We’re very matter of fact with the children about life and their experience in the world. We discuss the cycle of life with them in terms we hope they can understand. They understand all things grow old and die—and that it can be sad, but that’s what happens to us all. They’re too young to understand their mortality, but we don’t want to shelter them from things by avoiding subjects.
We don’t sad, “someone has passed” or use other euphemisms, we say that the cat died, for instance, and that that’s what happens when we get old. We talked about how our prior dog, Lucy, died because her heart wasn’t able to continue on. We’ve told them they are very fortunate to have four grandparents who are alive and love to spend time with them. They also know that they will live longer than their grandparents as well as their parents. My son will ask about exceptions and we tell him that unless something unexpected happens, we as humans live a long life.
They know people can get sick and that usually we recover from the sickness. Since they’ve been sick before with colds, fevers, ear infections, etc., they understand what we mean. We always say how it’s sad when something or someone dies, but that’s part of life. As a result, they’re not afraid of death in an unhealthy way, but they’re also full of life and want to live a long, long time.
I remember when I was a child. I don’t know what the surrounding situation was but I was in our neighbor’s yard, playing with their children, Jeff and Joey. We got to talking about dying and I remember vehemently believing I was going to live forever. I wasn’t going to die—ever. I just wasn’t going to do it. That one little memory has helped me to understand what it might be like for my children when we talk about life.
We also talk about birth and reproduction. All in terms the children can understand. They each had different questions about why we were getting the dog spayed. They both thought it would be wonderful to have little baby dogs. But they were okay that we weren’t going to have any with Matisse.
I was talking to my son about this the other day and I told him G-Money (my best friend’s husband’s nickname my son has for him) was a doctor that delivered babies. That the type of doctor he was was call an obstetrician. My son said to me, “he delivers babies like the stork?” I laughed and told him that yes, he delivered babies, but it was a different way of delivering babies.
I don’t know where my son heard the stork story, could have been anywhere. It’s not a story we’ve told our children, but it’s a great mental image—even if it’s a nonsensical one as an adult.
The Big Boy Update: My son got cranky last night about his screen time. He lost the ability to track his time and is now dependent on us to grant and time his use. He isn’t trying to cheat so much as he loses track of time when he’s engaged.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter is very occupied with her friends and the, “conveyor” they have from the deck to the play structure. Just a few small chocolate eggs are keeping them busy for a good period of time today as they haul the bucket back and forth.
Sunday, March 31, 2019
Saturday, March 30, 2019
Do I Have To Be Blind?
I mentioned this last night, that my daughter just casually asked the other day while getting dressed, “do I have to be blind?” This give a little insight into her mind, or perhaps the mind of a child. She doesn’t remember being able to see, well, anything she says. I know she understands a three-dimensional world and how sighted people can see things beyond the range of what they can interact with tactilely. She understands some of this because of sound and how sounds have direction and magnitude, but sight is different.
Through sight we can take in vast amounts of information from a single glance. The, “picture is worth a thousand words” phrase comes to mind only in this case it’s more like, “is worth a thousand data points”. On a piece of paper in an instant we can tell there are drawings, or a picture or a cartoon. We can See that there’s a title, subtitle, multiple columns, different fonts, maybe a bulleted list. Important things might be highlighted with color and the main topic can be clear from the instant sight-reading of words.
A blind person has to read through the information one character or braille cell at a time. Periodicals are printed in braille and available to blind people. I can’t even imagine the challenge in just getting to the article you want to read in a braille periodical. I have a very small sample of what this is like from some of the children’s braille books I’ve downloaded or read with my daughter.
As a sighted person we see the cover page and open the book. There is a lot of junk at the beginning in small print at the bottom of the page about ISBN number, author, publisher, printing date, print version, etc. There is the interior title page. There is the chapter index. Pages have numbers and once you get through all that hoopla, you get to the start of the book proper.
It doesn’t take a sighted person long to learn to flip until you get to what looks like the actual first page of Green Eggs and Ham. My son picked this up well before he was able to read well even. Braille books aren’t that easy.
While most of us don’t care about all that, “hoopla” before the start of the story, it can’t be skipped—it has to be included. And that means typically lots and lots of braille you have to skip through to find the start of the book. Skipping isn’t so easy though. You can’t visually see that the small font is over and now you’re looking at a great big title on a page standing alone. Braille Cells are Braille Cells. There are ways to indicate bold, italics, strong type, etc., but it’s still a sea of dots on paper. I don’t know how a braille reader finds their way quickly through a book, let alone a periodical.
Think about all the stuff on a single page of periodical. There are the ad blocks, the tiny type, the captions to pictures, the veritable sea of information our eyes sift through in an instant to find the particular thing we’re looking for on the page. Or pages when we’re scanning a magazine in the checkout line to find out how to lose ten pounds in ten days, just like J. Lo.
I downloaded some books to put on my daughter’s Orbit reader a while back. There is a site I can get all manner of books in braille format to load onto the Orbit refreshable braille reader. Once I load the book, my daughter can have the braille pop up on a single line. She presses the down arrow and it goes to the next line. At the time I last did this I could barely read braille. It was nightmarishly confusing to try and get the reader to display the beginning of the story because at twenty-four characters per line, it took forever to get to the story itself.
I went back to the file, opened it up on the computer and cut out the large chunk of information before the story. At the time, close to a year ago, the books my daughter wanted to read were things like Goldilocks and the Three Bears. The entire story was less content than the introduction information at the start of the book.
I just looked up and realized the title of this blog post has nothing to do at all with what I ended up writing about—the challenges of quickly sifting through information as a blind person. So let me circle back to the beginning to end this post.
It was poignant that she would ask, so innocently, if she had to be blind. What do you say to that? I told her that some things we couldn’t control. I said I’d love to be eight feet tall so I could slam dunk the basketball, but unfortunately I was always going to be 5’4” and wouldn’t ever be able to dunk the ball. I don’t know if that made any sense at all, I though after I said it, because she probably has no memory of what our basketball goal was like in the driveway.
But it seemed to make enough sense to her and she seemed to be happy with the explanation. I wish I could have told her a different answer. We’d do anything, if we had a choice about her being blind.
The Big Boy Update: My son was in the car with my parents several days ago. After riding around for a bit he asked my father, who is a careful and deliberate driver, “Gramps, can you get a ticket for driving too slow?”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter is having Aditi over for a sleepover tonight. Aditi is the other VI student in my daughter’s class. The ladies have been having a good time having planned out an Easter egg hunt (which my son and I did for them) and s’mores after dinner. They’re now up in the bonus room, preparing to stay up all night. As an aside, Aditi is significantly visually impaired, but she seems near 20/20 vision in comparison to my daughter. She can see, well things. She knows what’s. “over there” and can do lots of things my daughter will never be able to do again. Aditi is very sweet and exceptionally mature. Her mother and I decided we’re going to get the two of them together much more often since they get along so well.
Through sight we can take in vast amounts of information from a single glance. The, “picture is worth a thousand words” phrase comes to mind only in this case it’s more like, “is worth a thousand data points”. On a piece of paper in an instant we can tell there are drawings, or a picture or a cartoon. We can See that there’s a title, subtitle, multiple columns, different fonts, maybe a bulleted list. Important things might be highlighted with color and the main topic can be clear from the instant sight-reading of words.
A blind person has to read through the information one character or braille cell at a time. Periodicals are printed in braille and available to blind people. I can’t even imagine the challenge in just getting to the article you want to read in a braille periodical. I have a very small sample of what this is like from some of the children’s braille books I’ve downloaded or read with my daughter.
As a sighted person we see the cover page and open the book. There is a lot of junk at the beginning in small print at the bottom of the page about ISBN number, author, publisher, printing date, print version, etc. There is the interior title page. There is the chapter index. Pages have numbers and once you get through all that hoopla, you get to the start of the book proper.
It doesn’t take a sighted person long to learn to flip until you get to what looks like the actual first page of Green Eggs and Ham. My son picked this up well before he was able to read well even. Braille books aren’t that easy.
While most of us don’t care about all that, “hoopla” before the start of the story, it can’t be skipped—it has to be included. And that means typically lots and lots of braille you have to skip through to find the start of the book. Skipping isn’t so easy though. You can’t visually see that the small font is over and now you’re looking at a great big title on a page standing alone. Braille Cells are Braille Cells. There are ways to indicate bold, italics, strong type, etc., but it’s still a sea of dots on paper. I don’t know how a braille reader finds their way quickly through a book, let alone a periodical.
Think about all the stuff on a single page of periodical. There are the ad blocks, the tiny type, the captions to pictures, the veritable sea of information our eyes sift through in an instant to find the particular thing we’re looking for on the page. Or pages when we’re scanning a magazine in the checkout line to find out how to lose ten pounds in ten days, just like J. Lo.
I downloaded some books to put on my daughter’s Orbit reader a while back. There is a site I can get all manner of books in braille format to load onto the Orbit refreshable braille reader. Once I load the book, my daughter can have the braille pop up on a single line. She presses the down arrow and it goes to the next line. At the time I last did this I could barely read braille. It was nightmarishly confusing to try and get the reader to display the beginning of the story because at twenty-four characters per line, it took forever to get to the story itself.
I went back to the file, opened it up on the computer and cut out the large chunk of information before the story. At the time, close to a year ago, the books my daughter wanted to read were things like Goldilocks and the Three Bears. The entire story was less content than the introduction information at the start of the book.
I just looked up and realized the title of this blog post has nothing to do at all with what I ended up writing about—the challenges of quickly sifting through information as a blind person. So let me circle back to the beginning to end this post.
It was poignant that she would ask, so innocently, if she had to be blind. What do you say to that? I told her that some things we couldn’t control. I said I’d love to be eight feet tall so I could slam dunk the basketball, but unfortunately I was always going to be 5’4” and wouldn’t ever be able to dunk the ball. I don’t know if that made any sense at all, I though after I said it, because she probably has no memory of what our basketball goal was like in the driveway.
But it seemed to make enough sense to her and she seemed to be happy with the explanation. I wish I could have told her a different answer. We’d do anything, if we had a choice about her being blind.
The Big Boy Update: My son was in the car with my parents several days ago. After riding around for a bit he asked my father, who is a careful and deliberate driver, “Gramps, can you get a ticket for driving too slow?”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter is having Aditi over for a sleepover tonight. Aditi is the other VI student in my daughter’s class. The ladies have been having a good time having planned out an Easter egg hunt (which my son and I did for them) and s’mores after dinner. They’re now up in the bonus room, preparing to stay up all night. As an aside, Aditi is significantly visually impaired, but she seems near 20/20 vision in comparison to my daughter. She can see, well things. She knows what’s. “over there” and can do lots of things my daughter will never be able to do again. Aditi is very sweet and exceptionally mature. Her mother and I decided we’re going to get the two of them together much more often since they get along so well.
