Balance

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We drive home from school after a quick check of the daily school reports. These notes are invaluable to give a parent a heads up. This lets me know that my older son has exhausted his words bank and that my younger son had a frightfully good day. I encourage frightfully good day to tell us all the details and let the empty bank re-couperate. For some unknown reason there is an excessively high count of "nit wits" on the road, who unfortunately, are also driving. I need to concentrate on his words. I need to concentrate on the nit wits. We pull up to the stop light and another car with open windows. Everyone turns as one and lifts their hands to their ears to examine the occupants, drawn by the 50 decibel musak. We all observe the same thing about this possibly typical family. The driver is a woman who chats on her cell phone, loudly. The small child in the front seat plays with his Nintendo DS. The two larger children in the back seat watch a DVD of cartoons and eat. We drive off with the green light whilst they are still static. I grit my teeth for the inevitable questions:- how come other children are allowed to play electronics when it’s not 5:30, how come other children get to watch the telly any time they like, how come we have to starve in the car for the 7 minute drive home, why do we always have to talk about our day, why do we have to do chores and homework before electronics, …………….but there aren’t any, just a statement,

“I wanna go and live wiv dem.”

Cheers dears

Let me know if the new little share button below works and I think my "Etsy" is up and running, I hope.

2 by 4 and other roadblocks

It’s a pretty ordinary kind of a day once they’ve all headed off for school. I strip two beds and start the laundry, nip out into the garden to plants a couple of packets of sunflower seeds, throw a couple of pots, bake a pair of loaves, take the dog for his customary two hour’s walk, fix two sprinkler heads, trim a couple of pots, carve one, attempt un-blurry photographs of said pots, return to supper preparations. As I peel potatoes at the sink I have the chance to listen to the radio on NPR where Michael Krasny interviews Germaine Greer about her latest fascinating book called Shakespear’s Wife, Anne Hathaway. My hands peel but by brain is back in Merry olde England, the trials of serfs, the division of labour, women’s rights and a whole slew of ancient memories of when I had a fully functioning brain when the phone rings.

The school requests collection of one ever so slightly, physically dented child.

I suspend all productivity and hare off to the school, then to the doctor, the radiologist and finally the Chemist for a sling. No permanent damage except to our finances and to her pride for apparently playing soccer with her hands!

This is why I shall never be an intellectual. Maybe I should buy the book?

Dog Therapy

My older son is a boy of few words. He rarely fills the world with idle chatter but it takes all sorts when it comes to the autism spectrum.

He has been known to wax lyrical on occasions, usually on the subject of Pokemon and more recently Spore, but other than that his silence is particular and dogged. That said, there is a particular dog, his own, who has an undue influence upon him. The influence of Thatcher the dog is all too apparent as we walk the ten minute trip to his first puppy training lesson. As we trot down the road I prepare my son for the hour of tuition, what to expect. I know what to expect because I have already spent six weeks attending the very same class with Thatcher and my daughter. Now it is his turn, my sons.

I worry that the trainer uses more words in the average lungful of breath than many an average Californian. The trainer has a warm and attractive personality. She says the same thing many times and in many different ways which is fabulous for the average learner, but for the differently abled her words are a sea of jumble, verbiage to be tuned out. My only hope is one of her even more advantageous skills. She models the desired behaviour that she teaches with a dog. Forget the words, concentrate on the body movements because my son’s mimicry skills are second to none.

I think these thoughts as I trot next to my son who hangs on to the end of the lead with Thatcher’s long strides on the other end, just enough rope to hang himself. I exude calm over silent panic but of course he’s far more astute than I give him credit for as he hauls the lead into a heel. He pauses, breathless next to Thatcher, poised in a perfect sit. All of a sudden his word bank bursts open with a torrential flood of "reassurance," “iz okay Thatcher, you’d gonna do great, you’re gonna make lots of friends, I’m gonna be there to help you, you’re gonna love the teacher, I’ve got lotsa treats for you, Kindergarten ain’t so bad…….” He continues in this vein for a full 7 minutes of uninterrupted, stutter free syllables until we reach the entrance door. Never say never my friends, we have a pal for life.

The R Word

Please Scroll down for Wordless Wednesday

Superheroes

Guess what we watched this weekend?

If you enjoy caption competitions and photographs, you may wish to nip along to"DJ Kirkby" over at "Chez Aspie" and test your brain power.

