Lawn Bowling

We spent a super beautiful day together with my sister and her family and a fabulous time was had by all. They flew in from sunny AZ for the weekend so the family could all be together for our little brother's wedding shower (well, the bridal shower actually). So we had a little pre-shower BBQ and swim at our house the kick off the weekend....

Uncle Brian got into the action with a little lawn bowling of sorts:

Weeeeeeee!

Not pictured: my little sister wrapped up in a blanket sitting in the sun for warmth because the mid-70's is "winter weather" for Arizonians. We all had a good time ribbing her about it.

Little Boy Logic

The kids and I planted a few veggie starters for the garden a while back and they sun themselves in the window sills throughout the house. I know, it's nearly past time to transfer them out to the garden. I need to get movin!

Anyway, Nick was relaxing in bed earlier this week, watching a movie and munching on popcorn before lights out.

Today as I moved from room to room, vacuuming, dusting and watering the plants I saw some odd yellow lumps poking out of the soil in the squash plant on Nick's window sill....

Nick had "planted" his unpopped popcorn kernels.

This made me smile. At least he's learning where food comes from :oD

Dinner Conversation

I came home from work this afternoon to find Hubs grilling up some hamburgers. The kids were hungry, so we ate an early dinner and, for once, we all sat together as a family at the dinner table.

We chatted about our plans for the upcoming week and a lull fell in the conversation. Nick chimed in, "So, tell me about your day, Mom." And, "Wow, that's really neat" after I told him a bit about work.

Plain old dinner conversation. This child never ceases to amaze me. *happy sigh*

Not All Video Games Rot Your Brain

Last weekend I broke down and purchased a Sony PS2 system for Nick. The young children's games (Disney princess, Nemo, Sponge Bob, etc) are plentiful and C-H-E-A-P. Yes, I am cheap - therefore, no Wii for us just yet.

I've been a little apprehensive about making this purchase for a while, but I think in moderation some of these games can be good for problem solving, fine motor dexterity, etc. (notice I said moderation and some, just to clarify) I just never imagined they would help Nick make a leap in language skills.

We've been working on a Sponge Bob adventure game for several days, nearing the end, and it was becoming more challenging. Let me confess: I stink at video games. Pac-man at the low (slow) levels are more my speed. Nick's character was jumping and twirling and punching while mine kept somehow leaping off cliffs to it's demise. After several failed attempts, my son was growing frustrated with my ineptness.

So, he started giving me directions. Multi-step, descriptive how-to directions. "No, mom. You've to go wait until ___ and then run and press the ___ button and then jump with the ___ button to catch the___." All those X, circle, square and triagle buttons that do different functions and the joystick? It's complicated! I can hardly keep it straight let alone give a running stream of verbal instructions simultaneously.

Sony PS2 console..............$99.00
Spong Bob video game ....$14.99
Your formerly language impaired son talking you through said Sponge Bob game? Priceless.

Free Workout with Speech Therapy

Guess what I got to do while Nick had speech therapy this week?!
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I played free handball!
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Handball you ask? Allow me to explain. There's been a pesky bird mating with it's reflection on the very narrow ledge just outside the 2nd story plate glass window of Nick's SLP's office. Every. Single. Day. All. Spring.

Add one very easily distracted five year old with a tendency to perseverate to that bird and you've got a completely non-productive hour of therapy at $350/hr.

So this week, Nick's therapist handed me a handball with a wink as I passed her in the hall on my way to the observation room.

Whenever I heard the bird start pecking and flapping at the window I dashed down the stairs and out the side door to play a quick game of handball then back up the stairs to my observation room. By the end of the session I had myself a nice little workout and a really good laugh.

**Never fear, no birds were harmed. I merely bounced the ball off the brick just below the 2nd story window to scare the bird away. **

Autism, Success & Happiness

Last night we had two guest speakers at the autism parent support group that I lead. We were having such a delightful time it was hard to wrap things up and get out of there!

To give you a little background….back in February, I represented our group at a gluten free food fair at a local market. There I had the pleasure of meeting a fellow autism mom (I’ll call her S.) who owns a GFCF hamburger bun bakery. We got to chatting and I learned that her son (whom I’ll call D.), diagnosed with autism at age 9 and now 20 years old, was a freshman at Michigan State University and living independently on campus. I’ve never had the opportunity to speak with the parent of a young adult on the spectrum, so I was really fascinated listening to her speak about her son. By the end of the afternoon, she volunteered to come with her son and speak at one of our meetings.

