Giving Thanks

Today I'm giving thanks over at Childswork.  And more than likely it's you I'm thanking.  That's right.  YOU.  I mention you practically by name.  Sort of.  Don't get so caught up in the name thing.  I didn't mention your name.  I wanted to, but I couldn't.  The um. . . law forbid it.  Or something.

Anyway, thank you for being you, and go read all the nice things I said about you and the things you've done for me and my family.

"People Who Get It"

This is a giant hamburger of awareness that I recently ate.
This post needed some awareness.

Weekend Update

I don't love Thanksgiving.  For starters, I don't love turkey, and I'm pretty tight-lipped with my emotional from-the-heart givings of thanks, so an uncomfortable holiday centered around a meal I'm only lukewarm about. . . it's nothing I want to devote a lot of time and attention to with a few exceptions:

Sorry about your car, but at least the McRib is back!

1)  Sometime on Tuesday evening, a tanker truck carrying black driveway sealant spilled its contents across a 39 mile stretch of the Pennsylvania Turnpike.  I was watching the news on Wednesday morning, mouth agape, as I saw pictures of what it did to people's cars.  When I left for work that morning, they said at least two hundred cars had been affected.  Most, if not all, were traveling to some Thanksgiving destination, and had to stop.  What a monumental fuck up.  The Turnpike authority blamed the trucking company.  I'm sure the trucking company will blame whoever loaded the sealant.  I'm sure they'll all look for insurance to cover it, and, as I watched, i couldn't help thinking. . . all those people are stuck paying for ALL of it, until the dust settles.  Nightmare.


2)  Mississippi cousins visited, and it was really nice to see them again.  My recently wedded sister-in-law and her husband came down, and it was also great.  Some highlights:  visited downtown, ate out, ice skated, roller skated, had Thanksgiving. . . some lowlights. . . lots of people, lots of activity and autism, not a super mix.  Honestly though, up until about 8 o'clock at night on Thanksgiving, Lily did great.  She started to spin a little out of control as the evening went on, and she has a tendency to kick my in-law's dog (okay, not so much tendency as uncontrollable need) but all in all she was very good.  The iPad, and all the one-on-one attention from her cousins and aunts and grandparents really helped.


3)  Lily has been using some really great appropriate language lately.  Her potty training seems to have stumbled a bit lately, but her special ed teacher offered that sometimes when her kiddos see a change in expectation/priority (we had prioritized potty training before Lily started Kindergarten in the Fall) they see some great advancement in the new priorities at the expense of some of the old ones.  She feels like Lily is doing a great job in class, but has seen a drop off in her toileting.  That's sort of a wash, I suppose.  Some of the things she's been saying:


Emma and Lily:
"Are you okay, Emma?"
"Yeah, I'm okay, Lily.  Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm okay."


The next few have been going on more frequently since we started playing with her AutismXpress app.  it has 12 faces on it, each describing a feeling.  She pushes the button and they get big and make a sound and animation associated with that emotion.  She perseverates over it.


Me to Lily:
"Lily, are you happy or sad?"
"I don't know, Daddy."

Emma, look at me.  Are you happy or sad?

Emma and Lily:
"Emma, look at me, are you happy or sad?"
"I'm happy, Lily!"
"Oh that's good, you're happy!"


"Emma, are you happy or sad?"
*silence from Emma"
"Answer the question!"

We hosted guests at our house, so I had an inflatable Queen size mattress in the basement.  I decided to let Lily and Emma loose on it before I deflated it and put it away.  It was such a hit, I'm not sure I'll EVER put it away.


"Daddy, it looks like fun!" followed by "Daddy, you want a turn?"


Lily drools, especially when she gets stimmy. . . or spitty, since her stims often involve her blowing raspberries.  But she'll wipe her mouth off if prompted.


"Lily, can you wipe your mouth please?"
"Oh, I'd be happy to."


And finally, her sister left to go upstairs to tell her mother something before returning.


"I want Emma."
"Well, you're in luck.  Guess who's back?"
"Oh, Emma!  Emma came back!"


It was all very cute.  Then she peed her pants.  Not really.  But it brings the whole appropriate speech vs. potty training theme I was going with full circle, so it makes my point seem more cogent if I say that.


4)  We got two trees up.  One is full decorated and the other is lit, but undecorated.  Within 10 minutes of being introduced to the newly decorated tree, Lily had three ornaments on the floor.  After "parenting" that frequency dropped down significantly.  Distraction, timeouts, trips to the aforementioned inflatable bouncy mattress-o-fun in the basement. . . whatever it takes.  Only four more weeks. . .


There was other stuff, some of it awesome, some not so awesome.  It was a very busy weekend.