Skip to main content

Happy Birthday, Camille!

Its's hard to believe, but my baby Camille is 15 years old! Camille's toddler and preschool years involved a LOT of medical issues, hospital stays, long-lasting illnesses, and doctor visits which I won't detail here. The rest of the time we enjoyed her happy and cheerful spirit. At least I tried to. Honestly, I spent too much time worrying about her delays and medical problems. She really was pretty happy most of the time.

Here are some pictures:





She learned how to talk long before she started walking. She started talking a few months before she was 2 and walking a few months after she was 2. By the time she walked she was saying over 200 words. Talking was definitely her strength although she was soft-spoken thanks to her poor lungs. She qualified for special ed preschool due to her fine motor and gross motor delays. She really enjoyed riding the bus there with her friends. Miss Kim was a very good teacher and Camille was a big fan. It was hard for her to graduate from preschool and leave Miss Kim. 




The felt costumes year


She loved to play pretend games and dress-ups. She was also aware of social relationships at a young age. She amazed me by realizing that her grandparents were my parents. I would say, "We're going to Grandma's house now." She would say, "You mean, your mom's house?" Another time, my parents were leaving and she said, "Bye, Paula's Mom and Dad!" She would also greet a few adults she knew by name. 




With a therapy dog, shortly after her kidney transplant.

Camille absolutely loved watching movies and she spent many hours when she was sick and/or in the hospital watching them. 101 Dalmatians was a favorite during the kidney transplant. Megamind was popular during the (horrible) recovery from her tonsillectomy followed by bad RSV. Toy Story, Robin Hood, Winnie the Pooh, and Cinderella were other favorites.




She loved it when people played with her and she was definitely the easiest to love. When Stephanie joined our family, Camille loved it when Stephanie would play with her. Once they played "owls" and Camille was in heaven. Everett spent a lot of time playing with her along with other siblings, especially Mindy. Camille said lots of funny things but unfortunately I didn't write them down.




Camping at Yellowstone, that time when she stole the last of the chocolate for the s'mores with the evidence on her chin. She was sad when her brothers teased her about it.




At David and Stephanie's wedding:



Camille was (and is) very sensitive to sentimental music. As a small baby, she would start crying during church if someone played or sang "I Am a Child of God." During David and Stephanie's reception, they played the song, "Lucky I'm in Love with my Best Friend," whereupon Camille started bawling and we had to take her out to the parking lot where she threw up.


Camille and her cousin Mika














We sure love Camille and are happy she is in our family!


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Do Dots Family System

The original post was written in January of 2015. I wrote an update at the bottom of this post in March 2021. A few months ago, a friend of mine told me about something she was doing in her family to help her family function better.  Her teenage autistic son had been struggling a lot so they had been working with behavior therapists to help him and this "Do Dots Family System" had been recommended.  As she described it, I was greatly intrigued since it sounded like something I wanted to implement at my own house. I looked into it and decided to purchase it right after Thanksgiving.  Here is my review of how it has worked for us over the last six weeks or so. The basic idea of the chart is that children need to take care of their responsibilities before they get any privileges.  It strongly reinforces the concept of "Work Before Play" .  The chart helps children see in a very visual way that, until they have completed their responsibilities, they are on Le...
Post a Comment
Read more

Hansen Family Reunion 2024, Thursday afternoon

For lunch on Thursday, Lauren and Kurt made Cafe Rio which was delicious.  On Thursday afternoon, we had free time at the lake. Heidi and Aaron rented a pontoon boat and took people out for rides. This was very popular. Some of us went on the kayaks and/or swimming or just hung out on the beach.
Post a Comment
Read more

2024 Hansen Family Reunion, Wednesday

Recently we had another Hansen Family Reunion at Bear Lake. We've been having these destination reunions since 2008. There were about 70 of us in attendance. Bruce and Michelle organized the activities and did a good job. I enjoyed myself! Hopefully lots of other people did too. We showed up on Wednesday afternoon and enjoyed a taco salad dinner, served by Neil and Kristie's family. We also worked on two mixer games:  a word search with the names of all 100 Hansen family members as well as a Bingo card that involved finding people with different attributes like recent high school graduation, birthdays in certain months, etc. The word search was definitely the most popular. Also popular was playing Nine-Square and Sandy Pickle (a cross between pickle ball and badminton). Thys and Katrina might have won! After dinner, we had an FHE activity/lesson. Liz had made a book with stories of the first ancestors to join the church. She had selected different stories for us to act out in g...
Post a Comment
Read more