Halloween 2013

Remy was Darth Vader this year. His interest in Star Wars comes more from the Angry Birds game than the movies but they don't make Angry Birds Star Wars costumes. ;)

Baby on Board

I couldn't believe it when I came here to the blog and saw that I hadn't updated since July! I think that may be a record for me. I have a good excuse though, I got pregnant in August and have been laying low while I waited out the morning sickness and 1st trimester exhaustion. Fortunately, I am 15 weeks pregnant now and feeling so much better. Here is an ultrasound image from week 12:

 

Isn't that a beautiful baby? I can hardly believe it. This is my 6th pregnancy and only the second one to make it this far so I am beyond grateful. At 35 years old I am considered of "advanced maternal age," so they have been carefully monitoring this pregnancy and so far it has been smooth sailing. Now that I am feeling so much better I will try to update more often.

July Sketches

Remy Listening to OneRepublic, Then and Now

Remy a month or two after his first birthday, enjoying his favorite album.


A much more mobile Remy enjoying the same bit of music two years later, aged 3.
 

Remy Reading

There was a time, not so long ago, when I thought everything Remy learned would have to be painstakingly broken down and taught to him with great deliberateness and care. I worried quite a bit about what his communication difficulties and his developmental delays would mean for his future. Then he goes and teaches himself how to read. This child is teaching me so much about possibilities, assumptions, hope, and perseverance.



I am guessing he can read 100 words, but it could be a lot more than that.

Green Valley Ranch Stay-cation

I think we may have a real family tradition going here! In May we had our third stay at Green Valley Ranch Resort and Casino just 30 minutes from home. The beautiful "backyard" area makes it a much more restful and family friendly destination than you usually think of when you think Las Vegas. It was our best vacation experience with Remy by far. We started preparing him for it a couple of weeks in advance; showing him pictures, explaining to him that he would be sleeping at the hotel, reminding him how to act at a restaurant, etc. It paid off. He slept well all three nights, he was (mostly) a champ at the restaurants, he loved the pool, and he is already talking about going back!

My favorite parts:

• Sharing Ross's Gumbo (if it wasn't Gumbo it was a lot like it!) and a glass of Riesling at the Oyster Bar.
• Breakfast with Mommo and Poppo at Grand Cafe - excellent pancakes and coffee!
• Snagging some good deals on school clothes for Remy at the Gymboree in the cute little shopping area next to the hotel.
• The view from our window! Mountains, city lights, and the highway curving gracefully to the West.
• Having nothing to do but lounge by the pool with a good book while Ross played with Remy (and every other kid in the pool.) 
• That we were there during on off week and never felt crowded (except the five minutes we spent in line for the buffet, we said screw this and went to the deli instead.) 
• The smell of the GVR shower gel - citrusy and herby. I think they make it onsite at the spa and it brings back memories of our previous stays. 
• Seeing Remy down a giant slice of cheese pizza by himself. He's eating like a big boy these days.
• The fact that Mommo and Poppo were there to enjoy it with us. The more generations the merrier!  

Remy is Three!

Remy turned three on Sunday, which was also Mothers Day. How perfect is that? It was Remy's first real birthday party - small but much bigger than the little visit to the park with Mommo and Poppo that we did the first two years. It went so well; he was just over the moon the entire time. He got terrific presents from everyone including a five pack of Ferrari Hot Wheels, a remote control Lightning McQueen, a balance bike, and a hand crafted Angry Bird. He has been asking for presents every day since!

It's early days, I know, but I think I am already getting a taste of what summer is going to be like with a three year old and buckle your seatbelts folks cause it's going to be all go!

What's Up

Spring is here and exciting things are in the air!

• We had a big meeting with the school district to figure out the best way to help Remy now that he has graduated out of the Early Intervention program. We decided that Remy will continue with 7.5 hours of ABA a week over the summer and then in the fall he will start preschool full time in the special program for kids on the autism spectrum. It sounds like a wonderful program where ABA methods are heavily incorporated and 2-3 neurotypical kids are in the classroom to model age appropriate socialization and behavior to the ASD kiddos. Everyone involved was so professional and so focused on the best outcomes for Remy that we left the meeting without any doubts that we had made the right choice. How often does that happen? 
• Being an owner of a sophisticated (euphemism for overly complicated and difficult to understand) heated inground pool/spa combo with waterfall feature is not something that you get good at overnight. It's like this giant (lovely) petri dish with lots of plumbing and moving parts, half of which are currently busted. Buying a Kreepy Krauly (like a mechanical bottom feeder) to do the daily scrubbing for us has been a great move. The pool looks good and at last check the chemical balance is pretty good too. Now if we can just get the heater working!  
• The neighbors Jasmine is in bloom and the smell is intoxicating. I love sitting out in the backyard around sunset and breathing in the romantic scent as the clouds turn pink and lavender. 
• I have a new niece! Noah and Lauren welcomed their second child, Lucy, into the world a couple of weeks ago. She's a peach! Mom and Dad are going back to IL on Tuesday to meet her.  
• Remy's third birthday is on Sunday. We're doing a thing but I am hesitant to call it a birthday party. When the neighbor kids across the street had a birthday party it involved loads of guests and renting a jump house. I can't compete with that.  What I can do is cake, balloons, chips, beer, and some gifts for birthday boy.  Take it or leave it.  
• I am super ready for a vacation. Our last vacation was three nights at the GVR with the Stangers last fall and it was awesome but not very long as far as vacations go. I am ready to get out of the house and do something different for a week or so. The question is how far can you go and how much can you alter the familiar before it becomes overwhelming for Remy and thus much more work than it is worth for his mama!  I am sure we'll figure it out.  
• Hope everyone is having a wonderful spring and looking forward to a long hot summer!  

