Taking the Scenic Route

This is one of Zane’s first phrases, and it has stayed this way since he first uttered them.  It is his way of asking somebody to play with him, usually a game of some sort.

Today when Zach and I were standing in the kitchen talking after he got home from work, we hear an enthusiastic voice ask “TWO PLAYERS!” and, without missing a beat, I said “please wait a minute Zora, we are talking right now”, and continued on for another three words and suddenly Zach and I realized that it was the wrong kid using the phrase and just started laughing so hard. 

She is going to grow up bilingual…english and zane-ish. 

Today when I was having Zane do a sequencing task during homeschooling, I was pulled away for a bit by Zora and left him on his own to work on the task. When I turned back to him, he looked up at me and asked, pointing, “is that right?” on a section. Woah. It is hard to act like it is the most normal question in the world when it is the first time he has asked it. lol. (getting too excited when he makes a verbal leap tends to make him retreat…acknowledging it is fine (and I did), but making too big of a deal backfires bigtime.)

Imagine my utter shock when Zane came up and asked me this today while I was starting some soup for supper, and again later when I was adding turnip greens to the soup. And again later when I was rolling out pie dough.

I think he asked me that a total of five times today. He has NEVER asked me that before, but went out of his way to see what I was doing and ASK ME. Woah. Very cool.

Even cooler…he waited and listened to my answer, and sometimes asked again (which I realized was his way of asking for more information, not just re-asking the same question).

He also tried to change his own pull-up today (a poopy one) and wipe himself. He did this once or twice when he did the enzymes, but never since. In fact, he usually denies a dirty pullup because it annoys him to stop what he is doing to be changed. He just doesn’t care if it needs to be changed. Today he cared enough to do it himself. I hope this is a trend. Until he has more solid stools, I can’t take him out of pull-ups, but I have been trying for YEARS to get him to treat pullups like underwear so that we can at least not go through as many of them and get him on the road to learning how to use the bathroom, but he has never really cared before. This is new, and it is good.

I think we will definitely keep up the Nystin and probably move to doing a systemic anti-yeast sometime in the coming weeks. Oh, and probiotics too. He isn’t eating yogurt with any reliability now days, so I will have to get a supplement for him, but I have two that look good right now and will be trying one of them as soon as he is off the antibiotics for the ear infection. Maybe we are finally on our way to solving the bowel issues. I hope.

instead of saying “yes”, she says “dat” (that).  Every time.  lol 

Zach and the thesis

Thesis is DONE.  He might have more revisions, although he has already completed the first round of revisions wanted by his thesis advisor.  (he wanted him to change something that would make it more usable for him (the advisor) in his project, which makes it more publishable).  Right now, it looks like he might not be able to defend it before the Spring graduation deadline.  It works for everybody on the committee except the head of the department.  We are now aiming for before graduation so that he can be technically done with all of his degree requirements before he walks, even if the degree won’t be conferred until the Summer semester.  At this point it is out of our hands.  If the defense date gets pushed beyond graduation, it won’t likely happen until the end of summer because his thesis advisor is leaving the area for the summer, so we really hope that won’t happen.

Zach and employment

No real news.  He has an “interview” for the same job he has had the last few years, for another 1 year contract.  woohoo.  No summer teaching jobs are available right now.  No summer jobs available anywhere that we have found yet.

No word from the job he wants in the south.  It is a federal job and it can take a long time to process everything, but we are still hopeful of getting it.  He is going to talk to the temp agencies tomorrow again to see if they have anything.  He is also expanding his job search to KC and OK City besides Wichita, but we hope that we don’t have to move unless it is the job down south.  Mostly, I hope we can just hear something good soon.

Church stuff

It is going well.  This week Zane went with his class to the big group (they have a group story time in a theatre/auditorium area with grades K-5 before breaking up into individual classrooms).  He sat better than most of his classmates (they put him in the 1st grade class instead of the kindergartners…the plan is to keep him in the 1st grade classroom next fall also, so he will be with his own age then but be used to the classroom already.  The Kinder kids have a slightly different schedule than everybody else, so getting him used to this when it will be changing soon seemed like a better idea).  He was participating in the activities in an appropriate way, and his “buddy/para” is a nurse and seems to really ”get” him.  I am very happy with how it is going.