Friday, March 29, 2019
This Keeps Happening
Mid-day I have this great thing I want to write about when I get to the computer at night. I have it all mapped out in my head. It’s going to be a great blog post. Then, round about now when it’s late and my back is spasming, I just don’t feel like putting forth the effort. And when it comes to a blog post, if I don’t think I can do it right, I just won’t write about that particular subject.
That being said, I can’t exactly remember what amazing thing I had planned to write about tonight. I don’t do any editing when I write these posts—which I’m sure you can tell, because there are typically a decent number of typos. I just open the laptop up, bang away at the keys for a few minutes, press the Publish button. Then, and this is an important step, I press the, View Blog, link. I do this because I’ve had a time or two, way back in the early days of writing, where the whole post just went poof.
It took me a while to figure out what the “poofing” exact steps were, but under certain situations, I would publish and then it wouldn’t be there. I won’t bore you with the details because as a software developer I can’t abide with an unreproduceable error—I had to figure it out. And since I didn’t really feel like writing and then losing blog posts, I took measures to make sure when it did happen, I’d be covered and wouldn’t actually lose the post.
It’s why I do the following on my keyboard all the time: Command+A, Command+C, Right Arrow. What does that do? Pressing the Command and A keys at the same time selects all the text in the post. The Command and C keys copies the text selected. Then pressing the right arrow unselects and moves the cursor to the end of the post so I can keep typing. I probably do that combination of keystrokes three to five times each night, which means even if I accidentally close the browser, I have the post held in the clipboard of the computer.
Maybe I drop the computer off the deck or into the tub or run over it with the car, but since I’m no where near any of those activities while blog post writing, I’m pretty darned safe. And if (or when) I lose another post from that series of unfortunate steps I’ve done in the past which will ensure a freshly written blog post disappears from Blogger’s record—I can just create a new post and use the paste command to resurrect the post.
Okay, see, I was tired tonight and wasn’t even planning on writing a long post. My back hurts and I hear Kelley brought banana pudding to Movie Night…so I’m going to the basement for dessert.
The Big Boy Update: My son really enjoyed Mimi picking him up after school and watching him play video games. He loves her attention. He doesn’t interact with her the way my daughter does, but I think it’s equally meaningful to him to have her around.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter asked me yesterday, “Do I have to be blind?” It’s interesting how she asked it. I don’t think it had occurred to her before. She’s always been blind from what she remembers.
That being said, I can’t exactly remember what amazing thing I had planned to write about tonight. I don’t do any editing when I write these posts—which I’m sure you can tell, because there are typically a decent number of typos. I just open the laptop up, bang away at the keys for a few minutes, press the Publish button. Then, and this is an important step, I press the, View Blog, link. I do this because I’ve had a time or two, way back in the early days of writing, where the whole post just went poof.
It took me a while to figure out what the “poofing” exact steps were, but under certain situations, I would publish and then it wouldn’t be there. I won’t bore you with the details because as a software developer I can’t abide with an unreproduceable error—I had to figure it out. And since I didn’t really feel like writing and then losing blog posts, I took measures to make sure when it did happen, I’d be covered and wouldn’t actually lose the post.
It’s why I do the following on my keyboard all the time: Command+A, Command+C, Right Arrow. What does that do? Pressing the Command and A keys at the same time selects all the text in the post. The Command and C keys copies the text selected. Then pressing the right arrow unselects and moves the cursor to the end of the post so I can keep typing. I probably do that combination of keystrokes three to five times each night, which means even if I accidentally close the browser, I have the post held in the clipboard of the computer.
Maybe I drop the computer off the deck or into the tub or run over it with the car, but since I’m no where near any of those activities while blog post writing, I’m pretty darned safe. And if (or when) I lose another post from that series of unfortunate steps I’ve done in the past which will ensure a freshly written blog post disappears from Blogger’s record—I can just create a new post and use the paste command to resurrect the post.
Okay, see, I was tired tonight and wasn’t even planning on writing a long post. My back hurts and I hear Kelley brought banana pudding to Movie Night…so I’m going to the basement for dessert.
The Big Boy Update: My son really enjoyed Mimi picking him up after school and watching him play video games. He loves her attention. He doesn’t interact with her the way my daughter does, but I think it’s equally meaningful to him to have her around.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter asked me yesterday, “Do I have to be blind?” It’s interesting how she asked it. I don’t think it had occurred to her before. She’s always been blind from what she remembers.
Thursday, March 28, 2019
What a Day
Today started out with a meeting at a property we recently acquired. We didn’t know the status of the interior of the house and to our surprise, when we went in, it was a hoarder’s nightmare. Stuff, junk, debris everywhere. Papers, boxes, random things just strewn about. The kitchen was a mess with prescription bottles (nothing dangerous) and a refrigerator we shouldn’t have opened, but did.
The power line to the house had been severed and the place was in disrepair. But we didn’t care. The house was inconsequential, mostly ready for tear down. The lot was the important thing. The lot had possibilities—so many possibilities.
The remainder of the day featured me sitting on my bed with my earbuds in my ears, making phone calls and following up with emails. We have a new foundation and exciting news about raising money to honor our retiring head of school.