Meanwhile I'm still struggling with international postage rates as $45 to the UK is daylight robbery as far as I'm concerned. I may have to limit myself to the good ole US of A initially and expose myself as the tendentious, ethnocentric nincompoop that I really am!

Business unplanned

My tackle this week is a hugely tiny task of how to get up and running on "Etsy."

I don't know if any of you have any experience of "Etsy" but hopefully I'll be ready tomorrow for the start of Autism Awareness Month.

If anyone has any advice you'd like to offer I'd be very grateful for any tips you might be able to share. I'm especially looking to anticipate problems, irritations and other annoyances, things that you did not like about your purchasing experience. I am especially terrified of the Post Office / mailing trips as getting to the post office is a complete nightmare for my family and sadly they're not open when my children are asleep. How tolerant will people be if they place an order and I can't get to the post office for a week? Not very I suspect.

Additionally I now have a load of commissions and bowls that are already spoken for, for a wide variety of charitable events which means I have hardly any to sell. What a twit. Clearly I am in need of some sound business advice.



Cheers dears

Try, try, try again

Hosted by "Tracy" at "Mother May I," but the photo-picture below will whizz you right there with one click.

Just call me snap happy.

If you look very carefully at the cow you'll be able to see the State of Montana!




Someone else is thinking of opening a Tattoo Parlour.




Yes is Science Project time of year.






I made my own mark.......




......and gave it the school auction. Gotta support our schools in their endeavours if we can't go physically.



Lastly, occasionally you too may find yourself doing odd things at odd times, because sometimes an opportunity is too good to miss. The trick is to know when on earth that time might be? Give it a "try."

Warning! Use hair conditioner not hair gel or you could get yourself into all kinds of additional difficulties.

How to stop a special needs kid from spitting?[*]

Please scroll down for Smiley Saturday and SOOC

[*] most interesting google search question of the week


So much depends upon what kind of special needs? Is he or she 2 or 10? But even more pivotal, is the ‘why’? Why is the child spitting? Special needs, autistic or typical. I’m confident that together we could come up with a lengthy collective list, but I’m happy to make the first move.

Top of my list would be Copying. Both my boys are exceptionally good at both copying and mimicry. Like most children that begin to attend school, they come home having learned a great many things that they were previously unaware of, such as name calling, teasing, arm pit farting and a great many other egregious but thoroughly predictable habits. Exposure to typically developing peers generally has this effect.

I was very interested to watch my boys, especially the youngest, try to spit. In case you were not previously aware of it, I can assure you that the skill of spitting is just that, a skill, a skill that he lacked. There can be a great many reasons why spitting is so difficult but in my son’s case, in layperson’s terms, it was poor musculature or low muscle tone in the jaw, combined with poor lip closure as well an inability to ‘suck it up.’ This is the kind of child that drools way beyond babyhood. It’s also the kind of child who needs a great deal of therapeutic help to improve the condition as well as a great deal of positive encouragement to attempt something that is so tremendously difficult.

So yes, it’s true, I’m a slacker when it comes to parenting and as soon as I caught him staring at the floor boards willing himself to spit, head hung low and waiting for gravity, I did nothing but watch silently from the side lines. I watched for days as he practiced and practiced and practiced, because these things take time and muscles don’t grow overnight. I cannot tell you how huge this is for someone who is peerless, that is to say someone without peers, groups or otherwise.

It took nearly two months but the boy was motivated, and motivation is a rare commodity indeed. I turned my blind eyes and willed him to succeed, in silence. The end result was still pretty feeble in the great scheme of the school yard hierarchy as compared with other eight year olds but he made his mark and so did his school report because such behaviour is socially unacceptable, unhygienic and terribly disgusting.

As with all new skills it took a great deal longer to teach him the last bit but everything is a trade off my friends.

My bottom is too thick

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five broken!

5 out of 42

More accurately, the differential between the foot /bottom is too thick by comparison to the rim / top = I need to be more bold in the trimming department.

Meanwhile, on a happier note since this is Smiley Saturday too, above you'll see my son's bed. Granted it is a little messy and may not obviously strike you as being 'made,' however, it is indeed 'made,' by his very own fair hands without prompting, which scores a ten out of ten in my book.