There was a funny moment with Zora this week.  I dropped her off at the desk this week, and they took her to the classroom.  Because Zane and I are starting our day in the office instead of the classroom, right after I dropped her off and filled out the forms at the desk, we walked past Zora’s classroom.  (normally people can’t walk back there for security reasons).  As I walked down the hall, a teacher poked her head out of the classroom to say that “I don’t know her…are you sure she has been going here for several weeks already?”.  I turned to the person and asked if they were talking about Zora…they were…I looked up and realized they put her in the 1yo classroom.  I pointed out that she is 2, almost 2.5, not one, and the situation was resolved.  Later, when I passed by again, I took a close look into the two year old classroom and noted that she really was a lot smaller than her classmates.  lol. I am still not used to being the parent of a petite person. 

I still haven’t had the opportunity to talk to the pastor about the disgusting sermon he gave last week.  I was planning on talking to him a little after church, but when I took Zane out to the playground in between services, I failed to notice that the rain had settled on the bottom of the dirty slides, and Zane slide right through it.  His entire back of his pants were muddy and gross, and I didn’t have an extra set of clothes, so we just went home.  I think I will call this week and see if he has a time he can meet during the week.

Zane and his reading tests

He took the Woodcock and the RAN/RAS (and maybe something else too…I will have to wait until I get the written report to see if I missed it).  He did fairly well.

For word identification he is at 96% for his age, and considered to be working at the level of a kid in grade 2, 1st month.  For decoding/silly words/word attack he is at 91% for his age, working at 3rd grade, 0 month level.  For Passage comprehension he is at 64% for his age, and at 1st grade, 0 months.  His receptive language 1 word recognition is at 21% in his age level, and he is working at the age of a 5yo,2mo level (a bit more than a year behind).   With the Rapid naming (how fast you can “read” a line of letters, numbers, colors, symbols in various combinations he was average and above average for his age.  He is working in the range of 1st grade, 2nd month to 2nd grade, 7th month for those tests.

So, as expected, his reading level is high for a kindergartner, but his direct language skills are behind.  (but receptive language not as behind as I thought they might be…a year behind is really not terrible given that is expressive language is quite a bit farther behind…he probably isn’t much more than a 3yo for a lot of his expressive language, if I judge where he is compared to Zora.  She is actually ahead in nonverbal language I would guess, and just on his heels for a lot of the verbal.  I suspect she will overtake his expressive language within a short span here).  The biggest thing we have to really keep an eye on is his comprehension, but we knew that. 

One of the things I do that I need to continue, and probably expand, is pull out vocabulary words in the things he is learning and make a visual reference card for the vocabulary word.  (I take words and find pictures that match it and have him glue them to an index card with the word on it to help him learn the word better).   Google is my friend in this project…I love the ability to google images. 

It sounds like it is probably time to start trying to find chapter books for him.  They said the “captain underpants” books are probably too high a level at this point, but maybe the “boxcar children” books might be ok. (I remember loving those as a kid…it will be interesting to see if I like them as an adult) ”Junie B Jones” was also mentioned.  I wonder if the first Little House books would interest him…I know the first ones are at a much lower reading level than they are later in the series.  If anybody has other suggestions, I would welcome them.  I haven’t really had time to look through books at the higher reading levels yet.

A few pictures

 Watching Daddy outside

 

During Speech Therapy..A Little Sailor Boy, pulling his boat behind him

src="http://www.takingscenicroute.com/wp-content/gallery/z143148260.jpg" alt="x2008-04-24 018.jpg" width="400" />

 

My view of him at ST (unless I am watching from behind a 2-way mirror)

Putting Yarn on a Yak (guess what letter they are working with.)

Discovering the joys of music in the headphones.

 

First Zane. 

Not so much “cute” as sort of amazing.  Today when Zach was getting the kids out of the car at Dillons, he first unbuckled Zane, expecting him to climb out of the seat and the car.  He went around and undid Zora, and Zane had unthreaded his arms, but hadn’t gotten out of the seat.  Zach told him to get out of the car, and Zane said “I’m waiting for Zora”.  It sounds so normal, but it was the first time he had said anything like that.  Yeah Zane!

Now Zora. 