Everyone I spoke to was excited—sad the head of school was departing, but looking at new opportunities and new chapters for the school which will be opened in the future. I didn’t think I would like development work, fundraising, asking for money, talking about what could be done with money donated by generous people for a good cause. But I love it.
It was a happy day filled with good news and the occasional anecdotal retelling about what we found in an unexpected house on a parcel of land we thought we’d never acquire.
Tomorrow I’m making more phone calls. I’m hoping we’ll raise a lot of money to seed the foundation in time for our head of school’s departure at the end of the school year. She is much loved and beloved. We’ll be sad to see her go, but we’ll remember her in years to come through the work she did to make the school what it’s become today.
The Big Boy Update: My son is really into dancing lately. We signed him up for a break dancing class soon. I can’t wait to see what he learns in the class.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter is making hand puppets with paper, scissors, markers and a lot of staples. They’re pretty creative. The one this morning even had wings and a name tag in braille, Tonight she was out of staples. I’m going to have to order more at the rate she’s using them up.
The power line to the house had been severed and the place was in disrepair. But we didn’t care. The house was inconsequential, mostly ready for tear down. The lot was the important thing. The lot had possibilities—so many possibilities.
The remainder of the day featured me sitting on my bed with my earbuds in my ears, making phone calls and following up with emails. We have a new foundation and exciting news about raising money to honor our retiring head of school.
Everyone I spoke to was excited—sad the head of school was departing, but looking at new opportunities and new chapters for the school which will be opened in the future. I didn’t think I would like development work, fundraising, asking for money, talking about what could be done with money donated by generous people for a good cause. But I love it.
It was a happy day filled with good news and the occasional anecdotal retelling about what we found in an unexpected house on a parcel of land we thought we’d never acquire.
Tomorrow I’m making more phone calls. I’m hoping we’ll raise a lot of money to seed the foundation in time for our head of school’s departure at the end of the school year. She is much loved and beloved. We’ll be sad to see her go, but we’ll remember her in years to come through the work she did to make the school what it’s become today.
The Big Boy Update: My son is really into dancing lately. We signed him up for a break dancing class soon. I can’t wait to see what he learns in the class.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter is making hand puppets with paper, scissors, markers and a lot of staples. They’re pretty creative. The one this morning even had wings and a name tag in braille, Tonight she was out of staples. I’m going to have to order more at the rate she’s using them up.
Wednesday, March 27, 2019
Waiting to Exhale
I’m going to be vague here, but my husband and I, along with a group of other people, achieved something we’d been hoping for for over three years now. We had people who offered up their field expertise, some that were available from a legal aspect and some very special people who were willing to help with a capital investment.
The trouble is, just because you want to do something, it doesn’t mean the thing you want to do is possible or available. That was the most tricky part—the how. The number of “how” discussions I can’t even count.
I had a friend that jumped in towards the end and ultimately brought to the table the missing piece we needed. He made it possible, and I’ll be in his debt for some time. He said he knows how I can repay him though: he’s had an iPhone 8 in his car for six months now, unopened in the box, because he doesn’t know how to move from his iPhone 6 without being absolutely sure he won’t lose anything. Work email and text correspondence stored on his phone he can’t afford to lose. I told him I could help him out and discharge my debt.
For me, tonight, I feel like I can exhale after holding my breath for three long years on this project. We can finally move forward. Thanks very much to everyone who’s helped.
The Big Boy Update: Last night at dinner with Uncle Bob my son wanted to bring the conversation back to Fortnite several times. He had this idea on how you could try and join a game with any of the famous players. His idea in theory was sound, but my husband told him they have an anonymous mode the popular players use. My son kept asking about this , “uh-nom-I-nus” mode and how it worked. We’d say with exaggerated pronunciation the word unanimous, but my son preferred his pronunciation.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: Aunt A told me today that Alexa has a story about a blind dog that got his own seeing eye dog. My daughter is just starting to discuss that she’s blind, mentioning it from time to time, so this story was nice for her to hear. Especially since she loves dogs.
The trouble is, just because you want to do something, it doesn’t mean the thing you want to do is possible or available. That was the most tricky part—the how. The number of “how” discussions I can’t even count.
I had a friend that jumped in towards the end and ultimately brought to the table the missing piece we needed. He made it possible, and I’ll be in his debt for some time. He said he knows how I can repay him though: he’s had an iPhone 8 in his car for six months now, unopened in the box, because he doesn’t know how to move from his iPhone 6 without being absolutely sure he won’t lose anything. Work email and text correspondence stored on his phone he can’t afford to lose. I told him I could help him out and discharge my debt.
For me, tonight, I feel like I can exhale after holding my breath for three long years on this project. We can finally move forward. Thanks very much to everyone who’s helped.
The Big Boy Update: Last night at dinner with Uncle Bob my son wanted to bring the conversation back to Fortnite several times. He had this idea on how you could try and join a game with any of the famous players. His idea in theory was sound, but my husband told him they have an anonymous mode the popular players use. My son kept asking about this , “uh-nom-I-nus” mode and how it worked. We’d say with exaggerated pronunciation the word unanimous, but my son preferred his pronunciation.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: Aunt A told me today that Alexa has a story about a blind dog that got his own seeing eye dog. My daughter is just starting to discuss that she’s blind, mentioning it from time to time, so this story was nice for her to hear. Especially since she loves dogs.
