I Believe In Miracles: Jodie Kidd Part 7

Fair

K and I are going to this mini fair tonight. I think that she will love the rides but flip out because she will have to wait and then get off and not go back on right away. I am testing her to see how she will do before we decide to take her to Disney. Now I probably will be taking her by myself because DH is on call this week.

Easter Egg Fun!

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter to Everyone!

Yesterday K painted eggs for the very first time and she had a blast. I got this speckled egg kit which allows the user to paint the eggs with dye using little sponges. I thought this would be more fun for K then dipping eggs into cups of dye. I had her paint 12 eggs. She had SOOO much fun painting the eggs! Her hands are dyed purple and pink from the egg paint dye! 

Also later today we will be doing some sort of Easter egg hunt for her with plastic eggs and candy and some little toys that I picked out. Also there are some books for her too! This should be fun! 

Now if I can ever figure out how to get the pictures off DH's phone and post them, then you can see K dying her eggs and how the eggs turned out.

Northern Trip with K

Please forgive me that this post is several weeks late in me writing it. A lot has happened since K and I have gotten back from our Northern Trip for Spring Break.

My Grandmother died on 4/6/11 (see In Loving Memory of My Grandmom ). This was about a week after our trip - we had gone up north to see her since she was dying. My Grandmom had stage 4 throat and lung cancer. She was surrounded by her whole family like she wanted - no one could have passed away any better then to have all their loved ones around them everyday.  I was not ready to write about the entirety of the trip or her death until now.

Friday March 25th we left for the airport. DH drove us and let us off at the drop off site at the curb. K and I were about 2 hours early for the flight. We checked in one bag, and I had my laptop bag, K's bookbag of toys, and my purse. Also I had my heavy jacket and K's winter jacket attached to her bookbag. We went through security with no problems and no melt downs. After putting our shoes back on and bags all loaded up on mommy the pack mule we headed for our terminal.

K and I stopped at this restaurant and sat by the windows so she could she the planes taxing in and people loading and baggage being put on to the plane. We shared an order of fries and had a soda for me and grapefruit juice for her. I pointed out the planes and explained that we would be getting on one and going high into the sky. I told her that the suit case was going into the belly of the plane. K sat there and watched the planes and kept saying "Airplane".

Once we got to the terminal, we spoke to the employee and I explained that K has Autism and this is our first time flying. The employee told us to load when they first start the preloading process. So that is what we did. We got on the plane without a hitch. K had the window seat. I was in the middle. I explained to the passengers around us that my daughter has Autism before we took us just in the event that K had a melt down.

But everything was fine. One of the air hostess did tell me that K could not play her noisy toy unless she had a headset. But K was ok with that. K had plenty of other things to do. We watched a movie. K was utterly and totally fascinated with the window. She could not get enough of looking out the window. When we were high up into the sky she looked out the window and said "ocean" when she saw all the clouds. Also I kept giving her lollipops and laughy taffy which helped with her ears popping. It go to the point where K would say "Ears pop. Candy please." Sometimes, she said "Ears pooping" instead of popping.   We shared a can of cranberry juice. K got the cup with ice and I had the can. We landed in our northern destination with no problem and on time.

LESSON LEARNED FROM FIRST FLIGHT: Do not bring out the noisy toys and take out all batteries. Do not over back on the toys - have a small backpack that the child can where themselves. Get a small portable DVD player instead of lugging heavy bulky laptop bag - or get smaller more stream lined laptop bag - this will save your back. Also pack other snack items (see return trip home).

From there, my cousin picked us up. We went to get some "real" pizza from this great place she knew. Then after eating, we went back to her house for the night. K explored her home and fell in love with running up and down the stairs. When K would go up the stairs, she would then go into one of the bedrooms and lay on the bed. Either I or V (the cousin) went in to the room to get her, K was all giggles and smiles. After that we all went to bed. In the morning, V made us a nice breakfast of eggs, toast, and sausage. K was not really in a mood to eat. But she did eat toast and got jelly all over V's table and chair. V had crayons and stock paper for K to Grandmom a card. So K colored for a little bit and wrote her name. After cleaning up from breakfast we headed to the town where my dad lives. (My Dad lives down the road from my Aunt and Uncle - this is where my Grandmother lives).

We (more like I) stopped for coffee since V does not drink or own a coffee pot. That was the only downside of breakfast. Then we stopped at a florist so I could get flowers for Grandmom. The florist had purple roses - I HAD to get then for Grandmom - since her favorite color is purple. I got three roses - one for K, DH, and myself. Then we continued on our way.

Now while I was in the florist, K decided she would gross out her cousin V. K stayed in the car with V. K had her finger in her nose. V told K "Ill that is nasty". K took her finger out of her nose which had a big booger on it (yuck!) and then ate it. V said that was nasty again. K with a big grin on her face, stuck her tongue out which had the booger on the end of her tongue at V. Then K put her tongue back in her mouth and ate the booger laughing. V told me all about this once I got back into the car.

Now finally one the way, V was going to drop me off at my Dad's (which is where we stayed for the trip). But in talking she drove past the rode. So we stopped to see my Grandmother first.

