w00t!!!!!!!!111

I just got off the phone with the woman who runs the HRA rental housing list. We have been accepted to program. She will be sending me out a letter next week detailing everything more. The down side, we could be looking at a year or so, but I can live with that. If we find ourselves in a situation where we no longer need it before it's available, no big loss. Also, she said it;s looking like some people will be rolling off the list soon due to failure to report a move out of city and what not.
Either way, it's a good thing. I know that I will want to find a place with six month lease increments, and that it will only be temporary. Life is getting good.

waiting....

I have now entered the month of "waiting". This is a little known month that falls from midway through January, to midway of February. Waiting for the w-2's to file tax returns, waiting for my anniversary, conveniently placed the day before valentines day, so we also celebrate a little early or a little late, but never forget, waiting for the cold that I always seem to have this time of year to go away. This year, I have added a nifty game of Catch to Waiting. This entails me almost losing the cold, and then Thor catching it, when it's about out of his system, it magically re-appears with me. Hermes and Buddha and Hubby all seem to be exempt from this game-not to say they don't have/haven't had colds recently, but they are different. Thor seems to realize that the cold is something special to just him and me, and seems pleased to share something so important with Momma.

Tonight Hubby and I have a meeting with Thor's team, to go over all the gleaned info again, and sign the paperwork for Toddler Group and HomeVisit. I am hoping that these help Thor, but I am also hoping that it will give an outside party a chance to see how splendid he is. I also worry, though, that they will see his improvements in some areas are marked by slides in others, and that it isn't just in my head. None of his backslides are really devopmentally related, but more along the lines of stimming and other activites normally seen with autism. Thor is a very interesting case study, being how everything presents, his age, and that to most knowledge, there isn't a history of anyhting like this in the families. Of course, half of Hubby's family is mystery.

Hermes has started doing simple math at school, something he is quite pleased with. Even though he already knows how to do most, if not all, of what they are working on, it is Math, and he knows you need math to be a train engineer, and astronaut, and about seven other things he wants to be when he grows up. He is finally starting to try and milk "But I don't feel good!" to stay home from school, but I have found the way to cure that. I know which days are Art days, Gym days, so on and so forth, if I can tell him one definitave thing he will be doing, he always feels better. That kid loves learning. i will have to speak with his teacher come the next conferences, if not earlier, to let her know that at much as he likes school, he is starting to get a little bored, and he needs to be challenged--hopefully this will take care of itself, however, as they will be doing math placement tests soon, and he will be getting harder work.

Buddha is so excited in his newfound ability to stand and take one to three steps before falling down, that he has quit napping! Yay!!! Otherwise, he is perfectly healthy.


Oh, and am I the only parent who has had to tell their child that we don't put chapstick on with our feet when it's bedtime?

comfort level

It was pretty cold last night. The house was fairly warm in the morning, by about two in the afternoon, I, she who likes bare feet, voluntarily put on socks. At about 7:30, it was cool in the house, even by the computers and couch, all of which are situated near vents. I trekked down stairs, and lo and behold-the pilot light on the furnace had gone out! We have a gas furnase with an electric ignition, so after shutting off gas and power to the heater for five minutes, we powered it back up and FWOOSH!, there was heat. We have space heaters upstairs in the bedrooms, being our heat is lazy, and doesn't so much rise as let itself get pushed around, so at least the bedrooms were toasty. I have been listening for the blowers to kick in, a sure sign the furnace is working.

Mr. Guy, a friend of ours, watched the younger two while I picked Hermes up from the palace of learning, and while he was here, litterally shoveled out the livingroom, making a nice pile of things for me to go through. He figured it was the easiest way to make space for Buddha and Thor to play nicely together, which for him, they did. Thor is very at ease around Mr. Guy, which is good to know, being Mr. Guy lives six doors down, and is our emergency go to guy. He watched Hermes and Buddha when I picked up Hubby, Thor came with. 4:30 is his normal car ride time, and he was not going to let me leave without him. As much as I say he doesn't have a set in stone routine, that is changing as he gets older.

The weather was interesting to Thor, he really isn't to familiar with snow, was too young last year to play in it, and was dealing with the ear infections, but this morning, after dropping Hermes off at the palace of learning, Thor decided that maybe, the mittens he loves so much serve a purpose other than having Curious George on his hands, maybe, the kep his hands safe and warm for a reason. He bent down, and picked up some snow...he threw the snow, he was pleased. Winter seems to be in his comfort zone! He likes the way fall looks, but not feels or sounds. It is really an abrasive season for him, all sharp and rough and crackly noises and feelings, but winter, it is quiet, and pretty, and smooth, and crunchy. I cannot explain the difference between a crackly noise and a crunchy noise, but it exists, and he has a preference. I am really excited that he enjoys snow, and am looking forward to see how he deals with sledding.

Personally, I am becoming more comfortable daily with having a child who is on the autism spectrum. I am no longer feeling the need to quantify him as being high functioning, or barely on the spectrum, or what have you. It is more apparent, as he gets older daily, that he will have some tendancies for a long hall, but at the same time, he is so charismatic, and happy, and loving, and funny, and well, he's just him. Labeling him doean't make him any less Thor, heck, it even helps to understand some of what he does that makes him Thor. Hermes is trying very hard to act as an interpreter, however, it is hard to believe him sometimes, as I doubt that Thor is always trying to do things in Hermes interests over his own. Few two year olds will relinquish a cookie.

Buddha took two unassisted steps in the playpen the other day! I need to let him on the floor more now that it is clean, and I cannot let Thor's accomplishments overshadow Buddha's developmental milestones, or Hermes amazing progress at school. More and more I am becoming more comfortable with the idea that I can do this.

dreaded evaluation

On thursday, we have another eval for Thor, it was supposed to be last thurs, but with Hermes being home with the mega-cold we had to reschedule. This will be on of the rare out of the house appointments. They want to observe him outside of his 'normal environment'. Sometimes I feel like he is a forign animal. Behold, Thor, in all his splendor, climbing the furniture and stalking the all allusive peanut butter cracker! Not the shunnung of bread...but wait..He'll eat the bread if it has sloppy joe on it? Behold, The Thor, in all it's glory!
Sometimes, I thik they are doing all of these 'pre-treatment' evals, not to study him, but to study me. I get the mental image of the therapy team sitting around at a coffeeshop or bar going, "Yeah...Did you see HW2K trying to come up with a way to describe his speech patterns? How great was that! Or what about when he started talking to the toy, but ignored her completely? And remember how hopeful she seemed when we all pretended to understand him? What a hoot!!!"
I know this isn't what really goes on, but sometimes it feels that way. He is signing more, and talking to other people and things moer, but talking to me less. He gets angry when I feed him the wrong foods, but will not tell me what the right foods are, then when Hubby gets home, will show him immediately what he wanted. A good day for us is one with at least ive clearly communicated concepts. Five times of not guessing, asking, trial and error, five definatives...more, hungry, sleep, all done, monkey. If I get at least these five things, back and forth, it's fine.

Hermes starting to get bored at school. Sistah-girl was instrumental this morning on getting him ready, as for me I would just get the "I'm sick, I'm staying home!". In the car this morning we talked about the testing that is coming up. They are finally getting around to the math placement, and chinese language assesments they were going to be doing pre christmas. Hermes is happy to know that they really truely want to see how smart he is, that they really truely will let him do more math if he does math at a higher level than the other kindergateners, that htey will be very pleased with how much of the language he has learned and they truely want to know. Hermes is starting to realize he's smarter than many, and it's starting to affect his moods towards school a bit.

Buddha is starting to stand on his own, and take one or two daring unassisted steps. I must finish cleaning, I need the space for him.

I would do about anything for ten guilt free minutes alone sometimes, but I wouldn't trade any of this for the world.

quiet

It's damn cold out this morning. The wind came down from the north, making everything all frosty and needing to be warmed up. Since Sistah-girl is home, we left the older two boys, like we almost always do when she is here, but Hubby and I also left Buddha. Buddha woke up at about four thirty to have a bottle and a daiper change, so, after much debate, and after I went out to start the car warming up, we decided to leave Buddha at home, where hopefully he would stay sleeping, and not wake up screaming, this panicking everyone. I came home to absolute silence. It is close enought to the time that the boys are up on weekdays to where their bodies are naturally starting to slowly wake. Sleeping still, they are not as deep in as they were an hour ago, so if I stand by them, all I hear is the gentle intake and output of breath-no snoring, no fits and stops of dreams, no turning in the bed like a demon is after them, just quiet, peaceful sleep.

Hubby is on winter hours for at least another month and a half. Up till this point, his mondays off have either fallen on a government holiday, or on a day when I've been sick. After this monday, they'll just be another day, a day in which he can go out and get his permit, from which he will eventually get his liscence.

The silence is nnow broken-Buddha is awake and presumably unhappy at the prospect.
The quiet was nice while it lasted.

