Buttons, baby doll, school fun too. Lined up cars, helicopters soar, fall trees, kitties galore. Sister’s cake, wear your helmet indoors please, new frog’s grassy swim, black cat meow, Happy October blogginstiens. 
p.s. I hate chalk.
Ariel and I have been painting, drawing and doodling a bunch. Joshua and Daniel not so much. Joshua did partake in a couple of paintings. Ariel named all of the pictures and they seem to have a common theme. Her dragon drawings have now eased their way down the hallway, on almost every wall of her room, and most importantly have surrounded her bed. She said that she had to make all of these dragons to feel safe in her room. She said that they protect her from fear of shadows. Fascinating. She also made several Halloween pictures, I have a few here. She cracks me up, David walked in on her the other day and asked what she was doing she said: “Reading Frankenstein.” She was, she then told him all about the scientist that made a monster, but she didn’t understand why people got upset with the Frankenstein monster. Hee hee She is awesome.
Not really, but this song did pop in my head sung by Nancy Sinatra because that was the version you could find me dancing and singing to when I was younger. Ok, sometimes now as well. I am so amazed at how well all of us are doing with David being gone. (Sorry David, I do not mean that as a bad thing.) It is just that the last time he left for a while I was filled with anxiety and going over every possible scenario that could happen. I went from a serial killer living across the street just waiting to get us to a fire sparking and I stayed up every night thinking of many other possible things that could happen that I needed a plan for. I was in a panic and would not leave the house. Granted it was several years ago and basically I could not go anywhere with all three children at the time.
Daniel could not even handle going to my mom’s house during that time.
I can see why I would be filled with anxiety. I am not at all right now. I am quite at peace. (Although writing this may stir some anxiety!) Even with getting pretty sick over the weekend and then Daniel getting sick for the past three days. We are doing much better still a little off, but we are our happy selves. Ariel and Joshua are fine and they have been playing very well together all day. I was able to clean my living room and get it back for a day. Yesterday it was covered in a pretend campsite and Lego’s, of course. Bedtime is upon us and we will see how well we do. I am rather wired I may be up late…maybe I’ll play some cards.
I believe they could be doing so well because I am calm.
I even Skyped a friend last night and talked to her for over an hour. I had no anxiety or feelings of being overloaded. Wow! I am pretty happy about that. I was happy with Skype. I actually liked it much better than the phone. I think I will write about that another time. I plan on doing some more cleaning and having a fun packed school day tomorrow. I know you all must be so excited! This is my boring post to have actual documentation that I am anxiety free for the moment and that I had fun having a video chat! Considering everything that is and has been going on in my life I think this is fairly monumental. This is my closest to “Wordless Wednesday” as I think I can get. I have some pictures of what the kids have been up to. Ariel felt bad for me being sick so she gave me some animals to make me feel better, and a baby doll that kind of freaks me out. Shh!
Happy Rest of Wednesday! (Enjoy our sunset)
I have a ton of pictures from the last two days. Ok, I have over 200, um….224 to be exact. I can’t help myself. We had so many birds flying around and visiting our backyard and crossing over our house. Butterflies everywhere, I have only been able to capture a couple from a distance. There are creatures out and about as well and the kids and I have been examining and exploring them. The sky has been changing practically every hour because we are having strange weather. Although there are not many colors only deep blues and grays which are quite intriguing as well.
I am not sure what all I am putting on here picture wise.
I am rather tired out from Daniel having a few rough days and Ariel and Joshua not getting along very well. (not getting along is an understatement) I am not really sure why everyone is all out of sorts other than the weather. Oh, it could be the anticipation of David leaving in a few days. Daniel did just pull a tooth out so that could be part of his problem as well. He is losing so many teeth. When they are ready to come out he just pulls it out and throws it. He came up to me and said: “Hey, mom I lost my tooth.” I asked him where it was and he said: “I threw it in your trash.” Nice. I am kind of weird about keeping teeth, I know I may sound gross, but I still have some of my baby teeth in a little container. Shh! Weird? Oh, well.
I did not dig in the trash for that tooth or any other tooth, ever!
This morning I was welcomed into the morning by the bright shining sun through the front door window and I had to go outside to see what it looked like. I thought it was beautiful so I had to take a billion pictures. As well as throughout the day as the weather continued to change from sunny to storming to sunny to raining to sunny again. We captured some pictures of critters in the morning and afternoon. It reminded me of the frog that was here last year, but I have not seen him or any other frogs. I am a bit sad about that. We have had ducks, rabbits, a snake, several other kinds of birds, but I do not know what kind they are then, there are the regular birds that stay in our backyard as well.
They have a nest in our bushes.
We also have some regular pigeons who hang out, I got a picture of them. We also have some kind of hawks that soar all around. There is one that is a regular who hovers and flies over our house specifically. I do talk to him and sometimes he will come a bit lower, really it is crazy! I got a picture of them. I was excited about that because I have been trying to get a good one of them, but haven’t been able to.
I got one that is alright.
If you see some painted toes with Lego’s those are Joshua’s. He does like to paint his toenails. We are not too worried about his manhood around here. They all dress up in girl and boy stuff, they have fun. I think it’s funny when his toes look better than mine. The Dino-Games that Ariel was playing and my lamppost that I am slightly obsessed with that is in our front yard makes quite a few appearances. I was feeling a little down so I felt like writing to see if I felt better. I do, the pictures make me happy.
Until next time, hope you enjoy the critters!
In one of my recent posts Aspie Isolation, I had mentioned that I dropped the ball with socializing for the kids. This is not true. After evaluating the last few years, I was able to see all of my many attempts to get them involved in activities and to get connected. I have done this for myself and I have done this for David as well. There are frustrations that I have with David about this that I have voiced on many occasions, he has shared his reasons as well as to why he is isolated around here. A lot of our isolation has to do with location.
We are very disconnected to the people in this area.
My mom and David both are prone to be isolators as well as myself so we are not good motivators for each other in this area. I am overly optimistic about new people, which can annoy them and lead me to unhealthy relationships. This puts them on the defense and watchful of the people that I chose to be around. I have learned my lesson in this area, there are very few people that I can have a relationship with in this town, I know that. It is a small town, with limited resources, knowledge, and acceptance of autism. It makes it very hard to participate in home school groups, churches, and social groups in general.
I am constantly trying to help people understand autism.
They really do not want to. The only group in our area is a group for “curing” autism and I cannot be a part of that group. There is no openness or acceptance of other opinions with that particular group. All of the social groups that I have tried, and the ones that I am currently trying to get Daniel into are about 45 minutes away or farther. Social groups after being in the car for that long for Daniel and myself may not work very well. I have been doing my part and getting frustrated and exhausted from my efforts to help my kids. I have also taken on the added stress of trying to get David social and my mom. They never asked me to, but I tend to do things like that because I want people connected and happy.
David is doing well in his writers group.
I am very happy about that because he is getting motivation and encouragement from the people in his group. It makes me feel like some stress is taken off of me to be honest. Even if he didn’t intend that stress I still feel it. This town is very isolating because of location, beliefs, limited activities that we can do, and the people in general we just do not connect to. I lack support in any area here. We have found some great people in surrounding areas, but again it is difficult to drive for long distances all the time, especially when you have sensory issues and you and your kids can get car sick.
The big changes?
Well it looks as if we may be moving back to my hometown. I vowed to never go back, never! Every time I say never I always and I mean always have to eat my words. The town has changed a great deal since I lived there and it has a lot more to offer in many areas. There is a huge autism support and opportunities that I feel are a necessity for Daniel with him going to be 7 years old soon, he is transitioning and I need help. I have certain family members there who are very supportive, accepting, and respecting of our family’s lifestyle and needs. They are also great motivators for me and will not let me isolate in an unhealthy way. Being around more family could help them be more understanding and accepting of autism as well, who have not been in the past.
It is a college town and that opens a world of free thinking.
There are nice small coffee shops and artsy folk along with a boom of families that have moved into a certain area, where we would live, who are computer geeks (No offense, I like computer geeks, a lot. I’m a geek in my own right.) which could explain the large amount of the acceptance and support of autism, it could. Though it can be a bit on the conservative side many people are open and accepting of different views. I would be able to work part-time for an organization that I believe in and plays into my fitness and health passions. Along with volunteer work and being able to help others in general. Not to overextend myself, but I see where I really miss volunteering, helping people, and working.
My aunt is a leader in the children’s ministry.
They are trained and equipped to work with children with special needs at her church. I do not think that I am ready to go back to church. I am not sure that it is the best place for me, at least for a while. However, I have no problem with the kids going as long as they are not being taught some crazy theology. I know the church and they don’t do that so I think it would be a positive. Plus it is huge so there are many types of people and all of them are on different journeys, which I think is great. There are other factors that seem very positive and it is kind of exciting.