So I will stopped this post now and continue with part 2 later.

In Loving Memory of my Grandmom

"To live in the hearts of those we love is never to die." (Thomas Campbell) 

~~ In Loving Memory of my Grandmom  who passed away peacefully on 4/6/11~~

Playground adventures :)

Today I took K to a new playground. The playground belongs to a local school about 15-20 minutes away. It is a pretty big playground too. It has 3 big play structures, 2 set of swings, this 4 person see saw, and some weird blue round climber.

When we first got there and parked the car, I let K out and her eyes got wide and she said "playground". K loves the playground. Being that this was new playground, she had to look around and get her bearings and check out all the cool play stuff. She was so funny checking out the new things to climb on and walking around each structure to see what she wanted to go on. Her favorite was the see saw and the monkey bars. She wanted to go on the monkey bars and I made her say "Help me on the monkey bars". We did that several times. She would not do it on  her own, she would get scared and drop down if she felt unsupported. So I had her do it while my arm was under her butt. K at first felt she had to wrapper her self around me and do it with one arm. But I made her use two hands and then supported her butt lightly with my arm to give her that security that she needed. One day this girl will do the monkey bars all on her own.

Before the playground, we had lunch at Wendy's. She had a salad, chicken nuggets, oranges, fries and we shared a frosty. We had some good times today.

Now, there are several playgrounds in the area - several that are very close to the house. This playground was pretty cool and I will take her again.

Speech Therapy and Easter

 

 K's speech therapist is having her use the words "in", "out", "under" and "on". So in the season of Easter, I have been using a basket with plastic eggs. I let K pick out her basket when we were at the dollar store. Last night, I had her pick out the eggs by using her words "I want pink egg, please". The I have been having her count the eggs, put them in, under, out and on top of the basket. Once we were done with that, I hid the eggs in obvious places so K could find them. When K found all 10 eggs, she had the biggest smile on her face!

After that, K practiced writing K, C, and A. These are some letters of her name that she has some trouble writing. She is getting better, but like they say, practice makes perfect!

K is fine :)

K has been doing good. She enjoys school and riding the bus. She loves to be tickled and to ride her bike. K loves music and counting. She likes to be silly. There have been no major changes or conflicts.

One Elmo Mylar Balloon = Hours Of Fun

Who knew that Elmo the Balloon would be the source of fun for hours? 

Yesterday, I received K's report card along with her reaching her goals on her IEP. K got all S's on her report card (all satisfactory marks). So after I school I took her to the dollar store and got her a mylar balloon. She choose the Elmo balloon. Then after I was done shopping for Easter stuff, we went to McDonald's. She got a cheeseburger happy meal, apple juice and a yogurt. Along with the happy meal she got a musical bird toy that she loves.

Between yesterday and today, K has been walking around with Elmo. She has been playing with it. She loves Elmo and even calls on of her aunts Elmo. She like looking into the silver side of the balloon and seeing her reflection. 

We have been having "conversations" about Elmo. Mainly, her saying "It's a mirror". I have been trying to get K to say "I have a mirror", "I have elmo", "Elmo is a balloon", and to answer "Who is in the mirror".  So Elmo has been a source of fun and I am trying to work in some speech therapy into this fun.

The sun goes bye bye

 

 Last night, K said her first 5 word sentence. She was watching a music video on youtube and she said "Look, the sun goes bye bye."

I was surprised when she said this and quite happy!

K - the fashion diva

The new fashion diva - K!!!

K and clothes - clothes and K! K has a love for clothes. She LOVES shoes, she LOVES certain articles of clothing. She loves this part of plaid shorts that are yellow, pink, green, brown. They kind of remind me of golf shorts. She has a love for clothes with pockets and buttons and zippers and clothes that have shiny graphics or clothes that light up. She has this butterfly dress that has a tie near the top and I have done "bunny ears" and now she loves that dress. She will want to wear this certain clothes over and over again whether they are clean or dirty. She has changed clothes on her father before going to school and has worn some creative designs. Like a purple crush velvet dress with teal sweat pants. She has decided not to wear panties under her pants. She is now wearing the butterfly dress with a pair of jeans and sandals. She has her own taste to be sure - she would changes clothes morning, noon and night if we let her!!!

Hard Thinking to do

I am trying to research and work on a post regarding Autism and Marriage. It is a work in progress. Not yet completed. I am going through my own issues in my marriage regarding K's autism and some of her behaviors. My husband and I are both stressed. Stressed with everything. When I was on my trip last week there were some things that K was doing - good things, great improvements and upward progress that she makes in little tiny steps here. She was surround by lots of people and family and it did the K good. I think that she made more progress in 10 days then in 6 months. Hmmm-that pretty bad. I have lots of things to think about and what is best for K.

K & her players

The top photo is K & Her Daddy (AKA DH) at the playground last last year. K loves her Daddy and is a BIG daddy's girl!

This photo was taken of K & I in 2009. There are not many photos of K & I since I take most of the photos. The most recent photo was taken when we got of the airplane in March 2011. See the photo below: