Flourishing

If you've read my previous post, then you know we were in the process of moving. Well, with the awesome help of my brother-in-law and nephews on move-in day, Hubster and I are all moved in, yay!!  We are busy setting up our new little place in our new town.  Pictures are going up, boxes are going out, we're learning our way around the area, and the kiddos are having a blast.

Hubster and I felt God gave us a word about moving to our new corner of the world.  We feel like we've been in survival mode for the past three years and we were tired of being tired, tired of contending for everything in our life.  And God gave both of us the word FLOURISH to mark our time here.  Not that everything would be easy, but that this was where we could find a little more rest, a little more fruit in the kiddos progress with all the extra therapies, the amazing school Kiddo is going to, and who knows what else the flourishing entails, but we are looking forward to it.

And in fact, we see the fruit already.  Kiddo has only been in school for a week, but he is communicating so much more.   He is telling us what he learned in school.  He is telling us the things he is doing in school.  They may only be one or two word answers about what he did at school, but he is telling us.  He is excited to go to school, excited about his Minion backpack and Star Wars lunchbox with his beloved peanut butter and jelly inside, excited to play and learn and to make friends.  He's playing more with his toys and Little Brother, and not even asking for his tablet, a device he was addicted to and we needed to limit.  It's like he's becoming more aware of the world and he wants to soak it all up.  Totally random, but the other day I heard him in the bathroom and went to check on him.   I was amazed, because he was peeing standing up, toilet seat up and all, as he's always insisted on sitting to do his thing.  He saw me, grinned proudly and said "Pee stand up.  Big boy!"  Yes, Kiddo, you are right, and I'm guessing you learned this from your peers, because no matter how much we encouraged, you did not learn this big boy skill from us.  He is flourishing before our eyes, and we're only two weeks into the school year.  He started his therapies this week, so I'm expecting even more progress.  If this trend continues, well I can't imagine what he will be like on the last day of school.  :)

He may not look happy in the pictures, but Kiddo LOVES school!

I had an IEP meeting for both kiddos, and I couldn't be happier with how things are turning out.  They still need to evaluate Kiddo for PT and OT, so for now they're keeping those services at twice a month, like his previous IEP in our previous county.  But they evaluated him for speech, and they are changing it from two sessions a week for 30 minutes, to four sessions a week for 20 minutes.   Shorter, more frequent speech is what is recommended for children with apraxia, and is exactly what his new speech therapist wants for him.  So he'll essentially get twenty more minutes a week, and twice as often, woot woot!  The therapist wants to do three sessions a week of individual speech, and one session a week in the classroom, working on socially interacting with peers, responding to his teacher, etc, which I think is awesome.  I'm hopeful that the OT and PT evals indicate he qualifies for more services, but if he doesn't, he's getting a lot of opportunity to practice his skills on their playground and in the classroom.  Kiddo's teacher is great and she tells me how smart and sweet Kiddo is.  She insisted on several of his IEP goals being made a little more challenging because she's confident he can master them.  I love everything about that.

As for Little Brother, he qualified for speech twice a week.  So I will be taking him to the elementary school in our district where he will receive speech.  I'm enjoying getting some one on one time with this guy.  We've found a few awesome playgrounds, indoor play areas, and a fabulous preschool story time at the library we plan on going to weekly.

Hubster is all set to go with his grad school class this week.  And I'm registered for MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) to get to know some Christian mamas in the area.  I found it awesome to know that this years theme at MOPS is "A Fierce Flourishing."  Coincidence?  I think not.

Anyway, things are going well, we're excited about what the future has in store, and we're looking forward to flourishing fiercely.  :)

Progress Report

Whew, it's been a while since I did one of these, so I'll try and remember the inchstones and new words and phrases since the last progress report.

Kiddo:

Social: We spent an amazing two weeks with family and Kiddo seemed to blossom socially from all his fun playing with his eight cousins and other relatives. The weird thing is, we didn't see it as much while we were there, but we do now.  He is now calling his friends by name, and when he sees pictures of his cousins will call them by name.  He also now calls Little Brother by his name, rather than "Baby" as he has for the past several years.  He is starting to respond to peers too, when they talk to him.  Before he seemed oblivous to them talking to him, so huge progress there.

Kiddo with his cousins--all born in 2010. :)

Gross Motor: It's taken me three years to find a good pediatric physical therapist, but FINALLY, I found one, a good 45 minutes away, and she is truly AMAZING.  Within one session she had taught Kiddo how to get up on tiptoes, and within two sessions, Kiddo was alternating his feet on stairs.  The two weeks we were visiting family, he had lots of practice alternating feet on stairs, as we were on the third floor of a hotel.  We encouraged the alternating of feet by prompting him with "One-two-one two! (without the prompting he doesn't alternate his feet).  He's doing so much better on stairs, and next time we're around a staircase I'll get a video.

Fine Motor: He is still not holding writing utensils properly, but is now coloring items on a coloring page rather than just scribbling all over it. Sometimes he picks really random things to color, like at church this Sunday they were to color a picture of Jesus walking with his disciples, and Kiddo only colored the plant and the sun.  But still, he's coloring, rather than just scribbling, which is awesome.