S. shared about her son’s early childhood (very little speech, very withdrawn into his own world) which was starkly contrasted by the handsome and articulate 20 year old young man sitting next to his mom as he lovingly teased her and shared stories of his past.

They spent very little time talking about therapy and treatments – though S. did start D. on the GFCF diet at age 11 and a few supplements (no chelation) and D. continues the GFCF diet still by choice. D. said GFCF has become the norm for him and he doesn’t really miss the “other” stuff. I was a bit surprised that he continues the GFCF lifestyle living independently on a college campus. I would have thought it difficult, but he jokingly assured me that Burger King Whoppers (on one of his Mom’s soon-to-be patented GFCF buns of course) and fries are pretty easy to come by! ;)

On an interesting note, D. commented that he really has no childhood memories up until age 11, when he made a breakthrough and became more engaged and interactive with the family and his surroundings.

S. also made a few points that really resonated long past the end of our meeting.

Happiness means different things to different people. Are we keeping our child’s happiness in mind, or our own? As S. mentioned, it once saddened her to know that her son has only 1 or 2 friends. D. said he’s quite happy with his very small circle of friends and it suits him just fine. He’s happy with the life he has.

Set your child up for success. Don’t set the bar too high or use the same ruler to compare your child to the next. In fact, throw the ruler away! Instead, build your child’s confidence by creating a safe, happy environment for learning and let them savor the victory of success. Often.

Advocate. It's our job to advocate for our children to build that environment for success. Don't stop until you find that environment that best suits your child, because not every teacher, classroom, or campus is a good fit for every student that passes through the door.

And by the way, D. found his perfect fit. He was recently accepted to the MSU Eli Broad College of Business and plans to pursue a career in Marketing. He’s already hard at work helping his mom with the patent process and has secured a national distributor for their GFCF product.

Success and happiness. I think D. has it all. It doesn’t get more inspiring than that.

More Snippets from Nick

Nick has suddenly reached new levels of awareness and presence. He's starting to develop some independence, share his opinion and question everything, soaking it all up like a sponge. To say he is truly coming into his own sounds cliche, but never more true. A few recent examples...

He's no longer just a willing participant with his supplement regimen - he's reminding us and asking to help with it.

*****

Oh the questions and curiosity, from "What does that sign say?" to "Who are you talking to?" (on the phone)

******

Today he announced he wants to paint his bike black. Where in the world did this come from? I thought only 12 year olds spray painted their dirt bikes?!

*****

More curiosity...

Nick had trouble getting to sleep last night. Since it was nearly 11pm and I had to get up at the cruel hour of oh-five-thirty, I let him climb into my bed. As we lay there, Nick began chatting...

N: "What's in popsicles, Mom?"

Me: "Oh, water, sugar, and probably a little juice."

N: "Oh."

Me: "Why'd you ask?" (curious as to why he's thinking of popsicle ingredients at 11pm)

N: "I'm just thinkin', Mom"

********

Since I went to bed late with the boy, I never did get a chance to clean up the kitchen of the dinner mess.

This morning, Nick observed, "Gee. This place is a mess. I think you'd better clean it up, Dad"

(I was at work. And no, Hubs was not very amused, although I was!)

*********

Mother's Day Gifts

I'm sitting inside sipping a cup of coffee and checking up on Facebook and Twitter. The house is quiet, except for the click-clack of Hubs across the room on his computer. The sounds of giggling and screeching children drift from across the street.

I checked in on everyone a few minutes ago. I called out to ask if the kids wanted to come home to eat lunch. My calls went largely ignored. Nick was there, in the throng of kids - all 7 of them, age 3 to 6 - bouncing on the trampoline and climbing the treehouse, doing things Nick would have had far too much anxiety to attempt a year or two ago. This not-having-to-moderate-every-social-interaction thing is kind of nice. :D

These friends across the street are new. They don't know about his diagnosis, nor do I feel the need to tell them.

A boy, a sister, his friends, and a perfect spring day. Quite possibly the best Mother's Day gift.

Bargaining Our Way to an IEP

Back in February, I contacted Nick's elementary school. Since we've been in private therapy and private preschool, I was unclear as to how to go about re-entering the district's special ed program when Nick begins Kindergarten in the fall.