Addendum:-





On another quite stunning note, here is a piccy of another quite ordinarily tiny huge accomplishment. I could remind you about lung capacity, lip closure, co-ordination not to say motivation but you know all that stuff already. Pretty darned impressive for an asthmatic.

Cheers dears

How to insult someone in a foreign language

I drop the cleaver in favour of the whisk and the rapidly deflating soufflé whilst my children squabble, full of hot air and pent up emotion.
“Jus leave it alone why dontcha! Yah lil ol dipstick.”
“Don’t call him a dipstick dear.”
“Why?”
“It’s not kind to insult people without reason or rather….”
“But I do have a reason.”
“Oh…..well don’t do it anyway. He’ll think you’re being mean.”
“But I wanna be mean.”
“Oh dear. Why….?”
“What it is?” interjects the insultee.
“What is what dear?”
“What is a dipstick being?”
“Ah….well a dipstick is a stick that you poke or rather dip, into the oil in your car to see if there’s enough juice.”
“What kinda juice?”
“Oh not juice, I meant oil.”
“Dere is being oil in dah car?”
“Yes.”
“Is dat being dah English car?”
“Er……no all cars run on oil or rather have oil in them and petrol of course.”
“Aha! It is being dah English cars.”
“How so?”
“English cars are being dah petrol but American cars are being dah gas.”

I’ve always wondered about gas fired cars? Just as well some people are fueled by logic.

The Theory of Mind is still with us

It's a given when it comes to autism, or rather a misconception. Like all misconceptions it is both commonplace and all pervasive, the myth that autistic people lack empathy.

***

We arrive at the restaurant, install ourselves in a booth in a rather haphazard manner and begin to examine the menu. Everyone knows off by heart.

A father and a baby arrive at the same time. They wait to be seated.

“Where for it is?”
“Where’s what dear?”
“The kids menu?”
“Oh did we only get one kids menu sheet?”
“Yup.”
“Hmm.” I look at my son’s face which is growing closer to my own height. “Maybe they thought you were too big for the kids menu?”
“Twelve and over?”
“Quite possibly. You do seem to be awfully large these days.”
"Awfully?"
"Um...'quite,' quite large." He grabs the unwieldy 8 page laminated menu with alacrity and begins to peruse his choices. He drops it again in favour of the less daunting single page of ‘specials.’ I watch him, animated and engaged. I don’t believe he has ever actively chosen to read a menu, even at MacDonalds, even if MacDonalds can be described as having a menu in the first place.

His eyes are sucked off the page by the arrival of the quite adorable baby and his father in the opposite booth. They had no problem 'waiting to be seated,' unlike my unruly brood. The baby cooes and kicks with contentment whilst his Dad quips his order to the server. I examine the specials so that I’m better able to prioritize and limit my son’s choices, as choice is always a hurdle.

The boys gasp collectively for no apparent reason. “What is it?” I ask two people who are staring across the room. I look across the room at the baby and father. The father reads the newspaper and eats from a plate piled high with pancakes, sausages and salad. “What is it dear?”
“Dah baby.” I look at the baby but my view is obscured by a large cuddly toy.
"It's o.k. his dad will probably feed him in a minute."
"No! Dah baby!"
“What about the baby?” I look at the big furry mass with the still legs underneath, the stiff arms poking out either side, the silence.
“He dun like it.”
“He doesn’t like what…..I mean…..what doesn’t he like?”
“Dah wolf is scary for him.” Whilst one child speaks, the other takes action as he flits across the passage, grabs the cuddly wolf and turns it’s face outwards, teeth bared, the wolf, not the boy, and slips back to our booth like a whippet. The father snaps down his paper, but not quickly enough. He glances at his baby son who chews contentedly on the wolf tail in his face.

Rats to “the theory of mind.”

Lay out guys

Bigger pi dishes require more numbers.


How do you ensure that you transpose all the numbers of pi correctly?




Employ a nit picker! Fueled by Goldfish.




If you enjoy caption competitions and photographs, you may wish to nip along to"DJ Kirkby" over at "Chez Aspie" and test your brain power.

Cat and dog love

If your family already has a cat and wants to add a dog, or vice versa, how is the best way to ensure that they all get along?











It’s good to begin with a carefully orchestrated plan of desensitization. Never force either animal into close proximity with the other. This technique requires a great deal of time and patience. As with all relationships, it cannot be rushed. Each animal needs to progress at their own pace.