Tuesday, March 26, 2019
We’re Lucky to Have Him
Uncle Bob came to town today to visit for a few days. My son had his first day of tutoring after school which he’ll be doing once per week for maybe five weeks to catch up on a few things he can handle better now with the Adderall. My daughter came home early but was able to call me at the front door on her watch GPS tracker to ask why the door was locked, which made me thankful for technology. And I got a present from Uncle Bob and Uncle Brian that had an unexpected timeliness.
We were finishing the children’s nighttime routine and for some reason I said, “Bob, come in here for a minute” as I motioned to my closet. I wanted to point out the two fleeces they had given me and how I wore them all the time. They’re definitely the thing I wear more than anything during the cold months.
Bob left the room and not three minutes later came back handed me another one of the fleeces—that he had found only weeks before and had gotten the last one in my size, knowing how much I like them. I’m wearing it tomorrow…and probably the day after that if I can get away with not seeing the same people.
The Big Boy Update: The title of this post is about a conversation I had with my son in the car on the way home from dinner though. I told him I had something to show him that was a trick with two paperclips and a piece of paper. Our friend, Nate, had told me about a YouTube channel, Numberphile, and I had found the “trick” there.
My son said, “I like Nate. He’s my favorite Movie Night person.” There was silence for a few seconds and then he said, “he’s never really energetic or excited.” I told him Nate was a musician and a singer in a band and he was definitely energetic when he was on stage. Was Nate famous, my son asked? I said he had lots of fans. Then, apparently one the energetic train of thought, my son said, “well, that’s good because you don’t have to worry about calming him down.” I had pulled my phone out to write this down when my son said one more thing in a thoughtful tone from the back seat, “yeah, we’re lucky to have him.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: While my daughter was getting ready for bed tonight she told me, “today, when I was getting a booger out with a tissue...it was shaped like a noodle."
We were finishing the children’s nighttime routine and for some reason I said, “Bob, come in here for a minute” as I motioned to my closet. I wanted to point out the two fleeces they had given me and how I wore them all the time. They’re definitely the thing I wear more than anything during the cold months.
Bob left the room and not three minutes later came back handed me another one of the fleeces—that he had found only weeks before and had gotten the last one in my size, knowing how much I like them. I’m wearing it tomorrow…and probably the day after that if I can get away with not seeing the same people.
The Big Boy Update: The title of this post is about a conversation I had with my son in the car on the way home from dinner though. I told him I had something to show him that was a trick with two paperclips and a piece of paper. Our friend, Nate, had told me about a YouTube channel, Numberphile, and I had found the “trick” there.
My son said, “I like Nate. He’s my favorite Movie Night person.” There was silence for a few seconds and then he said, “he’s never really energetic or excited.” I told him Nate was a musician and a singer in a band and he was definitely energetic when he was on stage. Was Nate famous, my son asked? I said he had lots of fans. Then, apparently one the energetic train of thought, my son said, “well, that’s good because you don’t have to worry about calming him down.” I had pulled my phone out to write this down when my son said one more thing in a thoughtful tone from the back seat, “yeah, we’re lucky to have him.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: While my daughter was getting ready for bed tonight she told me, “today, when I was getting a booger out with a tissue...it was shaped like a noodle."
Monday, March 25, 2019
Conveyor Belt
This is a story about how all ropes are not made equal. We had our friends come visit some weeks back—the friends we’re going on a sailing trip with this summer. We were going to have rope knot lessons when they were here. I prepared by getting us some rope from REI that I cut into ten-foot lengths, melting the ends so that they didn’t fray.
We had lots of fun both before and after they were here with the rope tying. We played with ropes, they were all over the house and out in the yard and most notably all knotted up over my daughter. She loved tying “harnesses” out of them and then hoisting herself up into the tree in the front yard.
The other day I was taking the dog on out and about to get her accustomed to different environments and as we wandered up and down the aisles at Lowes I noticed bundles of 100’ ropes in various widths. They looked similar to the much more expensive ropes I’d gotten at REI and I thought I’d get one of them for my daughter. If she could have fun with ten foot lengths of rope, what mischief could she get into with a full hundred feet?
We unbundled the rope the next day and I discovered why the price point was so attractive. The rope had been tightly bound and it was losing internal structure from the long period it had remained in the one position. I couldn’t get it straight and bits of the center parts stuck out the sides here and there.
I didn’t know what to do with it until the next day when conversations about zip lines and the deck came up again. I told Keira and my daughter I had an idea. I sent my daughter to find a bucket and Keira down to the play set. Ten minutes later we had a loop of rope from the top of the deck railing to the cross bar above the slide in the play house. We tied a bucket on and I told them I’d be sending something over shortly.
My daughter wanted to know if it would involve Easter eggs? I told her maybe and then ran to the attic to get some plastic Easter eggs from the year before. Candy was inserted into the eggs and then the eggs into the bucket and we started hoisting. My daughter was just short of ecstatic.
We sent things back and forth several more times before everyone had to go in. My daughter, alone in the play house asked for one more thing and I surprised her with a popsicle. She really (and I mean really) likes the conveyor belt. Today after school she got her friends involved and they started sending things back and forth. I had to go to a board meeting so I missed what happened, but I think they were occupied for a good while, moving things from the deck, which has no access other than the door from our breakfast room, to the play house above the slide.
They connected the remaining rope in another way over to another tree. I don’t know what that rope was for, but it doesn’t really matter. The important thing is ropes are fun when you’re a child.
