June 2013 and a few following months

Once June rolled around we were DONE with casting!!!!! We kept each cast once it was removed so we could see the changes in her foot position. In the picture below you can see that her foot starts at a downward and slightly inward angle (far left) but through the weeks it gradually turns up and outward (far right) until it ends up in a "normal" foot position. 

This angle gives an ever better perspective of how the correction was made. Far left is, again, her first cast and far right is her last cast.

This is her first cast and then her last cast

After her final cast the next stage was to put her in these medieval torture devices. Ok, so I over-exaggerate, but that's exactly what they looked like to me. The boots look like miniature ski boots but then they are strapped onto a metal bar.  The bar has dials under each foot that can be adjusted to keep her feet turned out at certain angles depending on what the doc thinks she needs. Paisley's magic number has been 60degrees. My husband erased the torture device analogy and made me feel better when he said maybe she'll grow up to be an Olympic snowboarder.

When you first transition from cast to boots/bar (or snowboard/skateboard depending on your preference) your little one will have to wear it 22-24 hours a day. So aside from maybe bath time your little one will always be in them. Don't know how my husband saw it, but I felt so bad for her. I felt like I was confining her, and I feared she wouldn't be able to reach certain milestones because of the boots and bar. The doctors assured us that she should be able to roll over, crawl and walk around the same time as most of her peers, but I just wasn't sure. How can this tiny baby roll herself over with these heavy boots and bar clasped to her feet?

The boots/bar have their advantages and disadvantages.
Advantages:
- changing diapers -  It actually got easier because we were able to prop her entire bottom half up by balancing the bar on our arm while we changed her diaper
- no longer had to worry about plaster getting wet
- bathing - Paisley took her FIRST REAL bath!!!
- location - as they grow and they learn to slam that bar as hard as they can onto the floor you will never lose the baby. Just listen for the smash of metal against your hardwood floor (cringe at each dent she leaves) and locate your child. *No, I've never lost an infant in my house, but once they learn to roll they can be pretty stealthy*

Disadvantages:
- time consuming to put on/take off - In the beginning we were all thumbs when it came to putting her boots on. There are 3 buckles and you need to make sure her heels are pushed as far back as possible into the boot so ensure her foot is at the correct angle.
- messes - It happened more times than I can count that Paisley would spit up into her boots. So we would have to remove the boots, change her socks, attempt to clean the boot as best as possible, and then struggle to get them back on. Most boots are leather so it's a pain when it gets wet.
- bruises - Your legs and hands will be covered in them because they bring that bar down when you least expect it. My husband actually wrapped the bar in Styrofoam to try and alleviate some of the pulverizing that was being done to our legs.
- clothing gets more selective - With the boots/bar wearing anything that has feet in not an option, unless you're willing to buy clothes only to cut the feet out, but I just couldn't do that. So we were always on the hunt for pants and sleepwear that didn't have feet. I didn't think it would be that hard, but for every 10 outfits on the rack *maybe* one would be without feet. Paisley has an older sister and we weren't able to reuse very many of her sleepers because they all had feet. Thank goodness for amazing Nana/Grammy and other family members who would pick up any outfit they saw that didn't have feet to send to us.
- flooring dents - the bar IS metal and the boots are REALLY hard plastic. And when they hit wood, wood loses.

We made sure to do things as we normally would have if Paisley had not been born with a clubfoot.  It was just a physical abnormality and not something that ever posed a threat to her health, so there really were no extra precautions we had to take. It didn't make her any more fragile than a "normal" baby, in fact I think it had the opposite affect. Even though she was just a baby and wouldn't really remember if we had chosen to treat her differently, it was actually more for her older sister's benefit. We didn't want her to think of her little sister as being "different". We went to the beach, the park, sat out by the pool, we just had to be more conscientious about getting dirt in the boots.

Aside from being paranoid about getting sand in her boots Paisley enjoyed every trip to the beach. At least I think she did, she slept every single time, lol.

The bar made it a little difficult to sit up in the Bumbo seat but we just took off the bar for a few mins so Paisley could work on her neck and back strength.  Abdominal strength will never be a problem for this kid because with the way she raised that bar, even as a tiny infant, she's going to have 6pack abs at the age of 1 :)

Making sure to raise her as a beach bum :)