Christmas & Birthday

We had a wonderful Christmas. Alden is REALLY enjoying his Skylanders game from Santa. We've been playing all of his new games and having a blast. Tomorrow is his birthday party (his actual birthday is on Monday and he has to go back to school!) . It will be his first party with his peers instead of just family so I'm hoping for a smooth transition.

He'll be turning 8 Monday so I'm sending his school class some cupcakes to celebrate! Then when he gets home I'm going to (HOPEFULLY) do something really cool with his room.'

I hope everyone had a great holiday and has a fantastic New Year celebration. Please be safe!

Alden's Favorite Things for 2011

I try to do this every so often so I can keep track of what he liked. Sometimes his answers surprise me.

Color: yellow
TV Show: Ren & Stimpy
Movie: The Brave Little Toaster
Song: Happy Happy Joy Joy
Meme: U Mad?
Website: YouTube
Book: The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales
Videogame: Super Smash Brothers
Toy: Yoshi

Christmas comes but once a year...thank freaking goodness

Autism Spectrum Disorder and Christmas can be complicated, whether it's figuring out the right toy for a child without speech or trying to get a verbal child to sit for dinner when there are presents in the next room it's always something! I've been on both sides of this and I'm so thankful that Alden has so much speech now and is picking up so much more at school. Last year he even talked a family member into doing presents BEFORE food, which no matter how my sister and I tried NEVER happened per our request.

Last night we took him to see Santa at the Zoo. He loved all the lights and the inflatables around the park and he told Santa what present he wanted four times to make sure he would get it right. He did have a mini-meltdown outside the carousel because it was closed but I convinced him to come on & see Santa and then get a toy before leaving. I still get upset when he has meltdowns but I am SO thankful for how much easier they are to deal with now that he's verbal and he isn't eating things he's intolerant to. Now instead of slamming himself in the head and screaming higher than a dog whistle he just says bad words instead. I can deal with bad words, at least he's talking, and he's using them in the correct manner. I'll take a "damnit" over throwing himself down protester style on the concrete and screaming until he is gasping for air any day of the week. He tells me what is wrong now even if he curses while doing so. Please don't think I'm terrible or that he doesn't get into trouble for using bad words, he absolutely does. He learned the curse words from a YouTube video and he KNOWS they get him into trouble. He just doesn't care.

Back to the holidays! One of the things I do that really seems to help is to prepare him days in advance for what we will be doing. I tell him where we're going and what is expected of him when we're there. This has helped him a lot with transitions in other areas as well but I find that during the holidays it is an absolute necessity. Holidays are exhausting for everyone and knowing what's coming is always helpful. We always do a Christmas Countdown starting on the first day of December which is also very helpful. He tears off a link and then counts them right before going to bed. The last night he'll remove the last link and all that's left is a picture that says "Santa Claus Comes Tonight!". That way there is no confusion and we avoid the "WHEN IS SANTA COMING?" question all month long.

Another thing that I do now that he's older is that he makes an Amazon and ThinkGeek wishlist with all of the things he wants on them. This would even work if your child is non-verbal but has skills such as pointing or using the computer independently. He also circles things in catalogs that he wants and of course now that he is very verbal if he sees something when we're out he will read what it say and tells us that he wants it.

When we have to travel during the holidays we pack things for the car to keep him entertained. The best purchases we've made are the portable DVD player and the TAG Reader from Leapfrog. He isn't much for coloring but I always pack crayons & coloring books just in case. He loves the TAG reader because it has games on it (he's reading above his grade level at this point so he doesn't really use it for that) and it has the characters doing funny things when you use the pen on them. If you do purchase a car DVD player I recommend getting headphones for it, mostly because we forgot his on our 9 hour drive to Disney World over the summer and by the end of the trip my husband & I knew every word to the "Young Dinos" story on the Mario DVD we'd just bought him.

The biggest thing to remember is to be patient, and ignore everyone when they offer useless advice because if you are around people ESPECIALLY older people it's going to happen. If I had a quarter for every time I heard "he needs more discipline", "have you tried x, y, or z", "maybe look into medication" I'd be one rich lady right now. Just smile and nod. Honestly, it's not worth the fight and they don't know what the hell they are talking about.