Even if there were no computer or television

Thor was supposed to have another eval today. I am rescheduling it.
Hermes woke up this morning rather warm, but I didn't think much of it at first; he is generally pretty warm first thing-he and his brothers and their poppa are all little blast furnaces when asleep. Then he told me his tummy hurt, and I was still kind of leary. After I had him come downstaris, drink some cold water, and he was still warm and achy, I still thought that maybe...just maaaaaybe, he was fine. However, when Hermes informed me that he fealt so icky that he wanted to stay home even if " we didn't have any computer or internets or television or cables or anything fun like that" I knew he was staying home. Hermes loves school, and often times will fib about feeling better than he does just to go, but after realizing that if he threw up at school he had to miss the rest of the day and the ENTIRE next day, he isbetter about telling me when he is ill. I don't yet have the same mommy radar for him being sick as I do the two other boys. With the exception of the occasional cold that would not die-Hermes has always been pretty healthy. About once a year he will come down with something that looks "Just like (insert common ailment here)", but after the Drs do a culture,take some blood, poke and prod him, etc...he is always fine....it just LOOKS like something bad. Since he's started school we have had more vomit, fevers, diarreah, colds, chills, and general aches and pains than ever before in his five years of life. Part of it is being exposed to other kids daily, especially in such a small school. The school tries to notify us of flu, strep, what have you, but when a parent just calls in junior 'sick' it makes it harder. I always give them a fairly graphic rundown of Hermes' symptoms, so if any other kid presents the same, we can alert people.
Well, it's gonna be an interesting day today, and hopefully he will be better tomorrow.

it's working

We have a morning routine, it's somewhat convoluted, somewhat malleable depending on the circumstances, but it's something all the boys know. If Sistah-girl is home, Hubby and myself wake up about fifteen minutes later than if she were gone, I through on something resembling clothes, Hubby gets dressed for work, we bundle up Buddha, I bring Hubby to work, come home, give Buddha a bottle, put him in the baby box, crash for half an hour on the couch, wake up Thor and Hermes, get Hermes dressed for school, get Thor into whatever he will let me, shuttle Hermes off to the palace of knowledge, and come home. If Sistah-girl is gone, which will also be our routine after she moves out-Hubby and I wake up 15 minutes early, toss a bottle in Buddha, get our respective selves dressed, pray that Hermes and Thor are still in their jammies, if not put them in some, bundle all into the car, bring Hubby to work, go home, trek into the house, Buddha in bok,Hermes on short couch, Thor on big couch with me, crash for half an hour, get Hermes dresses and to Palace of learning, and get home. This part of the morning, though long, is sound. The system has worked since Hermes started school. Where the issue used to arise was once we got home after dropping off Hermes. Normally, Buddha will resist sleep for a few, then crash out for a long morning nap. Thor, on the other hand, needed to figure out how to let me know if he was hungry, tired, wanted to play, wanted to play but really wanted to sleep more, etc... This morning, when we got home, I asked him, with my hero-speach accompanied by ASL- if he was hungry, or wanted to play, or wanted to sleep. He looked at me and signed sleep. I asked again, this time making sure he knew how to do the sign for hungry, and he insisted sleep. Up to his room we went, where he promptly got into bed, grabbed George The Monkey from Mexico, covered up with Nemo, and signed Thank You.

I am ecstatically pleased that my two year old can actually tell me some of his wants and needs now. Normally, at this time of the morning, I would be wildly guessing at what he wanted-was he not eating because he was tired, wanted to play, didn't want the cerial or fruit I gave him...What!!!! Now, he is starting to let me know, and it is grand!

Buddha is starting to wave now, which is sooo precious. I forgot in between Hermes and now how sweet it was to have a child do 'normal' child things. He is also starting to make the 'kissy face' which Thor is thouroughly entertained by, and they will sit for about half an hour makeing smoochy lips at each other, playing like two little kids without a care in the world.

