bright dark and early yesterday morning, we piled into the car and set off to Sydney Olympic Park for our first Run4Fun event – all in the name of Team Jovie! neither Regan, the kids or myself had ever been in some sort of running event, but they added a 3km fun run/walk this year and I couldn’t resist the chance to 1. exercise, 2. fundraise for Rett Syndrome and 3. do something different.
our walk started at 7am, and we had a great time walking (briskly) the course with our friends around us. Jovie LOVED it, she loves being outdoors, even in a stroller.
Jasper actually had a great time and jogged/ran alot of the way around the 3km course with Regan. I think we have a future runner in the family…. They beat us by about 10 mins, lol.
a sea of amazing people running the 10km
Jogging to the finish line with Aunty Aislin, we’re up on the big screen at ANZ Stadium!
Afterwards we headed off to the amazing Blaxland Riverside Park for some breakfast and a play – if you’re in Sydney you should definately check it out. Get there early because parking is terrible…
We’ve raised $2,245 for Rett Syndrome Research in Australia which is AWESOME (and coincidentally, we would of been the 3rd highest fundraisers for the Run4Fun if they included Rett Syndrome Australia in their list).
Now it’s the next day and we’re totally buggered, thank goodness we had a day off! I think we’ll definately do the run again next year, so stay tuned for that!
yesterday was Jasper’s 5th birthday! omg! where is the time going??
next year he starts ‘big’ school, and after that he will be driving my car off to uni … my darling boy is growing up to be a funny little sweetheart. i look at him every day and am amazed to see how he’s grown.
this is still how i see him sometimes …
and i probably will never stop seeing him that way!
he’s had an amazing year, learning alot at speech therapy and coming up with crazy sayings. is obsessed with his, and other people’s, butts. finally has his own room, and asks alot of questions about Jovie, which is good.
crazy to think in 5 years time, a whole lot more will have happened. can’t wait to see what’s next!
happy 5th birthday, Jasper!
with all the craziness of Jovie’s Autism and now Rett Syndrome journey, I must admit that I wasn’t ready to face possible challenges that Jasper might have. sounds a bit slack, doesn’t it? yeah i think that too.
a couple of months ago, i sorted myself out enough to find a speech therapist for Jasper. his speech, at 4 and a half, is still unclear to others, he repeats himself alot to get a sentence out and there were just a few other things that I wanted to check on before he heads to kindergarten next year.
he’s been diagnosed with a mild language and speech delay, and is working hard every day to improve his skills. our homework for this fortnight is practicing ‘in front’, ‘behind’ and ‘next to’. and we’re still trying to keep his tongue back in his mouth, so he doesn’t lisp as much when he speaks.
i still wonder how much of it is ‘just Jasper’, how much of it is ‘normal’ and how much isn’t. whether having a non-verbal sister has effected his development, whether he’ll just grow out of it. i still have a referral for Jasper to see Jovie’s developmental paediatrician, because there’s a tiny part in me that wants to be cautious. but there’s another part of me that says that he just needs time and support.
so maybe i’m right and he’ll be fine, or maybe i’m wrong and will be called into the principal’s office next year. but i think he’s doing the best he can, so i’ll keep doing what we’re doing because it’s all for him, and we can’t forget that.