I hope some of these things might help someone else. I hope you all have an amazing holiday season and a wonderful new year!

(P.S. I know I've been slacking on this but you can find our latest Batman Elf updates over @ my Facebook).

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day Ten

Batman Elf toilet papered the tree!

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day Nine

Batman Elf & friends decided to camp out.

Roasting Marshmallows!

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day Eight

Batman Elf managed to get out the tree and put it up (with the help of Prudence).


They appear to have had a little trouble with the lights though!

I couldn't resist getting a shot like this but I was scared they might catch fire so it was just for fun!

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day Seven

Batman Elf made Alden a Scavenger Hunt!
The Letter!


The prizes he'll find at the end: Lucy from Peanuts paint set & magnet, Goofy Burger we stashed from our trip to Disney this summer, Coraline by Neil Gaiman, and a Donkey Kong action figure.

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day Six

Batman Elf falls in with a bad crowd.

(Sidebar: I hate wrestling & had nothing to do with the purchase of any of this stuff).

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day Five

Batman Elf got into our craft stash & covered himself in stickers!

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day Four

Batman Elf and Darth Vader have a snowball fight!

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day Three

Batman Elf made himself at home by making a bed and a sleepmask.

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day Two

hanging out with his Dino friends. (before he wakes up tomorrow I'm going to turn the dinosaur on so Batman Elf is riding him around the living room while we get ready for school)

The Adventures of Batman Elf: Day One

Day One: Batman Elf goes ZipLining!!!


Close up!

Note from Batman Elf! It's inside the envelope next to him & written with my opposite hand since he knows my writing.

The Adventures of Batman Elf!

Today our darling little Elf on the Shelf (known as Batman Elf) fell out of the closet, in his box. I decided to hurry and put him in the livingroom while Alden was in the bath so that he could appear suddenly out of nowhere. I mostly did this out of fear because I was scared Alden had or would see him. After this happened I of course started freaking out because last year we only had Batman Elf for 17 days and I had a terrible time finding places to put him. Thanks to Pinterest that will not be a problem this year. I have over 50 ideas which I wrote down in a notebook of things to do with Batman Elf which is good because I think we'll have him for about 40 days this year! I have decided to chronicle Batman Elf's adventures every day with a photo which I will try to remember to upload to this blog.

You can get your own Elf on the Shelf to start your own tradition with here! They also have them on Amazon but I like to support bookstores when I can since I have an E-Reader now and rarely buy hardcopies anymore.

I can't think of anything clever for the subject this time...

On a complete whim about 2 weeks ago Alden & I decided to give his room a total makeover. The walls are all officially painted and ready for the detailing. I am absolutely exhausted from painting at least 4 coats (two of Kilz, two of paint) every day for the past three days. I am really glad the big part is over and it's all just little stuff from here on out. There is an album on my Facebook full of photos of the project that I've been updating since the idea came to fruition.

Today was Alden's first field trip! Josh & I tagged along as chaperones and had a great time. We went through the corn maze, went on a hay ride, played games, and they played in the corn crib. I'm so thankful that he was moved into the big kid class this year. I realize that he is the baby, everyone else is at least a year older than him (and some of them are three years older than he is) but he is thriving and this is just the environment he needs. They are all rough and tumble and funny and verbal. All things he wasn't getting from the previous class he was in.

He isn't doing Halloween this year, we aren't sure why. He is afraid of it or something and refusing to participate so we're just going along with it. We'll be going out this weekend to celebrate with friends and he'll be hanging out with his grandparents. I'm pretty bummed that he isn't wanting to do anything because Halloween is my favorite holiday, but I don't want to upset him any more than he already is, so I'm not pushing it.

I guess that's about it, now to attempt to get him into bed after a long day that has totally thrown us off schedule.

so tired

Alden is doing absolutely brilliantly. I heard from a professional that I'm in touch with that his school teacher has been bragging about how well he's doing in class and how much speech he's gained in just a month and a half.