The Big Boy Update: My son told me in the car after school, “I like brown people the best.” He has been studying different cultures in school recently.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter has music lesson every Monday. It’s really Music Therapy, but honestly, we just want her to have a good time and learn about music in a way that’s meaningful to her. Her friend, Madison, loves to join in the lesson with her and Chelsea, her teacher usually doesn’t mind. They’re learning how to play songs on the piano most recently. And then they run around and sing and dance. It’s very loud in the house during music lessons here.
We had lots of fun both before and after they were here with the rope tying. We played with ropes, they were all over the house and out in the yard and most notably all knotted up over my daughter. She loved tying “harnesses” out of them and then hoisting herself up into the tree in the front yard.
The other day I was taking the dog on out and about to get her accustomed to different environments and as we wandered up and down the aisles at Lowes I noticed bundles of 100’ ropes in various widths. They looked similar to the much more expensive ropes I’d gotten at REI and I thought I’d get one of them for my daughter. If she could have fun with ten foot lengths of rope, what mischief could she get into with a full hundred feet?
We unbundled the rope the next day and I discovered why the price point was so attractive. The rope had been tightly bound and it was losing internal structure from the long period it had remained in the one position. I couldn’t get it straight and bits of the center parts stuck out the sides here and there.
I didn’t know what to do with it until the next day when conversations about zip lines and the deck came up again. I told Keira and my daughter I had an idea. I sent my daughter to find a bucket and Keira down to the play set. Ten minutes later we had a loop of rope from the top of the deck railing to the cross bar above the slide in the play house. We tied a bucket on and I told them I’d be sending something over shortly.
My daughter wanted to know if it would involve Easter eggs? I told her maybe and then ran to the attic to get some plastic Easter eggs from the year before. Candy was inserted into the eggs and then the eggs into the bucket and we started hoisting. My daughter was just short of ecstatic.
We sent things back and forth several more times before everyone had to go in. My daughter, alone in the play house asked for one more thing and I surprised her with a popsicle. She really (and I mean really) likes the conveyor belt. Today after school she got her friends involved and they started sending things back and forth. I had to go to a board meeting so I missed what happened, but I think they were occupied for a good while, moving things from the deck, which has no access other than the door from our breakfast room, to the play house above the slide.
They connected the remaining rope in another way over to another tree. I don’t know what that rope was for, but it doesn’t really matter. The important thing is ropes are fun when you’re a child.
The Big Boy Update: My son told me in the car after school, “I like brown people the best.” He has been studying different cultures in school recently.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter has music lesson every Monday. It’s really Music Therapy, but honestly, we just want her to have a good time and learn about music in a way that’s meaningful to her. Her friend, Madison, loves to join in the lesson with her and Chelsea, her teacher usually doesn’t mind. They’re learning how to play songs on the piano most recently. And then they run around and sing and dance. It’s very loud in the house during music lessons here.
Sunday, March 24, 2019
Pressure Up
We can’t get the pressure down in my daughter’s left eye. The pressure may be high in her right eye, but we haven’t been measuring it because she has no vision at all in it. The left eye has been high—upper forties to low fifties—and they’d bad.
My daughter was prescribed one and then two pressure reducing drops. When those didn’t help she was given an oral medication used to treat altitude sickness. That hasn’t helped. Now we’re increasing the dosage of the oral medication. In a week if things haven’t changed at all, I’m going to ask if they think it would make sense to have her seen in the OR to find out more.
And that would mean a trip to Detroit. Gosh, it’s been a long time since we’ve been there. But I’d go any day if it would give us a chance to save any of my daughter’s vision.
The Big Boy Update: My son is doing very well at certain things now that tell me he’s more confident about himself and more secure as well. He does things like clean up without arguing and he does them completely and thoroughly. He’s doing things without being asked too. I don’t know if it’s in part due to the positive results we’ve seen with school since he’s started taking the Adderall, but I like it. He’s and I are becoming “friends” more now that we’re on a more positive keel most of the time.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: At Movie Night my daughter was upstairs with me while the movie was playing in the basement. She told me, “when I put my ear to the ground, I hear the movie really well and it sounds like it’s in 3D"
My daughter was prescribed one and then two pressure reducing drops. When those didn’t help she was given an oral medication used to treat altitude sickness. That hasn’t helped. Now we’re increasing the dosage of the oral medication. In a week if things haven’t changed at all, I’m going to ask if they think it would make sense to have her seen in the OR to find out more.
And that would mean a trip to Detroit. Gosh, it’s been a long time since we’ve been there. But I’d go any day if it would give us a chance to save any of my daughter’s vision.
The Big Boy Update: My son is doing very well at certain things now that tell me he’s more confident about himself and more secure as well. He does things like clean up without arguing and he does them completely and thoroughly. He’s doing things without being asked too. I don’t know if it’s in part due to the positive results we’ve seen with school since he’s started taking the Adderall, but I like it. He’s and I are becoming “friends” more now that we’re on a more positive keel most of the time.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: At Movie Night my daughter was upstairs with me while the movie was playing in the basement. She told me, “when I put my ear to the ground, I hear the movie really well and it sounds like it’s in 3D"
Saturday, March 23, 2019
More Free Stuff
I fell asleep after dinner last night, full of two bowls of vegetable soup my mother, daughter and I made yesterday. I was sitting up with my clothes on, iPad in my lap. And that means I forgot about writing this blog post until around three in the morning. My daughter is outside with a friend and my son has a classmate over for a playdate, which means I might have ten minutes to catch up on last night’s post without interruptions.