learning process/learning style

I have been trying to teach Thor ASL. Signlanguage would give him a reliable, non-verbal way to communicate with me, or snub me, depending on his mood. I was becoming very frustrated because it didn't seem to be 'taking'. Also, as bad as this sounds, during the hours I would be trying to get him to make the sign for 'more' I would be staring at my messy messy house thinking the time could be used to clean. I feel really bad for thinking it, but better for admitting it. Sunday, as always, was bath day. In the tub, communicating with Thor is near impossible. He is happy in the tub, genuinely happy, he likes to splash, he likes to fill up the water cup and dump it back out, he likes to squeeze the spunges. The bath is a highly textile, but safe, environment for him. Oftentimes we don't know when he is done until he tries to bolt out of the tub, we still don't know how he hasn't fallen. About halfway into his normal tub-time, I asked if he wanted more, or was all-done-using the signs for both. He watched me intently, then took my hands IN his, and made me make the 'more'sign. I was pleased. We did this about every three minutes, untill he made me sign 'all-done'.
I was very pleased, but still frustrated. It is great that he will make me sign, but still not HIM signing.
Last night we are eating dinner. He starts to fuss when there are only three noddles (an odd number) left on his plate, so I ask, while signing, "All-done or more?" and HE SIGNED BACK!!! He looked at me and signed 'more' I was so pleased! I would have liked more, please, but I'll take more on it's own!!
This morning, it was nearing naptime, and I asked if he was ready for bed (with sign), no response, so I went to him and asked if he was ready to NAP(with sign-slightly different than bed), or if he wanted 'more' awake time, and used his hands (mine covering his) to make the signs. I could see the light click. He looked at me, made the sign for 'nap', grabbed his cup, and lifted his arms for up! Once again I was so pleased, as was he!

It's looking like I will save alot of time and energy on both our parts if I say something, sign it, let him 'feel' me sign it, and then 'help' him sign it. That seems to be how he gets it. I cannot wait to tell his therapists on thursday! Maybe we have something here!

Scorn for sandwiches

I have been trying to get Thor to eat meat between two slices of bread-aka a sandwich- for the last few weeks. Hasn't been happening. He used to have no problems with sandwiches, he would only eat the crust or the center bread, but he would eat them. I made him a sandwich for lunch today, and he wouldn't eat it, he pulled out the meat and cheese and ate that. I was eatin a sandwich and after he was done with his, he came over looking for a bite of mine. He took a alrge chunk, made a face, opened his mouth, removed the two, now soggy peices of bread, and deposited them squarely in the middle of my lap. He then joyfully chewed the meat and cheese, and toddled off on his merry way. Apparently, he now has a thing against bread if it has anything on it. I took some meat and folded in a dry peice of brea and he ate it, I put a little mayo on it, right out, a little butter, spit on the floor, a little mustard-spat across the room. I don't know why he now won't eat bread that is anything but dry, but then again, I don't really know why he does anything.
Since he doesn't yet become violent, angry, or inconsolable when given a spread on bread I'll keep trying. He won't do jelly, jam, or preserves anymore either. Peanut butter has a pass for now, so as long as I don't give PB to him on a spoon or celery, that should be fine.

On thursday, we meet with the SHIELD team again, to go over more stuff as we figure out what might help him, I will bring up his new aversion to moist bread, as well as his newfound attachment to his blanket. He has always had a thing for bedding, but now he will walk around the house half-hiding under the Nemo blanket. He also is starting to through himself around more when we hold him. If he crawls into our laps, it's fine, but if we pick him up unprompted, he almost gets violent, his attempt to free himself is so aggressive. I keep trying to tell myself that he will get better, and in some ways he is, but in other ways, it's deffinately getting worse.

flat bread

I've been baking. First I made cinamon rolls, which well tasty, were not rolled tight enough, so the bottoms had scorched cin-sugar on them-though tasy, not appealing to the eye. Today I made two loaves of bread, bread that rose well outside of the oven, but didn't rise in the oven, they expanded to fill the pan. They are dense, but should be tasty. I am making a second batch of rolls right now. They are turning out beautifully. I used a french pin to roll the dough, and rolled them back up nice and tight. They are currently on their second rise before the oven, but should come out perfect. Most of them are going to work with Hubby, like the last ones did. I am getting quite the rep as a good baker!

The Cold That Would Not Die

So I have this cold, or at least I think it's a cold, it comes and goes a little, but has been with me for about two weeks or so now. I honestly thought I was getting better, the sinuses were draining, The coughing was not only lessening, but when I did they were productive, and all was fairly well. Cue to this morning. I don't know if it's because of multiple nights poor sleep, the weather changes, or if I am the switching tracks for this thing before it meanders on to my kids, Hubby, SistahGirl, the rest of the world, and it just keeps coming back because I'm so mutch fun, or what. I woke up this morning, coughing, hurting throat, nose that was running so much and so fast it was a sprinting nose, and oddly, even though I hadn't drank at all yesterday, even though I drank tons of water, and only two sodas, I am dehydrated. I am drinking water now-I put it in my thermal travel mug, I figure I'll do some tea later, but I need to get thouroughly hydrated if there's any chance of my body beating this--I also need to rest...yeah...right!