This week is the book fair and he's spent $28 there, and I thought I was obsessed with the book fair when I was a kid!

He and I have started a project together to give his bedroom a makeover. We bought about $50 worth of paint to fix it up. We're going to paint over his current theme (Dr. Seuss characters) with a comic book theme. It's going to be so cool! We got my old drum kit out of storage and it's now in his bedroom. He is loving it! I'm having to get used to them being in the house. If you aren't the one behind them it can be quiet scary if you're sitting in another part of the house & there is a huge cymbal crash!

back to school

It's been a while since I last updated, I would say I've been busy but that's only partially true. I've also been lazy.

Alden is really thriving in his new classroom this year. I think it's partly due to being in class with kids older than he is and partly because his teacher this year is a good teacher. I'm going to call her next week sometime to schedule his IEP meeting for next month because I think she's realized as well as we have that he's far surpassed the one that his old teacher made him at the end of the year last year. I haven't gotten ONE phone call about him being rude or violent and I honestly think that last year he was just acting out because he was bored out of his mind. This year they are trying not only to teach him but to challenge him and I am SO pleased. Moving him up to the older class was definitely the best choice for him.

Not only does he come home with work he's done every single day in class, they are letting him go to the library every day as well. He chooses one or two new books to bring home each night. We read them after he gets off the bus because I told him "homework before computer time" and the computer is always where he always wants to be. He really is enjoying the books and reading them with us though, he doesn't seem to mind doing that before he gets to do his "fun" activities.

Speaking of books I think after he gets out of school today we're going to see if he wants to go to the bookstore or the comic book store. He's been doing so well he really deserves a treat (which we call "Alden is Awesome Day").

Tomorrow we send back his communication device. I'm happy to say that he does seem to have picked up some new language from it, which is great. He also let us know with it that he TOTALLY knows how to spell bad words. (Thanks again YouTube!)

We have now completely put a block on YouTube during the hours between school & bedtime so he can't watch any of their videos. He just kept finding horribly inappropriate stuff dubbed over really sweet cartoons. Parental block & safe search didn't seem to do anything filter-wise so we just had to block the entire thing. I made it re-direct him to Poptropica so he wouldn't whine because he loves that site.

The other day when he was getting off of the bus his driver gave him a still wrapped Fig Newton. He looked at it like "uh, I can't have this" and immediately handed it to me. It's so nice to see that he is actually aware of what he can and can't have to eat.

That's pretty much all we have going on right now. He's doing great and I couldn't be more proud of him!

gotta go back, back, back to school

We found out yesterday that Alden will be in a different class this year! I'm so pleased as I was not a big fan of his other teacher. He is going into the second grade but he will be in the 3-5 class. All the children we met who he will be in class with were verbal so he will actually have someone to talk to this year! His friend Joey (the only friend he ever talks about because I guess Joey is verbal as well) will also be in his class. He wasn't sure about moving across the hall at first but once he saw the new toys they had he was game. I personally thought the room was laid out in a much more aesthetically pleasing way. There was a large space in the middle of the floor instead of all sorts of shelves all over the place like his previous class.

I can see him growing a lot in this environment. Especially since I noticed that they will be using technology this year! He will get to work with an iPad in class instead of just the computer in ST and OT. He will also have his communication device that I'm going to go program at the seminar tomorrow.

We will still be having an IEP meeting at the beginning of the year (likely in October to give him a chance to settle into a new environment) and we will still be pushing for at least one inclusion class. We feel it's important that he grows up with neuro-typical peers as well.

Waking up for school tomorrow should be interesting because I keep forgetting he has to get up at 5:50 to get out to the bus on time. We haven't bothered fixing our schedule yet. Oops!

are you talkin to me?

I somehow forgot in all the Disney excitement to mention that Alden was chosen for a study! He will be using a Vantage Communication Device for a month as a trial to see how well he learns from it. The people from the center in charge of the study came by today to videotape him for the "before" and they were absolutely STUNNED at how well he did with it. I always tell people he's a computer nerd but they don't really believe me for some reason. Anyway it's a really cool touch screen device and I am going to the parent training seminar on Thursday to learn how to customize it specifically for him. I'm very pleased that he was selected and I'm even more pleased that he showed them how quickly he picks up on things related to electronics.