I’ve been trying to take the dog places with us to get her more accustomed to different places, people, environments, situations, etc. I decided to take her with my daughter and me to get her measured for new glasses. She rides in the car fine and I discovered she prefers to lie on the floorboard in the back seat. She was happily in the car for fifteen minutes while my daughter and I were in the store. It was cool outside but the sun was out so I had the air conditioning running.
Next we went to the flea market. The goal of this was completely to have an experience for the dog but it was nice for my daughter too. She got to feel some things and we talked about what antiques were. She found something that looked like a bicycle with a large basket on the back. Then she realized there were two back wheels, one on either side of the basket. I told her it was likely for an adult who was delivering something or going to the store and needed a place to put their groceries. She thought we should buy it.
There were a lot of puppies for sale only the puppies had either been purchased or were up for the day (we got there late afternoon). She wanted to come back to see the puppies even though we weren’t going to buy one.
I saw a stall with lots of dog sculptures and nicknacks. I walked my daughter over and started in on the, “here, feel this one. Can you feel how the head is big and the body is small? This one is a sculpture of a puppy. Now let’s feel this one, see how the head is smaller and the legs are longer? That’s an adult dog.”
The man came over and said, “which one is your favorite?” This happens a lot and I am guilty of the same thing. In one sweeping motion of our head we can survey the entire table of fifty-odd sculptures. My daughter has touched two, and only knows what they are because I told her. But this nice man was going to (I guessed) give her one for free. I talked quickly to her about what types of choices there were on the table and then picked up one with two dogs in a basket, one an adult and one a puppy. He told her she could have it and she was very gracious and told him thank you. I said we had nothing like it and we’d find a very special spot for it in our house.
As we meandered we found a pet supplies stall. My daughter wanted to get something for Matisse and settled on a squeaky toy. When she asked and found out it was a dollar, I said I only had a twenty dollar bill. The lady said, “you just take it, that’s okay.” I told her we were going to get some food and would come back with the dollar and thank you very much.
We got mini donuts and my daughter felt responsible giving the dollar to the stall owner and then we enjoyed our donuts. We met dogs and people and somehow I managed to navigate through a very crowded flea market with a dog still in training and a daughter who needs to be in constant contact with you because she can’t see where you are.
But we had fun. I think if I can get the children to go with me again today I’ll take them both. I’d like to see some puppies myself. I can always use a dose of cuteness.
The Big Boy Update: My son wanted to have his friend, Philip, come over. His mother dropped him off this morning and my son and he have been having a really good time ever since. They’re in the back yard with some of the other children from our street now. Philip has to go at 11:45 but I told him we hoped he could come back soon.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter asked me this morning, “is ‘tizuvthee’ a real word?” I asked her where she had heard the word. She said, “you know, in ‘My Country Tis of Thee’”.
I’ve been trying to take the dog places with us to get her more accustomed to different places, people, environments, situations, etc. I decided to take her with my daughter and me to get her measured for new glasses. She rides in the car fine and I discovered she prefers to lie on the floorboard in the back seat. She was happily in the car for fifteen minutes while my daughter and I were in the store. It was cool outside but the sun was out so I had the air conditioning running.
Next we went to the flea market. The goal of this was completely to have an experience for the dog but it was nice for my daughter too. She got to feel some things and we talked about what antiques were. She found something that looked like a bicycle with a large basket on the back. Then she realized there were two back wheels, one on either side of the basket. I told her it was likely for an adult who was delivering something or going to the store and needed a place to put their groceries. She thought we should buy it.
There were a lot of puppies for sale only the puppies had either been purchased or were up for the day (we got there late afternoon). She wanted to come back to see the puppies even though we weren’t going to buy one.
I saw a stall with lots of dog sculptures and nicknacks. I walked my daughter over and started in on the, “here, feel this one. Can you feel how the head is big and the body is small? This one is a sculpture of a puppy. Now let’s feel this one, see how the head is smaller and the legs are longer? That’s an adult dog.”
The man came over and said, “which one is your favorite?” This happens a lot and I am guilty of the same thing. In one sweeping motion of our head we can survey the entire table of fifty-odd sculptures. My daughter has touched two, and only knows what they are because I told her. But this nice man was going to (I guessed) give her one for free. I talked quickly to her about what types of choices there were on the table and then picked up one with two dogs in a basket, one an adult and one a puppy. He told her she could have it and she was very gracious and told him thank you. I said we had nothing like it and we’d find a very special spot for it in our house.
As we meandered we found a pet supplies stall. My daughter wanted to get something for Matisse and settled on a squeaky toy. When she asked and found out it was a dollar, I said I only had a twenty dollar bill. The lady said, “you just take it, that’s okay.” I told her we were going to get some food and would come back with the dollar and thank you very much.
We got mini donuts and my daughter felt responsible giving the dollar to the stall owner and then we enjoyed our donuts. We met dogs and people and somehow I managed to navigate through a very crowded flea market with a dog still in training and a daughter who needs to be in constant contact with you because she can’t see where you are.
But we had fun. I think if I can get the children to go with me again today I’ll take them both. I’d like to see some puppies myself. I can always use a dose of cuteness.
The Big Boy Update: My son wanted to have his friend, Philip, come over. His mother dropped him off this morning and my son and he have been having a really good time ever since. They’re in the back yard with some of the other children from our street now. Philip has to go at 11:45 but I told him we hoped he could come back soon.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter asked me this morning, “is ‘tizuvthee’ a real word?” I asked her where she had heard the word. She said, “you know, in ‘My Country Tis of Thee’”.
