A Whole Lotta Sumptin Goin On

No training wheels!

I am starting a new trend in sunglass wearing.

Heart shaped glasses for the ballerinas


So the first of 2012 has flown by. The kids enjoyed the rest of their break from school in January and here we are at Spring Break time already. For us Spring Break is starting at weather in the low 50s and miserable drizzling rain. yay. fun.

Noelie is quite the reader these days having moved up to chapter books and tested completely out of first grade reading a few months back. We are so proud of her and enjoying all the new reading material... however, with the chapter books comes longer nightly reading assignments which = more time for mommy, but we're all hanging in there. One thing I give her credit for is although she has to sound out some of the more difficult words, she really reads fluently and with expression. So that certainly helps in the parental supervision of the reading assignment front. Also, Miss Noelie has just learned to ride her bike without training wheels. She is a bit scared to go it alone and needs some work in the stopping department but really has done quite well avoiding parked cars on the street and such. Her daddy also gets an extra special workout from this learning process as well:)

We are also making more and more progress with Eli. He is set for his second autism screening with the school district which will determine if they can help him out in some of the therapies. He has also been seen by a developmental doctor to identify his specific place on the spectrum. We get those results as soon as next week. I have basically been guessing what he needs at this point and pretty much feel like I am putting putty on a leaky pipe, fixing one spot while water shoots out the other side. From what I understand from my 'peeps' (my ever so small network of people with very big knowledge on this subject) is that a lot of his therapies and treatments to come will still be somewhat like this from a trial and error perspective. But we will know more specifically what type of autism he has and be given a course of action by a professional. If you remember the previous post said about the year wait list for Texas Children's to evaluate him. Upon waiting a month for a response, I found out that one year was actually two years and we promptly decided we had to find another way. My 'peeps' came into play again and I found a wonderful doctor with UT that was with Texas Children's that was able to take him within months. Although I mourn the loss of time wasted on our first course of action... and the four days worth of paperwork I had to fill out that is forever useless... I am so very thankful we are now in a position for some answers soon.

While we've been waiting to figure this out Eli has made some progress language wise even though he is still well shy of where he should be. He, speaking while using sign language (he is learning this in speech therapy), is able to communicate things like what he wants more of or even wants in the first place which eases his frustration. He is also able to tell us he loves us which helps sooth our impatience with this whole process. He is also much more evolved than he was when he first started his class. We had a full circle moment this week. Addie is a sweet girl who would always comfort Eli when he was upset to be dropped off at school as a new student to the class. This week it was Addie that didn't want to be there and came in crying. Eli stopped what he was doing and went and grabbed a tissue for her and patted her tears and rubbed her back and said "Tissue. Don't cry." This is a HUGE step for someone that is up against what he is because many children on the spectrum struggle with or never have emotional attachment and empathy. To us it is a sign that there is a light at the end of this tunnel we've been walking. We can only pray that's the case.