School starts back on Thursday and I am absolutely DREADING getting up that early to put him on the bus. We have NOT been getting back on schedule like we should be. Guess we'll have to start that tonight. I've written his teacher a note that we need an IEP ASAP because he mastered all of his short term goals relating to regular classroom speech over the summer! He is really taking off!

Disney World!

We just got in from Disney and we had an absolute BLAST! Alden was great the entire time. When we got to the resort he actually thought it was Disney World because there were 30 foot statues of all his favorite characters, two pools, an arcade, a food court, and a shop. He was SO sad when we left but once we got into the park he was excited again.

His favorite ride was the Buzz Lightyear Star Command ride in Magic Kingdom. The only ride he didn't like was Dinosaurs in Animal Kingdom, and to be honest none of us liked it. All for different reasons. It hurt Tim's back, it was too loud for Alden, Josh didn't like that the guy was screaming over the already loud dinosaurs, and Lynnda & I didn't like that we were being jerked around (quite forcefully) in complete darkness.

I think my favorite ride was probably Aerosmith's Rockin Rollercoaster. Josh and I rode it on one of the nights we got to stay late in the park (for staying in a Disney Resort) and I was SO scared. I ended up loving it. I absolutely HATED Soarin' apparently I am NOT a hang-glider.

Alden only needed his headphones a handful of times. We forgot them during Fantasmic but he just covered his hands with his ears and really enjoyed the show.

He used them during the Nemo Musical which he absolutely loved. So he sat through his first musical and his first movie in a theater. He used his headphones during it too, the Muppets had crickets chirping in their movie and for some reason he is VERY sensitive to that sound lately.

I had a headache the first day from all the 3D stuff but I really enjoyed it regardless.

Josh didn't like Expedition Everest because when you go up to the top and then you go backward it jerks you really hard and it hurt his back. The photo of us from that ride was hilarious, I'm screaming with my hands in the air & he's grimacing in pain. A perfect analogy for our relationship.

Noteable things Alden enjoyed: Kali River Rapids, Star Tours, Fantasmic, Teacups. Those were the ones you could tell he was having the best time on (Besides the Toy Story rides of course).

The night of his dinner he absolutely insisted we go ride Buzz Lightyear again. So we ran to the other side of the park, rode the ride, within 5 minutes...ran back out, then had to pee and then we RAN back to the other side of the park and made it JUST in time.

He LOVED his character dinner, he jumped up and joined the Friendship Day Parade with Pooh and his friends, marching & clapping while going in a circle all over the restaurant. The dinner was seriously overpriced, but you CANNOT put a price on seeing your child participate in something like that, especially when they are not one to join in group activities! It was so adorable.

I think the longest we waited in line was maybe 5 minutes. That was for Alladin because they didn't have FastPass or disability pass. It was absolutely AMAZING. Sadly we didn't get to ride Pirates of the Carribean or Voyage of the Little Mermaid. Pirates was broken and Ariel was being updated.

That's all I can think of right now, I'm pretty brain dead from doing an 8 hour trip home today. I'm going to unwind with a glass of wine and catch up on some TV. I'll update more later if I think of anything that was particularly awesome (which it all was)!

Here's a breakdown of what we did in the parks. (more for me than for you)
Day One
Hollywood Studios
Toy Story Mania
Star Tours
Muppet Vision 3D
Met Handy Manny, Leo & Annie

Day Two
Magic Kingdom
Buzz Lightyear Star Command
Met Chip & Dale
Peter Pan's Flight
It's A Small World
The Magic Carpets of Alladin
Mad Teaparty
Snow White's Scary Adventures
Splash Mountain
The Many Adventures of Winne the Pooh

went swimming in the Fantasia pool


Hollywood Studios
Fantasmic
Aerosmith's Rockin RollerCoaster*

Day Three
Epcot
Soarin
Inoventions

Hollywood Studios
Toy Story Mania
Star Tours

Magic Kingdom
Character Dinner with Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, and Eeyore
Buzz Lightyear Star Command
Wishes Fireworks

Day Four
Animal Kingdom
Kilimanjaro Safaris
Pangani Forest Exploration Trail
Kali River Rapids
Finding Nemo the Musical
Dinosaur
Triceratops Spin
Met Baloo
Everest Expedition*

Epcot
Illuminations

Disney or Bust!

