At the Duck Pond with Emma

 I am posting these on my blog instead of Emma's since Michael said I wasn't thinking clearly on June 21st when I thought it would be a fun idea to have Emma sit near the water of the retention pond to see the ducks in our neighborhood. Due to there being the possibility of an alligator being in the water and suddenly jumping up to eat her. -- It did unfortunately happen at a Disney resort a couple years ago, but that was in a huge lake, so that is way more understandable. And they had signs warning of snakes and alligators there. -- Obviously that didn't happen to Emma in our neighborhood, but I won't be taking her over there again. I was not thinking about this since have never seen an alligator in our area and I'm sure if there was one living in that water, we wouldn't have so many ducks because they would have been eaten first. Whatever. Anyway, here are the pictures. :) 

The main reason I was excited to take her near the water is because I want so badly to take her to the beach, but at that time, Michael kept saying no. However, we are now currently planning to take her to the beach (possibly Daytona since they have packed sand and allow cars to drive on the beach for $20) in October!! I need to say more prayers that it doesn't rain that day. I saw the idea of picking shells to glue to a frame, so I definitely want to do that and hang it up. Emma's first beach trip!! I will definitely post all about that on Emma's blog since it will also have a lot of medical information about how we kept everything clean. Meaning, how did we avoid getting any sand in her trach stoma or in all the nooks and crannies of the ventilator? Michael says we do not have a ventilator cover. I even asked for other parents' tips on the Trach Moms Facebook page on Friday, but nobody has responded. Ugh. There have been other beach pictures posted in the past from those thousands of families in the group, although some of those kids do not require a ventilator and lately Emma hasn't been able to go more than about 20 minutes with sprinting (breathing on her own with only the trach, like she was doing in all of these duck pond pictures). But at least that's long enough to get a handful of great family photos! :)