One easy place to start is to feed each animal it’s favourite treat by hand at the same time so that they can then learn to associate treats and the new pet, with positive associations. If this is done on a regular basis, gradually they will hopefully become physically closer.





Currently, our cats are not keen on the dog but will tolerate being in the same room together.








As we have just completed two science projects for school with the children, their enthusiasm for experimentation has expanded in quite unexpected directions. They decided to investigate another possibility to speed up relationship development between their pets with the assistance of these two trusty tools. First spray the dog with liquid cat nip then sprinkle liberally with dried catnip. Wait patiently for the cats to fall in love with the dog. They waited quite a long time until it suddenly dawned on them……both the cats and the dog are all boys. I decided to explain ‘ménage à trios,’ when they are older, maybe, the children not the pets.

Far afield

Hosted by "Tracy" at "Mother May I," but the photo-picture below will whizz you right there with one click.

Just call me snap happy.

Evidence of successful field trip! No matter that it was hateful, boring, hard work and had no souvenir shop. Despite all his numerous verbal complaints he still managed a veritable treasure trove of productivity.

Her Royal Highness and Pi dish Two

He flits about the house following orders from his older brother, “yes your Highness,” he quips in mid flight, which seems odd for a die in the wood republican.

Only a year ago we had to endure the neverending tirade about the "evils of England" and now all of a sudden he has turned into a serf.

I decide to check his political allegiance.


“Hey sonny jim!”
“I am not dah Jim.”
“True……..so when you called him Highness, did you mean this kind of highness?”






“No dummy. Dat is a wimmins.”
“Of course. You mean this kind of highness, right?”




“Right.”

Did I mention that his big brother grew an inch and a half in less than a month over on "Twitter?"




Lastly, on a final note in response to the "criticism" that the bowls were too 'empty' meaning 'too much blank space,'

I have my final offerings:-




And yes, if I ever get them fired, glazed and fired again, they will be available on Etsy.

Cheers dears

Stop the R word

You can read a full version of the argument at the link below:-

Stop the hate speech: r-word dot org

"ASAN" [Autistic Self Advocacy Network] are working hard to raise awareness of this issue.

You can also nip on over to "Facebook."

Pi dish

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Autism awareness month is nearly upon us, so I have a new design, with "Daniel Tammet" in mind, for those of us ordinary folks without savant skills.

Criticisms so far:-

1. The numbers are too big
2. The numbers are too small
3. There are not enough numbers, 50 numerals is stingy
4. The numbers are anti-clockwise
5. It has to end with a zero or serious pain ensues
6. The numbers are upside down
7. Where are the fish?
8. Why can’t we have negative numbers instead?
9. Green is better

Please feel free to add your own criticism and comments so that I can adjust and try to accommodate.

Cheers dears

Reciprocal exchange, scripted yet unscripted

For the longest time imaginable, we have been trying to extract reciprocal conversations with our boys. We started off small, but gradually as they grew and learned, more has been forthcoming. I can still remember the ‘game’ that we invented. Coloured paper coins had different letters on them:-
Q for question
S for statement
C for comment
P for praise
We gave them each half a dozen. They had to use them all up before they were permitted to escape. Escape was the reinforcing positive reward. Oh how stilted it all was. Oh how frustrating. Oh how many times I had to cut out more coins as they were crushed, screwed up and hurled.

They grasped the basics. They knew what was expected but it was hard. It was difficult. It was unrewarding for them, just one more chore to add to the never ending list. It’s only redeeming feature was that it was finite, the end was always in sight, completion and gone.

It’s been a long time a’coming but every so often I get the chance to sit back, feet up and listen to little unprompted chats.

“So whya cats better than dogs then?” she asks him at the dinner table as he hunkers in close proximity to his untouched meal.
“Coz dey are man’s best friend.”
“No, that’s dogs yah dipstick.”
“Oh man yah kill me.”
“What else?”
“Cats are meow.”
“Dogs bark louder.”
“Oh man yah kill me.”
“What else?”
“Cats run fast.”
“Dogs run faster.”
“Oh man yah kill me.”
On and on they go, again and again and again as the spaghetti congeals on the plate. How else could it possibly be? It’s not as if you should eat and talk at the same time, how rude would that be?