So we are leaving sometime tomorrow to drive part of the way to Disney. 10 hours is a lot of sitting/driving so we decided to break it up into two days of travel. I *think* I have everything packed (except things like toothbrushes etc that we'll need tomorrow before leaving). The iPods, portable DVD player, Nintendo DSi, and our phones are all charging right now so I'll have to grab them in the morning when I pack the daily essentials.

We've been buying cheap toys here & there to lay out every morning of the trip for Alden "from Mickey & friends" to find in the hotel room. Josh is out grabbing a few more right now. **Edit make that a LOT more things. He just sent me a picture and HOLY CRAP! lol

I probably won't have a chance to update till we get back so see you all then!!!

wish upon a star

Alden has swim lessons this week, of course it's the hottest, most humid week so far this year. Monday I was literally sitting at the little table sweating like crazy. They really should spring for some fans over in the area with the tables. He loves him swimming lessons and has so much fun. His coaches always end up loving him. It's also good for him to be around his peers even if he isn't exactly interacting with them (they each have an individual coach and go at their own pace).

Alden's Toy Story toys have been leaving him little notes and prizes around the house for doing his chores. He gets a "Disney Dollar" every week to put in his Mickey Mouse Bank to take to Disney and use on whatever toys he wants. Of course we'll be buying most of them but we're currently working on showing him how money works and making him "pay" for his own things. He always runs off with his fun new stuff & forgets his change though.

I can't wait to see his face when he meets Buzz Lightyear at Disney. It's going to be the best thing ever.

Disney is booked!

We made our Disney reservations! We're going in August...I really didn't expect to be going so soon but I am SO EXCITED! Josh didn't want Alden to miss any school so we just decided since we have the money in the bank to go ahead and go next month before school starts back!

I have been researching extensively for 4 days now (no really people are impressed by my 20+ pages of notes) and it's just making me that more excited to go.

I got REALLY lucky, you are supposed to make your dining reservations for things like Character Dining 180 days out, but I called tonight at @ 7PM and got THE LAST dinner reservation for the week we're going to be there. We'll be dining with Winnie the Pooh which is great because Alden loves him!

His noise canceling headphones came in the mail today and tonight I'm planning to order him a Who's Shoes ID kit in case he gets lost or wanders off. I'm also going to order each of us a Bobble because Florida water tastes like crap and the bottled water in the park is pricey. There's a ton more stuff to get but for right now those are the biggies.

I CAN'T WAIT!

fun in the sun

Recently my mother gave Alden a craft book from the 1940s she found at a thrift store. He is completely obsessed with it and we've made a craft every day since we got it. We've made a peanut doll, a blanket fort, a shoe box train, and a floating soap boat. He grabs the book before bed every night and goes through it to find a craft for the next day. He's gotten so excited about them now that I have to take the book away in order for him to go to sleep! I'm so happy he's taken an interest in reading, crafting, and following directions!

Today's craft was the Floating Soap Boat (complete with little Pirates mad out of corks & toothpicks) we took it outside to his pool and he played for a long time. I was surprised how well the soap held up (I've never used pure soap before) but he had it in there for over an hour and it was still completely intact when we came back in!

summer breeze

We went to a local craft fair over the weekend. Alden was very well behaved. He picked out one toy and stuck with it the whole time even after looking through everything. He got a Pirate Mushroom from the adorable little shop Panda With a Cookie. I was really surprised he didn't whine for more stuff. They had a LOT of cool stuff there. I got my intermediate hoop and he's been playing with my beginner hoop a lot. We're having fun in the sun this summer. We played with water balloons & squirt guns earlier today before it rained.