“toot” = cute
“d, d” (along with the ’sign’ of holding out her palm and drawing with her pointer finger) = draw
“why why” = water
“d, d” = donuts, if they are seen in the house
“eat” (with ’sign’ of pointing to her teeth, and getting right in your face) = of course, eat. “eye” is also said correctly
“moof” = mouth
“node” = nose (said like you have a really bad cold)
“die-ya, die-ya” = daddy, when he is in Zane’s room (not sure why she just says it those times though, the rest of the time it is daddy)
“butt” (along with the ’sign’ of holding her hands out like a steering wheel and opening and closing her fists) = buttons? wants to play a video game with daddy and Zane…actually, hold the controller so she thinks she is playing a game)

all animals, except dog, are called by their sound instead of name.  If you try and correct her, she gives you a look like you have grown two heads.  so…

“baa, baa” = sheep
“nay nay” = horse
“quack quack” = chicken/duck/bird in general I think
“unk unk” = pig

And the one I know we will look back at fondly, but by the end of the day I am soooooo tired of hearing is “stuck”, said as “tuck” about half the time.  It is used for the obvious situations, when something gets stuck on something, or her foot gets caught in something, ect.  However, it is also used for when she wants us to get up and do something…if we aren’t up *right now*, she pulls on our hands and declares us “stuck”.  Or when I am on the phone, and she wants the phone and tries to grab it from me and I don’t let go, it is “stuck”, or if the door won’t close completely, or won’t open, or she can’t move a chair, or get clothes off, or she wants the baby gate in Zane’s room moved so she can get in there, or she wants out of the car seat…she is “stuck”.  *sigh*

And finally, today Zora shocked the heck out of Zach (and me when he told me).  He was wearing his “Google” shirt and she came up to him, points to the letters and says:  “gee, oh, oh, gee, llll (the sound), eat”.  *jawdrop* (and a giggle at “eat” for “e”) I know where Zane figured out the letters at this age (actually younger) because he was obsessed with letters and was writing out the alphabet and said the letters by this age, but he had the luxury of being the first child and had parents who had time to sit with just him for hours on end.  Zora doesn’t get that as much, and isn’t obsessed with the alphabet, so it was a total shocker to hear that coming out of her mouth.  Maybe I will have two early readers.

 

Sarah Ariella wrote a great post on IEP process and the problems faced when dealing with the education of her son.  I could identify with a LOT of it.  I think the biggest, most discouraging, thing I could identify with is the overall attitude of unwillingness to see the gifts and strengths, nor the desire to put in the effort to really push ds.  I don’t think it is everybody, and I don’t think it is limited to just SN kids, but it was there.  I knew what it felt like to have people push him and recognize who he is because I was getting that at WSU and Heartsprings.  It is intangible, but probably the single most important thing for any child in their education. 

---

Fee has a neat post about Bedeism, and instead of leaving a blog in her comments, I thought I would share some Zaneisms, also computer related.  (no surprise, since both Bede and Zane are accomplished on the computer) 

“Next Level” - means he wants to do something again, usually also means he wants to modify it some way or make it more challenging.
“2 Player!” (or 3 player, 4 player, ect) – means he wants you to play a game with him
“click on it” – means “look at that” or to press some button
In a funny coincidence (probably heavily influenced by parents who buy candy on clearance sales) the day she posted about Bede wanting a “J” candy cane, Zane was bugging us all day for “stick candy”, which we finally determined was the stick candy canes we have up in the shelves.

eta:

“Oops!  Try Again!” is said with the same intonation by both boys…we figured out it comes from an educational internet site they both like (when I think of the name of the site, I will add it, but I am having a brain fart right now)

Examples of Functional Echolalia. 

---

KAKE, the local ABC affiliate, did finally post his video in their video links.  (on the right side of the page, but will probably have to scroll to see it if you don’t see it right away.

Little Helpers

The kids are helping with laundry.  Zane seems to be the most enthusiastic about helping load the washer, and these days I need to remember to check if there is something in there when I start a load to avoid having a red shirt buried under all the whites and other potential problems.  Zora, on the other hand, is most enthusiastic about the dryer.  On a recent load, as I was unloading the dryer, I noticed as I pulled out the first shirt, two dryer sheets came out with it.  I didn’t think much of it, until I pulled out the second piece of clothes and another 3 or 4 dryer sheets came out with it.  Uh oh.  There had to be 30 or 40 dryer sheets in that load and the box of dryer sheets was empty.   The clothes had so much fabric softener on them they were probably waterproof.  lol.  Yesterday I bought another thing of dryer sheets and Zora couldn’t talk me into opening them, so she went to Grandma.  (they were here helping us pick up a mattress set for Zane in their bigger vehicle)  Grandma opened them, Zora grabbed a handful and ran to the dryer.  We put the rest up and I will need to store them up much higher now.

