Spring has Sprung

Well it appears that Spring has finally opened her welcoming arms to Minnesota!  Thank God!  We thought it would never happen.
Roa is celebrating Spring with his usual-  bubbles, gait trainer walks, playing in the birdseed/sand/dirt/water table and chasing Beast, our cat, around the front yard.  It is so nice to see those sun kissed cheeks and nose of his again!  Welcome back, Mr. Sun!

Along the subject of outdoors, the Thayers are planning some outdoor renovations and improvements to help out the outdoor enthusiast, King Roa.  We will be replacing our front porch and step with an easier ramp for gait trainer accessibility.  We are also looking at doing some altering of our backyard to make it a more CP friendly playspace for Roa and Gunnar, as well.
We count ourselves lucky to have a beautiful big backyard.  There is plenty of play space for the boys to roam, along with our dogs and cat.  We even have a nice portion fenced off for a sizable garden. 

While doing some research about outside play for kids with physical impairments, I ran across a great resource.  White-Hutchinson is a company that designs beautiful natural playscapes for childcare centers, city parks, churches, etc around the country.  I went out on a limb and sent an email to Vicki  Stoecklin, Education and Child Development Director for the firm and she has been very helpful in our planning for a natural backyard wonderland for the boys!  She was kind enough to request photos of our backyard and then give detailed ideas of activities we could include in our landscape.  She also sent me a variety of book titles, websites, and contacts to help plan our yard. 
Thank you, Vicki, for all your help and guidance with our project!
Check out White-Hutchinson at 
http://www.whitehutchinson.com/children/playgroundexp.shtml

For those of you who are curious about Natural Playscapes,  I want to include some interesting links and articles.  Research is finding that, not only are playgrounds designed around natural elements more enticing for children, they also tend to be more cost efficient, AND  handicapped accessible!

http://www.arborday.org/

http://www.planetearthplayscapes.com/

http://playgrounddesigns.blogspot.com/