My mom got us a book from the 1940s full of fun craft ideas for kids and we've been browsing it for cool ideas. It's been so rainy lately that we haven't gotten to go out as much as we'd like. Hopefully it'll clear off over the next few weeks.

summer time and the livin's easy

It's summertime here! We've been playing video games, throwing water balloons, having lightsaber duels, painting, and putting up lots of new posters!

Alden is all signed up for swimming lessons again this year. He loves going to swim class. It was the first thing he mentioned when we asked him what he wanted to do this summer. He has gone the past 2 years and absolutely loves it.

We've been reading the comics in the newspaper lately. He's kind of obsessed with them and has like 20 papers (I keep having to rotate & throw some away).

Father's Day was a huge success. Alden picked out, read, signed, and decorated Josh's card himself. He also picked out the gift but I had to order it since I am the owner of the AmazonPrime account. We got Josh another Rabbids video game. They play those games every night together & then watch Quantum Leap & go to sleep. It's pretty adorable!

He's now summoning me to come play Mario Party 8 with him.

update

I've been a bad blogger. I've just been so busy lately. Alden ALMOST got all As on his report card. He got one B which was one point away from being an A. I'm so proud of him & the progress he's made. He didn't even get asked to go to any sort of summer schooling program this year and I'm so pleased about that. They said he's pretty well on target with his IEP goals. His speech is rapidly increasing and his sentence structure is getting much better. He is still struggling with a few things like different pronoun usages but that's pretty typical for autists.

He's been spending time away from the house with my inlaws while I'm at school and suckering my father-in-law to take him to WalMart and buy him toys. The other day they had like a carload of stuff, it was ridiculous. He's recently taken on an obsession with posters which is awesome because they are cheaper than toys and they don't clutter up his room. He's covering the walls pretty quickly and the other day wanted to hang one in the kitchen. haha

He's also recently become obsessed with the tooth fairy & keeps trying to wiggle all his teeth.

We're starting to plan our Disney trip for this winter. He has no idea that we are going and it's going to be a surprise. I'm really excited, especially about going to Universal to the Harry Potter themepark. We will be able to get a special pass at Disney so that we don't have to wait in the long lines due to his autism which is absolutely wonderful. If you've ever been anywhere with a child who has autism you will know most of them are not very patient at all. We will also be able to have Breakfast With Mickey because they take precautions with food allergies and will make him a special Gluten & Casein free meal! I'm so happy that Disney is so caring about catering to special needs and allergies, we wont' have to miss out on anything!!! The only thing I'm concerned about is him being afraid of some of the rides. I remember when I was 5 Mr Toad's Wild Ride scared me so badly I started crying & I wanted to get off the ride. I'm assuming there is some sort of special protocol for this now too so hopefully it will be smooth sailing! For more info about going to Disney with a child who has autism check out this page.

long awaited update

So it's been, more than a while. Alden's foot healed quickly (likely within two weeks) but we made him leave the boot on an extra week because of how hard he is on his toes.

We ordered the sample enzymes from Houston Enzymes and next Wednesday we are planning to give them a try. It would be REALLY awesome if they worked but I'm not banking on it or anything. We got the TriEnza and the No-Fenol if anyone wants specifics. I'm planning to order some breadsticks because those seem to be the "regular" food he misses the most.

Alden has started drawing pictures of himself in various costumes and with certain super hero powers. They are pretty much the coolest thing ever. He's also recently started telling us his address and his birthday which is great. We waited this long because a few years ago (when a typical child would learn these things) he would just randomly start chanting words and phrases he knew over & over. We felt that this could lead to a safety problem but now that he understands speech a lot more and can answer questions we are comfortable with him knowing these things.

I've been sick as a dog this week but tomorrow I am going to an autism conference. I went last year as well, I didn't learn much but it's always good to refresh and meet new people.

first break

Alden has his first broken bone. He has a stress fracture in 2 of his metatarsals. It's likely caused by his excessive jumping and made worse by his toe walking. It took us 24 hours to get him fitted for a boot. I was really angry he had to go to school without and protection for it today. We went right after I got out of class to get him one. He is doing well with it except for stairs, which is understandable. He doesn't seem to mind it but it's only been a few hours.