned so much that I'm pretty sure that Grandma and Mom won't have to type my messages for me much longer!  I wanted to share some of my recent adventures and how they are helping me with the challenges of the pesky missing piece of Chromosome 3.

I love horses!  Oh my gosh!  Mom discovered that therapy on horseback counts as respite care so it's a two for one benefit!  The action of being horseback stretches the leg muscles and hips, one of the tight areas the doctors want to focus on.   Here I am riding Ellie!  I love her!

If that wasn't enough excitement, I was invited to participate in the Special Buckaroos Rodeo - part of the BIG HUGE California Salinas Rodeo.  Kids with all sorts of abilities were able to rope, ride horses and bust broncs and hang out with the clowns and bull riders!  I got a trophy which I wouldn't let go of for anything.

Yee haw!  Here I am with by best buddy Chelsea, who helped me with the barrel racing!

Busting broncs!  The cowboys and cowgirls who helped us kids were super nice!

My trophy rocks!  Thank you so much Salinas Rodeo!