Helmetized

On Tuesday Carter had his fitting with Cranial Tech. It was a difficult appointment for me, but Chris and Nolan were there. We wanted to make sure that Nolan included in the process. He walks around now saying 'See my brother's round head!?' He means the helmet, but we told him that Carter was getting a helmet so he'd have a round head. I guess he shortened it.

Our first 2 days home we had to do skin checks every 2-3 hours. They want you to keep an eye on the pressure points where the helmet is applying resistance. You don't want anything to red or dark, they call them 'angry' spots. If he has 'angry' spots you want to see them disappear within an hour. The skin needs to recover, if it doesn't you can have problems. Fortunately, Carter didn't have any of these. So we could proceed as planned, from here on out Carter has to wear for 23 hours out of the day. During the one hour, I have to wash it everyday in rubbing alcohol and in the summer months the helmet can start to stink from all the perspiration. Great. We got DOC Band put on in May...Carter will wear it for a minimum of 3 months...May, JUNE, JULY. We'll be in nasty Oklahoma heat and humidity in July. That'll smell fantastic!!

So then painting process began. It was definitely trial and (A LOT of) error. But in the end it turned out really cute. I had to apply 3 coats of acrylic paint. The third coat crackled instead of looking smooth. I cried, but then just went with it. Then I put his name on in sticker and then painted his flame details. I wish I could have enjoyed the process more, but I was stressing out about it and having an allergy attack all at the same time. It was a mess. Once I had painted it all I then had to apply three coats of Modge Podge to keep the paint from peeling. The Modge Podge really helped it look shiny and polished and disguised some of the cracked paint. I'll probably do a coat of Modge Podge a week to help maintain the AWESOMENESS.

It's going to be quite a process, but I'm glad we are finally in it instead of just talking about it. Again, if you have any questions about this please comment and I'm happy to answer them!!