Up, Up and Away...

So, when I started this blog I mentioned that this would be a great place to share information about how our little guy, Luke, is doing specifically with his cochlear implant. I also eluded to something very exciting that was going to happen with Luke and Children's Hospital and Saturday was the day!

It seems that Luke was Children's 500th cochlear implant and that was going to be celebrated in style at the Great Forest Park Balloon Race in St. Louis on Saturday! We had the opportunity to go into the VIP section and enjoy all that the Children's tent had to offer including fun entertainment, a wonderful catered lunch, and the absolute best seat in the house for the balloon launch! Luke's story was even a 2 page spread in the official program complete with a picture of the whole fam!!!

We arrived at 11:30 and signed in under "Team Buka" as the cochlear implant team has now dubbed us (I guess that started when we had a room full of family and friends all in specially made orange t-shirts for Luke's "turn on day" when his implant was activated and he could hear for the first time!) Luke had lots of family and friends on hand on Saturday too - Dan and I, his two big brothers, Jack and Nick, my mom and dad (Nana and Papa), my Aunt Joy and Uncle Gene, Aunt Jackie and Uncle Steve, and even Kristin and Maddie (Luke's babysitters...more like a second mom and sister though!)

Here is the crew before many balloons or people arrived...
We managed to grab a few pictures of our favorite cochlear implant team members...here is Jamie and Jericha, the two CI audiologists who work with Luke to make sure he is hearing to the fullest...we ABSOLUTELY LOVE THEM....
And here is who we called Santa Claus on Saturday. Standing there in the blue shirt is Luke's surgeon Dr. Hullar who has taken such awesome care of Luke and actually completed his CI surgery on March 28th! You should have seen the sight though, when Dr. Hullar arrived all the moms and dads and little ones ran up to him. At one point he sat down and parents were seriously putting their kids on his knee for pictures. To us, he is definitely better than Santa though, as he gave Luke and us the best present ever...the gift of sound!!! Just after this picture was taken, Luke totally reached out for Dr. Hullar and went right too him...I wonder if Luke knows what Dr. Hullar did for him!!! :)
As many of you know, Luke had the chance to ride in the Children's sponsored hot air balloon, but Dan and I kind of nixed that idea...neither of us are too fond of heights and after seeing how high the balloons went, we definitely made the right decision! But, we did manage to stand in this hot air balloon basket and get our picture taken...thanks Walgreens! :)
Unfortunately this very exciting day was right smack dab in the middle of our Luka Buka's nap time. Luckily, Kristin was there for Luke to rest on and he was able to grab a few minutes of sleep before the balloons launched! Notice the monkey has a little CI on his right ear....thanks to Advanced Bionics, the maker of Luke's implant, for making stuffed animals just like him (the monkey is SO fitting as he thinks he can walk and climb anywhere that his two big brothers do!)
Okay, so as not to make this post SUPER long and bore you all...I'll stop for now, and include all the great balloon pictures next time (hopefully that is sooner rather than later!)