First Rose

This picture is from last week, we have a lot more going on in the garden since then, but I have yet to get pictures. Anyway, I think such a fat yellow rose has to be a good omen!

World Autism Awareness Day

With as many as 1 in 50 school aged children now diagnosed with Autism the number of families unaffected by this condition are becoming fewer and fewer. Autism has brought many blessings into our lives but we would be sugar coating things if we didn't acknowledge that there are many struggles and obstacles these kids will deal with that no parent wants to see their child face. Please go out to your local Home Depot today and buy the official blue light bulb. Proceeds go to support Autism Speaks. Then, tonight, you can shine your blue light to show that we will not simply shrug our shoulders and ignore this problem and the children it affects.

10 Things We Know About Autism That We Didn't Know a Year Ago

5 Years!

On March 15th we celebrated our 5 year wedding anniversary. In a wonderful turn of events, my sister Valerie, who was a matron of honor in the wedding and who I hadn't seen since that day, was in town that week and we all went for a wonderful lunch at the Yard House and a trip to Red Rock Canyon.

Thinking back on my wedding day the first thing I remember is just the delirious happiness I felt. I have never smiled so much in my life as I did on that day! Our wedding ceremony and reception were held in the Elgin rec center, but to me it might as well have been a ballroom at the Ritz, it all felt so magnificent. The decorative cake utensils from Walmart gleamed like freshly polished silver, the centerpieces constructed from beaded wire we found at Michaels glittered and gleamed as if enchanted by fairies, instead of the regular shyness I usually feel with people, a kind of sweet love seemed to flow back and forth and swirl around the room.  I don't know what other people who were there experienced, but to me it was truly a blessed day.

What's Up

Holy moley, it's been a long time since I blogged! I need to get back into the habit because I am pretty sure I am going senile and when the ol' memory is completely gone I want to be able to look back and read about Remy learning to talk and what happened on Doctor Who in season 7. So here is what is up!

•  Remy is coming up on  his third birthday and so we are working on making the transition from Early Intervention to pre-school a smooth one.  I took him in for his school district evaluation a couple of weeks ago but they weren't able to come to a consensus on his autism. The speech therapist thought it was a misdiagnosis but the psychologist and nurse were "100% convinced" it was the correct diagnosis. So two school district psychologists are coming out in a couple of weeks to repeat the ADOS and we will see how that goes. The reason the speech therapist doubts autism is because Remy's eye contact and "joint attention" (desire to have those around him notice what he is noticing) are very, very good where usually these are two of the most obvious signs of autism.  It is my personal opinion that the reason Remy is so strong in these areas is because he received special help for these skills before he was two years old, while his mind was still quite flexible. I think if more kids got this training at such a young age they would see similar results.  
•  Remy's speech is blossoming at such an amazing rate. Is this what neuro-typical kids experience when they start to talk? I don't really have a reference point but all I know is that every day he is surprising us with new words, and better and better sentences.  
• Remy loves to sing. He can sing his alphabet really well and gives the good old college try to Twinkle, Twinkle and Row, Row, Row your Boat.  He also loves to dance and drum and has great rhythm.  
• Remy can read many words: cat, dog, dad, mom, vacuum, mop, car, Lorax, Ford, Dodge, Bissell, Hoover, McDonald's, up, upright, dirt, pet, keep, go, toy, stop, duck, moon, kid, on, off, box, shoes, eat, socks, ball, cup, train, truck... And he doesn't just recognize them in familiar forms like a logo or a flash card, I have seen him read many of these words in upper case or lower case, hand written or a variety of fonts. 
• Now that he is talking more, echolalia is becoming evident. This is a common issue with kids on the autism spectrum. While Remy is getting really good at telling others about his interests (vacuum cleaners, cars) or exciting things that happen to him (a boo-boo or a trip to the store) he has a hard time responding to questions or carrying on a back and forth conversaion.  For example yesterday his OT asked him "do you want to kick or crash?" and Remy's response was "kick or crash!" She had to ask him three times before he could indicate kick.  When you say "bye Remy!" he will usually respond "bye Remy!" If you say "is this a ball?" his answer is "ball." I hope that as his fluecy in language increases we will see the echolalia fade. 
• We love the house and the neighborhood, but the HOA? Not so much. Our house is not what I would call shabby but they have sent us violation notices twice now, once for the shutters and once for the eaves, so we have to spend all this money to repaint them when what I really want to do is fix the pool heater so I can use the hot tub for my fibromyalgia. Annoying as heck.  
• We bought a season pass to Springs Preserve so I hope that I will take full advantage of it this year! They have so many great things for Remy to do, and art, gardening and cooking classes for adults as well! 

Well, that's a good update for now, I will try to check in with the blog again soon!