So the principal, who gushed how happy he was to meet a proactive parent, told me to gather all of Nick's recent assessments, progress notes and samples of his school work, bring it in for his staff to review and we'd meet this spring after kindergarten round-up. Apparently, I was misled.

I dropped everything off two weeks ago and waited. And waited some more. Growing impatient, I called the principal who gruffly told me that his staff is too busy right now with current students' IEPs that any new students would be evaluated after the start of the new year.

Now, I'm sympathetic to the fact that there are more and more students with IEPs these days and social work staff is underbudgeted and overloaded. But as a teacher? I wouldn't want to start off my school year with a student who has already been identified by the district as needing special assistance, and quite possibly an aide, with no aide and no plan of action.

Why start out falling behind? Why set him up for failure and put his self esteem at risk?

With Hubs' employer change-over looming ahead in the near future, we will also likely be looking for a new preschool for the interim.

I'd really rather spare Nick unnecessary transitions: one transition to new preschool, second transition to new elementary school, and possibly a third transition if the multidisciplinary team determines he needs a different type of classroom?! Potentially THREE transitions in three month's time? I THINK NOT. That's a recipe for certain disaster if you ask me, spectrum or not.

We spoke again today and cleared the air...a bit. He is willing to sit down and have a meeting with us, the speech pathologist and district special ed director to formulate an interim plan for the start of the year - which may include a transitional aide for 30 days (we have to make our case with the director) - while we complete the evaluation and IEP process.

Not perfect, but as long as he holds up his end of the bargain on this deal, I'll take it.

Keep your fingers crossed and send up a few prayers if you think of it.

Chalkmanship

Nick is a leftie. No one else in our immediate family is a leftie, so this has made teaching handwriting a bit more challenging.

Our new pediatrician (not the dev ped) recommended at our last visit that we "force" Nick to become a rightie. I imagine lefties do have it hard living in a mostly right-handed world, but is it right to force my son to change what comes naturally? That just doesn't feel right to me. Society already expects him to conform to a different standard than what comes naturally for him. Who cares about which hand he writes with?!

So we've been practicing letters here and there, left-handed. I keep a letter strip tacked up in the living room near the kids' craft table and I catch Nick tracing letters with his fingertip periodically. The tough part is teaching proper pencil grip - I have a hard time reversing it to show him proper technique before I lose his attention and he moves on.

At pre-school they use the Handwriting Without Tears curriculum and they use a lot of sensory-motor activities (drawing in sand, tracing tactile surfaces with fingers, etc). One of his 4 teachers is a leftie, so she's been working with him 1:1 as time permits.

Clearly it's working. Nick drew this with sidewalk chalk today....

Okay, so he forgot the C. But look at that penman-, er, chalkmanship!

AND? He said, "I like drawing my name, Mom. It's fun."

Learning = Fun. Rock on, buddy. I hope you always have fun with it.

Shaking Things Up

It was announced yesterday that Megaware has sold it's software product line and staff of about 350 software engineers to Microware (fictionalized names), which is headquartered in the UK outside of London. The new company is currently looking for a location in which to set up operations in the US.

Hubs said the general atmosphere around the office is a mixture of excitement and worry. The new company seems confident they will have a prosperous future. Their work philosophies are much the same and they provide lots of small perks to maintain morale.

While I'm thankful that Hubs still has a job, there are many unanswered questions remaining.

Probably the most distressing part of the change, is how this will affect the kids. For the past 2-1/2 years, the kids have attended full-day Preschool at Megaware 3 days a week. We've developed a close working relationship with Nick's teacher - who has been SO incredibly wonderful for Nick's progress. It will be hard to leave them all behind and we'll miss them terribly. I'm hoping that the transition to the new company/location does not take place until later this summer or just prior to the start of Kindergarten in order to minimize the number of transitions he has to make. Of course, I always underestimate my son's resilience and he never ceases to amaze me.

I was looking over Microware's benefit package online yesterday. On the surface, the healthcare benefits look great....if you stay in-network. If you go out of network - as we usually are for Nick's care - there's a $5,000/person deductible. Ouch.

Type A personality that I am, I can't help but be a little resentful of changing the status quo, especially when it was already so good. But I keep reminding myself - sometimes it does some good to shake things up a bit. Perhaps Hubs commute will be shorter. Maybe we'll find the perfect school for Meg closer to home. God has a plan; I just need to be patient.