School is Cool

So far Rylie has transitioned well into preschool. Last week she did better than I imagined she would. I thought she might be more scared than she was, but although she was very hesitant at first, she did great. She attached herself to one of the teachers, Ms. Donna, and by the second day she was feeling a lot more comfortable. One thing that I think helps is that we moved her from the T/Th class to the W/F class, because the W/F class has fewer students. There are 8 others in her W/F class. The T/Th class had 15 other kiddos. 

On Wednesday Rylie was evaluated for special services, and she did qualify for speech therapy and physical therapy through the school district. She will have therapists start working with her in her class, and we hope this helps her feel more comfortable on the playground and start talking more in the classroom. The teacher told me on Friday that Rylie did very well on all the learning activities they did. She sorted all of the colored bears just like she was supposed to and she put together all of the puzzles they were doing! Yes, she's a smarty!

By complete accident I marked that I would be a volunteer for the preschool PTA. I thought I was volunteering to help in Rylie's classroom when extra adult hands are needed, but I marked down I would be the "room parent" for the PTA! I'm not sure what this entails, but I got an e-mail saying I need to start collecting money from the other parents for the next fundraiser. Opps! I guess in the future I'll be more careful on any boxes I check on forms from the preschool! 

On another note, we had Rylie's allergy doctor's appointment today, and he tested Rylie for peanut, milk, and egg allergies. She tested positive for peanuts (obviously) and eggs. Since Rylie has been eating eggs without any problems, he said we don't have to stop eggs for right now, but we should watch and make sure she doesn't develop any reactions since she has a sensitivity to them. For now, our rules are: no eating of anything with peanuts as an ingredient and no eating anything from a factory with peanuts. Rylie can have seeds like sunflower seed butter (if I could get her to eat it!). The doctor also said she can have peanut oil (except for cold-pressed peanut oil) since it does not have any peanut protein in it and it is so processed--nice--that it doesn't even cause problems for people with peanut allergies. The hope is that Rylie will grow out of this allergy. The doctor said that our best bet of getting her to grow out of the allergy is to avoid all exposure (even from foods that have come into contact with peanuts) so that her immune system forgets her dislike for peanuts. If she is exposed to peanuts, we will treat with Benadryl and start driving to an urgent care facility. We now have two epipens to carry with us, just in case the Benadryl doesn't work. Rylie's preschool will also keep a couple of epipens and Benadryl on hand for accidental exposure. I'm going to do everything in my power that we will not need to use it! :)