They are also helping with unloading the dishwasher, but since Zora isn’t tall enough to actually see into the drawers, it makes for some interesting sorting at times.  If Zane is in there he gets really upset when he sees her just chucking the silverware over the edge and not putting it into the proper slots and has designated himself as the “fixer” of the drawers.

 

New Bed

Zane has needed a new mattress set for some time.  When we bought his mattress we were dirt poor and couldn’t afford anything but the absolutely rock bottom cheapest set they had.  (and that was a stretch financially).  He keeps trying to go to sleep on Zora’s bed.  (the only reason Zora got the nicer mattress is because I still lay with her to put her to bed and Zane’s mattress is too cheap and noisy and I was honestly a little afraid I would break it and I couldn’t get out of that bed without a lot of noise).  Yesterday we got him a new mattress.  He was over the moon.  In the store when we went to get a few other items, he kept making sure we didn’t forget the bed.  That night, after the “God Bless….” he did the “Thank you for…” and included a big thank you for the bed.  lol.  He also had a thank you for showers.  Not sure where that came from, but it was sort of cute.

 

Cute

Zora is really excited about clothes and wants to change outfits several times a day (an hour sometimes).  Of course, she also likes running around stark naked too.  lol.  That is the most frustrating thing about doing laundry…if she sees me messing with clothes, she wants to try everything on and it is a real challenge to keep the clean clothes in the drawers.  It doesn’t help that the laundry pile is next to her dressers, which means I am probably washing a lot of “had it on for 30 seconds” clothes over and over again.  Oh, and when she brings you clothes, she holds them up saying they are “toot”  (cute).  Funny girl.

 

A conversation or two.

I was playing a nintendo game with Zane in his room one afternoon.  When one game ended, I wanted to leave to go do something else.  As I got up, explaining that I needed to go do something, Zane said “Where are you going Mama?”  It had such perfect intonation that I was halfway through my answer before I realized that Zane asked the question.  I told him I was going to do dishes….is that ok?  He said “No”.  I asked “What do you want me to do?”  He said:  “Play Mario Cart with me”.  So I did.  An actual conversation, with sentences you didn’t have to interpret.  Wow.

And about an hour ago he wanted to go outside, so I helped him get bundled up (although he put the boots on).  Zach went out with him since it is super slick outside.  As I stood in the door watching him, he looked up at me and said “It’s slippery Mama!” as he slid around on the patio and grass. 

He is really making some amazing gains.  It is clicking for him.

First, he is feeling better and nobody else has caught whatever he had.  *knock on wood*

Now for the funny thing:

Zane, in typical big brother fashion, has begun name calling when Zora irritates him.  What name do you think a verbally delayed kid would call his little sister in such a situation?   He emphatically states “UNDERWEAR!” at her. 

We have NO idea where that came from, but it is really hard to keep a straight face when we hear “UNDERWEAR!  UNDERWEAR! UNDERWEAR!” being said in his exasperated little voice. 

He has some sort of stomach thing going on tonight.  This evening, about a half an hour before bed, he walked downstairs where I was with Zora, and puked all over the place.  I managed to grab a plastic box to catch the last of it, but most of it was all over the stairs and landing.  Zach was just finishing up a “bath to relax” (that didn’t work out so well) and the tub still had warm water in it, so we just took him over to that tub and washed him off.  He has spent the evening on the couch, except for standing up in panic when he is either about to puke or, as the most recent development, when we got to him in time and were holding the box under his mouth to catch the puke, he had explosive runs.  Wrong end.  Poor guy.  As we were asking if he needed to puke (and following him with the box, that he kept dodging) he kept saying “no! no! and crying.  Finally, as it was too late to do anything, he said “Diaper!, diaper!” in tears. 

We got him to the toilet post-problem, to see if he needed to finish up (no such luck) and told him how proud we were of him that he got up so it wasn’t as messy and was able to tell us.  It was a pretty miserable situation, but he at least recognized what was going on, even if he couldn’t get the words from his brain to his mouth in time. 

I just feel so bad for him.  He is so miserable.  He tried so hard to let us know something was going on but wasn’t able to, but he tried.  I wish this were easier for him.  It just breaks my heart.

 

On the other end of the spectrum, we have Zora, who was pointing at Zane behind me when he came downstairs, with the weirdest look on her face.  I turned around to see Zane puking.  As I was gently leading him to the tub (downstairs), I looked back to make sure Zora wasn’t playing in the resulting mess to see her pretending to “puke” into the box.  If there could be anything funny in the midst of this, that was it.