Speech: Wow, this kid has so much stuff to say now.  I wish I could even remember it all, but life is so busy I don't even have time to write down the conversations we have.  Yes, conversations!

Biggest articulation improvement is he is now including more final consonant sounds.  Words that end in p and t sometimes d he's including those ending sounds.  He's also getting better at changing consonant sounds, rather than repeating them.  Example: potty used to be poppy but now has the d sound in the middle, whoo hoo!  However, he's had so much practice switching consonant sounds that he's doing it in words where they stay the same.  Example, I'm now "Moppy!"  And yes, always with an exclamation point.  I can't wait to be Mommy again, regardless of whether it has an exclamation point or not.

Biggest speech/communication improvement is he is now using verbs.  They usually have to do with what Little Brother is doing, as Kiddo thinks it's his job to report on Little Brother's activities.  Some examples include:

Little Brother's name + ______
Throw toys.
Close door.
Loud noise.  (aka, Little Brother is screaming)
Cry.
Sleep.


Some conversations (though these are not his pronunciations, just what he's trying to say)

Me: Look, it's a roly poly!  If you touch it it will roll up into a ball, because it's scared.
Kiddo: Yeah.  Wake up bug!
Me: It'll wake up when it's not scared anymore.
Kiddo: Eat leaves?
Me: Yes, I think it eats leaves and grass.
Kiddo: Bee eat honey.
Me: Yes, they eat nectar from flowers to make honey.
Kiddo: Butterfly eat flower.
Me: Oh, yeah, they eat the nectar from flowers.  Like bees.
Kiddo:  Yeah.  Bug wake up!  Eat leaves!

Me: Time to pray.
Kiddo: No pray!
Me: Yes, we always pray before bed.
Kiddo: Mommy, Daddy, (Kiddo's Name), (Brother's name), Jesus!
(those are the things he always thanks God for, but usually in fill in the blank format: "Thank you God for ____."  Way to rush the praying there, Kiddo.)

Kiddo: (spotting the toddler bed we had bought for Little Brother)  Big boy bed!
Me: Yes.  It's a big boy bed for Little Brother, just like you have.
Kiddo: Yeah.  Big boy.  Little Brother--little boy.
Me: Oh.  Yeah, Little Brother is a little boy and you're a big boy.
Kiddo: Yeah.  Daddy big big boy.

Hubster: I've gotta go to work, to fix the robots.  (He works with computers, but always talks to Kiddo about his work using robot references, since Kiddo is so into robots).
Kiddo: Robots sick?
Hubster: Well, they fell down. I have to help them up, make them feel better.
Kiddo: Robots get up!
Hubster: I'll help them up.  It might take them awhile.
Kiddo: Ok.
(Later, when Hubster returns)
Kiddo: Robots up?
Hubster: Nope, they're still down.  But I'm helping them up.
Kiddo: Ok.  No robots down.


Little Brother:

Behavior: Little Brother has some hyperactivity/impulsive issues that Kiddo's OT was noticing and recommended we get him evaluated for sensory processing disorder.  He also is terrified of water, and whether it's fear or sensory related, we do not know, but we're getting him evaluated in a few weeks by Kiddo's OT.  I've started using Peace and Calming essential oil on him and it does seem to be calming him down.  He has less temper tantrums and is hitting and throwing toys less.  He's much more enjoyable to be around lately. :)

Speech: I got Little Brother formally evaluated by Kiddo's private speech therapist.  She admits that apraxia is a possibility but it's too early to tell yet.  She diagnosed him with "severe expressive delay, mild receptive delay, and moderate articulation delay."  His behavior made it rough for her to finish the evaluation so we agreed that private therapy is not a good idea for now, until we get his behavior issues figured out.  So we'll continue the twice a month speech with Ms. Blessing in our home through Early Intervention, which he'll get until he turns three (in August).

I attended Little Brother's transition meeting yesterday.  He will receive speech therapy services through the school like Kiddo, when he turns three.  Now I have two kiddos with IEPs, fun times, but whatever we have to do to help them, we will do. :)

Little Brother's speech seems to be totally taking off lately.  He repeats a lot of two to three word phrases we say.  Sometimes they sound clear, sometimes, not so much.

New words and phrases:
apple
grapes
I know
bubble
It's a _____
One-two-one two  (this is how he counts after our stairs experience with Kiddo.  Even if I say One he'll say one, I'll say two, he'll say two, I'll say three, he'll say one, I'll repeat three, he'll say two, etc.  Gotta work on this)
color
Me! (when he sees himself in the mirror)
moon (which is for both the sun and the moon in books)

Academic skills: He can identify body parts, lots of animals and their sounds, and several shapes (circle, triangle, star, square and rectangle).  Naming colors is either a concept he doesn't grasp or doesn't care about, though his favorite color is definitely red.  (Any time he colors, he always starts with red, and sometimes will only color with red.)  Counting is also something we're working on, so far he only counts to two.  Puzzles though, he's a champ at.  This kid loves puzzles, and sometimes can sit for twenty minutes, doing the same puzzle over and over again.