It is also very scary.
I do not want to leave my mom and I am hoping that possibly she would go back with us. She is not truly happy here. After being here for about 7 years, I think she still has not connected. She is in a job that is extremely taxing on her sensory issues and socially takes a lot out of her. She goes to church, but is not connected. Her main reason for not wanting to go is weather, she is terrified of snow and ice now. She hated it when she lived there and now that she has lived away from it for so long it has become a huge anxiety trigger. She doesn’t want to leave the beach. These were the reasons she gave me.
My reasons are similar for not wanting to go.
I am not scared of snow or ice, but the cold is very painful for me. I do not do well in the long winters with no sun. I like being able to pack up and go to the beach in 15 minutes. I like that it gets cold here, but that the sun still shines. Honestly though these are the only reasons. I know that changes need to be made. I know that I have got to get the kids around other kids and all of us have got to get connected to people. My decision cannot be solely based on weather. It makes me sad and happy. There are possibly more work opportunities for David, he could teach at one of the colleges possibly.
I don’t know there is just more options to us there.
I cannot move to another place where I do not know anyone, I need to get my footing back socially. I have to walk in my new self-awareness for a while in a safe place and with support before venturing to a new town or something. I know it won’t take me long, but it is needed to gain my confidence back. We wouldn’t be moving for about 9 months anyway so we have time to process, plan, and take care of business around here.
Like preparing Daniel for a move!
Yikes, it took months for him to get back to his “normal” state when we moved here. That doesn’t even include everyone else around here. The good thing is he knows the place that we would move to. He has been there, he likes it, and even though he was very young while we stayed there for over a month or so, he remembers every detail and person. Once he became more verbal he would tell me about it. He asked me questions about it and also told me about the people and places we went to. I had no idea he took it all in like that, he wasn’t talking and was focused on every ceiling fan he found. We’ll see how this all plays out.
Any prayers, happy thoughts, positive energy, or thought into the universe for direction, wisdom, and clarity is greatly welcomed.
Ariel wanted to do dragon poems. I think we are in an obsessive state that is all she is drawing, playing with, talking about, and writing about. We’ll just go with it. Dragons rock!
Dragons
By Ariel
Dragons are cool. 
Dragons need help,
With people giving them food and water to survive.
They need people petting them,
And riding them,
Because nice dragons like that.
Mean dragons—stay away from.
They need to learn how to be nice.
When you see them move backwards slowly,
Then they may start liking you.
Dragon
by Ariel
Nethew is his name.
He is red and black.
His eyes are blue.
In the summer and spring he stays outside
And the sun makes him shine on his back.
He has green points on the back of his arms and legs.
He has sharp teeth,
Because all dragons need sharp teeth to eat meat,
To make them strong.
He says hello a lot by saying “RAWR”
Because all dragons need to say “RAWR”
When he was little he said a tiny “rawr” like a baby,
But when he was grown-up
He said “RAWR” so everyone could hear him
When he was flying,
When no one could see him.
The color of his wings are yellow.
He has three claws on his wings,
Four legs.
He shoots out an earth ball.
He lives on Colden, my secret planet
With other dragons who are his friends.
When he turns mad,
His eyes turn glowing red,
He gets mad when other dragons tease him
Or other mean dragons hurt him.
Or when people try to fight him.
He plays a lot.
He likes to run and exercise,
To get strong
To defeat in battle and win in the dragon war.
He likes to fly a lot too
To see birds,
To play with them and meet them.
He eats meat, animals that die,
Or people who die in war,
Or if animals kill a person,
He eats the bones
Because he doesn’t want to kill.
He only hurts bad guys,
Because he doesn’t want to die.
He likes to hang out.
He is a very happy dragon.
He protects other dragons.
Star Wars Lego
by Joshua
Luke is my favorite,
Because he was a gun guy
And Luke was a Jedi.
Hans Solo, I like a little
And I like Luke the best.
Hans Solo has a gun,
But he is not a Jedi.
Obi-Wan just turned into a spirit,
I don’t know how he does that.
The Alien Walker
by Joshua
I really like it because of the guys.
And the green trap.
It can fly
It flies into space with the aliens.
They fly to their home,
Alien Glass Planet.
It’s really cool because,
It has three legs and three feet.
Darth Maul Lego Watch
by Daniel
It has a clock in it—SEE!
The face spins right and left.
Its white and red and black.
It has white in it.
Darth Maul Lego spins on my watch.
Cell Phone
by Daniel
Its gray and black
When I close it,
It makes a “roun” sound.
The battery is a rectangle one.
I like batteries,
They make electricity.
I like the numbers on it,
When I push them they go to the screen.
The screen looks like a TV,
But it’s just a phone.
I started reading “An Invisible Sign of My Own” on Friday and finished it on Tuesday. Ariel said she really liked the book and wanted me to read it out loud. She had picked it up and investigated it at some point. She liked how the page numbers were vertical and in circles and the swaying words of “an invisible sign of my own” was on each top right corner of the page. I did too. We spent some of Sunday and our school hours reading this book. I had to edit however, and make it a PG rating for them. I did get some questions like “Why did you stop reading?” I would tell them that it wouldn’t make sense to them so I was skipping it. They seemed ok with that.
They enjoyed hearing about the 2nd grade classroom and what they did.
Mona Gray, the main character ended up being a Math teacher for kindergarten to 3rd grade, but we mostly heard about the 2nd grade class. She had the children make numbers out of their bodies and created math problems. We all thought that was great and Ariel jumped up as soon as she heard it and made herself into a 3. We all got up and started making numbers and math problems with our bodies. Then, we went into the alphabet and started spelling words for a while. Our largest number we created was 1111. We were all ones per Joshua’s request. And Daniel and Ariel laughed and said we are “One thousand one hundred eleven!”
There were numbers throughout the book.
It was awesome. We talked about the math problems in it. They also asked me questions about why people were saying certain things or acting a certain way, so it turned out to be a great social learning tool as well. They didn’t get a lot of things, but they did pick up on more than I had anticipated. As I read they made Lego creations, Dragon tales with Ariel’s dragons, colored, drew, looked for numbers in their toys, and also shared with me their perspective about the story. Like why was Mona was acting like that or explaining to me that the 2nd grader who was misbehaving should not act like that. They told me how some of the kids seemed mean.
During our breaks we came up with our own stories.
Since I shared about Mars the other day, I asked them which planet was their favorite and we read about their favorite planets. Ariel’s is Neptune, Joshua’s is Jupiter, and Daniel’s is Earth, but is subject to change at any moment. Then, we created our own planets and wrote stories about them. I am going to share them in another post. After we wrote our stories we drew our planets. The next day we wrote poems during our reading breaks. I will share them too on another post. We also took pictures. Later we pretended with Lego’s and Dragons that we were on our special planets. We had a great time and I think I am going to do this again with another book.
On a personal note, I have realized another thing about myself.
I know why I have such a problem with reading fiction. I need to relate to the characters, but when I do, I get too involved. It is too hard for me when I get to the end. I get sad that it is over. It does depend on the book, but when I invest in reading I am fully engrossed. With this particular book I started off excited and immediately fell in love with the characters. As the book went on it became too close to home. At times I felt like I was reading my own words and it exposed things that I wasn’t ready to expose. I thought. I do not think that it was an accident that I read this book at this particular time in my life.
It helped bring to life things in me that I have so deeply hidden.
I have already been on this journey, but the book helped solidify particular me parts that I was unsure of. It also helped me see how many things that I have quit. I quit so I wouldn’t feel, I quit so I wouldn’t fail, I quit so I would not have to deal with uncertainty. This was a hard book to read, but it was also extremely enjoyable. I saw parallels in my life and it was good to see it alive on paper. I also saw the characters as characters and felt their lives. I lived it with them in the movie that played in my head as I read it.
I get sad when I am finished with a book because I miss the characters.
Many books when I get to the end, I cry a little. I never understood why my eyes would start to fill the closer and closer I would get to the end of the book. I think I get some of it now. When I read a book it is like I am the camera man who is trying to capture all that the director wants. I get frame by frame, with the perfect setting, timing, color, lighting, stills just everything. I am capturing the very small detail with the shadows or special effects and the people. It is seeking that perfect moment where the actors capture just the right facial expression and emotional manifestations that are so important and mean so much to the story. The movie plays out and I have hoped to bring forth the complete desire of the director and what they wanted all of us to experience.
When I get to the end, I realize that many people have missed it.
All of the tiny details, the most crucial of moments are missed. The speck of dust that had a world of treasured truth was not seen. And I am sad. I miss my friends that were playing in this movie that I became intimate with. I shared in their deepest darkest times and their awesome joys and wonders and now it is over. I feel lost a bit when I finish and if I am deeply attached it can take a few days to recover my loss. This is the case with this book. I love them all. I love the town. I love the little things. This book is definitely one of my top 5. I am finished writing, but I have to share this lovely quote.
“Math and music tend to get along, supposedly music is just math in its best dress”
I am tired of writing about my stuff so I am going to share some things we have been doing with school. Yes, I do school all year round pretty much, it helps keep us on a schedule but we do have light months. The lightest months of our school year is October through December because with the holidays all of us are just too overloaded and overwhelmed so we take it easy then. Last month was kind of lax but we did go on a lot of outings and had some pretty cool adventures to several different beaches, a state park, the museum, and then a birthday of course. It was a pretty packed month. I was feeling like a slacker but now that I think about it, we did accomplish quite a bit.
Ariel has been picking out subjects she would like and I have been going with it.
Her most recent is reptiles (specifically King Cobra’s) and weather. We have several books on both subjects and I decided to tie in the living/non-living theme in with the whole animal interest. I recently found this site that is free that I like using when I haven’t pulled together detailed assignments for the week. I went with some crafts as well with the whole animal theme and we talked about environments, foods they eat, how they are different and the same. They had some funny stuff to say during our conversations. We were discussing what is our food, Ariel informed everyone that our meat is “actually, real chickens and cows” Daniel then yelled out “We are bad guys to chickens, cows and fish!” Meaning we kill them to eat them. Nice. Funny thing is that Daniel has refused to eat meat since the age of three.
We have been working on story telling also.
My focus has been on story building and poetry with the kids. Ariel and Joshua come up with detailed elaborate stories with their toys. Ariel said the other night that she likes being in her room alone so she can play out her stories. She said “I need my alone time to do that.” Joshua does it anywhere and doesn’t notice how loud he gets or how much space he has taken over. He will take over the entire living room on throughout the whole house if I let him. I have to be pretty quick to confining his “stories” otherwise in a matter of seconds the house is covered. I am trying to have them connect their stories into written word. Daniel has started adding his ideas as well but it is new and right now he is venturing out by using the scripts he has learned from Ariel and Joshua.
I think it is great that Daniel will soon start making up his own stories.
The big thing is that he is trying to add things to their play, he isn’t just quietly following, he is really being active in the roles. He takes on the characters and that is huge. They have been continuing to paint, Ariel has geared toward abstract more. She used to be very particular about creating a certain image but she is stepping out with blocks of color or swirls and I think that is awesome. She draws all the time and has a ton of pictures around here of stories that she writes with pictures. We have been doing a lot of music and dancing too. There is other stuff but it is basically regular school, I will not bore you with the details. I am trying new craft materials that I wasn’t able to try before because of lack of interest or possible fixations. We haven’t done any food activities lately so foresee some of that coming up. Fun, fun, fun!! Here are a couple more links that we enjoy.
Khan Academy Daniel is addicted to Khan Academy videos. He has only gone through the arithmetic section so far, he hasn’t watched all of them yet.
I got some pictures of our activities.
The kids and I have just been painting away together. We have done a ton of squiggly, swirly, twirly kinds of fantastic fun. Today Daniel actually decided that he would join me. I made some sort of design and then he would try it. When I suggested the number 8, he said “Oh, yes the number 8, that is a good idea.” He then proceeded to start making numbers on his own and wanted me to join him.
So I did.
His color of choice today was yellow. Interestingly, because he “owns” green but I was green today. Later he decided that straight lines were the way to go. Ariel has been painting with me for two days and has made her own pictures along with swirly like paintings. Today she went on a dragon kick. Yea! Dragons! Joshua wanted to paint a Star Wars Lego scene and of course create something out of wood. He loves building and creating things like that. I cannot really paint any Star Wars scenes so I made what I saw, explosions. He made this whole scene with Jango Fett and Obi Wan.
I am just going to keep going with this painting thing and see where we all go.
There are a lot of pictures, this is kind of a big deal since the only one who has ever really painted was Ariel. She is super excited to have us all join in her special interest. You can scroll over them to see their title and click on them to get the full fabulousness!
Here is our gallery of fun!
Again not much to say so I wanted to share some of our photos. We take a lot of photos around here. Daniel wanted to take pictures and didn’t want to stop, I don’t know the actual count of pictures taken but it was a lot. The first photos up until you see him at the type writer are some of his pictures. The others are just some of our school stuff, Ariel was fixated on painting and she encouraged Joshua to paint too but he ended up having other things to do, like play with Mat Man. Here is our “exciting” life.