Friday, March 22, 2019
Pinball Tour
I had a blog post title ready. I came downstairs to the computer to write up something I’d already planned out in my mind. But I have a much, much better topic to write about now, just fifteen minutes later after listening to my husband and daughter in the next room.
They’re playing the “One Thing to Know” game. We (or rather my husband) has several pinball machines. My daughter knows you pull the plunger and bang on the buttons until someone tells you you lost your ball. Other than sound and vibration, what happens inside the box?
My husband took the glass off and pulled up a stool for my daughter. He gave her the pinball to feel—it’s bigger and heavier than you might think. He let her feel the different paths for the ball and then place the ball in different locations on the field to see what would happen.
He answered her questions and told her about multiball. He knew I was in the next room and called me in to show me something. My husband had the settings mode on. He pressed a button and all the lights on the board turned green. My daughter said, “green!” and smiled. She got blue and red and white correct too. I wasn’t sure she could tell colors at all anymore. She got tripped up by green being blue on the next go round, but corrected herself when the next color was blue.
She is having a very good time playing an interactive version of pinball. My husband loves pinball; he’s having probably just as much fun as she is. This has to be the best, “One Thing to Know” yet. I just heard my daughter say, “yes, it does make sense” while her father showed her how the bumpers work when the ball hits them. It’s hard to top pinball.
The Big Boy Update: My son spent some time with my parents today. I’m not going to go into it, but he got up on the wrong side of the figurative bed and would not, could not, refused to be anything other than obstinate, insulting, screaming and hateful at both my husband and me this morning. He had consequences. He was mad. He was disregulated. My husband and I were frazzled but resolved he was going with my parents when they arrived at ten o’clock and we wouldn’t say a thing about how the morning had gone. They arrived and my son left without a complaint. He loved the museum and had a good time the whole day with them.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: I just heard my husband say, “do you want to feel the zombie in The Walking Dead?” (pinball machine) “Of course!” my daughter said with clear excitement in her voice—she’s not scared of zombies.
They’re playing the “One Thing to Know” game. We (or rather my husband) has several pinball machines. My daughter knows you pull the plunger and bang on the buttons until someone tells you you lost your ball. Other than sound and vibration, what happens inside the box?
My husband took the glass off and pulled up a stool for my daughter. He gave her the pinball to feel—it’s bigger and heavier than you might think. He let her feel the different paths for the ball and then place the ball in different locations on the field to see what would happen.
He answered her questions and told her about multiball. He knew I was in the next room and called me in to show me something. My husband had the settings mode on. He pressed a button and all the lights on the board turned green. My daughter said, “green!” and smiled. She got blue and red and white correct too. I wasn’t sure she could tell colors at all anymore. She got tripped up by green being blue on the next go round, but corrected herself when the next color was blue.
She is having a very good time playing an interactive version of pinball. My husband loves pinball; he’s having probably just as much fun as she is. This has to be the best, “One Thing to Know” yet. I just heard my daughter say, “yes, it does make sense” while her father showed her how the bumpers work when the ball hits them. It’s hard to top pinball.
The Big Boy Update: My son spent some time with my parents today. I’m not going to go into it, but he got up on the wrong side of the figurative bed and would not, could not, refused to be anything other than obstinate, insulting, screaming and hateful at both my husband and me this morning. He had consequences. He was mad. He was disregulated. My husband and I were frazzled but resolved he was going with my parents when they arrived at ten o’clock and we wouldn’t say a thing about how the morning had gone. They arrived and my son left without a complaint. He loved the museum and had a good time the whole day with them.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: I just heard my husband say, “do you want to feel the zombie in The Walking Dead?” (pinball machine) “Of course!” my daughter said with clear excitement in her voice—she’s not scared of zombies.
Thursday, March 21, 2019
Dog Day Trials
The dog is having fear issues. I would worry that there’s something specific with our puppy only I keep hearing the same thing, again and again from dog owners—around five to eight months their dog suddenly became fearful for a period of time. I talked to a lot of dog owners today because I spent a lot of time with our dog in pet stores and out in public today.
I had some errands to run today and decided to take Matisse with me and to go to some stops specifically for her. She looked out the window, watched me pick up prescriptions, place drive through orders and get food. Then I went to a pet store. It was raining but I stood there and waited for her to jump down from the seat and then out of the car. I stood still while she looked at the surroundings, watched the cars, smelled things and finally was ready to move in the direction of the pet store.
I waited patiently when she was spooked by the two sets of automatic doors at the entrance of the pet store and when she was ready, we walked in. I walked through aisles and told store employees I was fine, thanks for asking if I needed any help, we were mostly here to work through some recent fear developments with the dog.
I let people ask if they could pet her, explained what the breed was and watched as some people she took to very quickly while others she hid behind my legs. (I rather agreed with her judgement call on more than one occasion when she hid behind me). On the whole she wasn’t afraid of people and appreciated the attention, although she was very subdued and calm.
When I thought she was ready, I got a shopping cart, effectively upping the game. She got over the racket and size of the things pretty quickly. I checked out and we went back to the car, which she was happy to return to. She curled up on the seat and may have even gone to sleep almost immediately. Throughout all this time she didn’t seem overly fearful, but she wouldn’t eat a treat so I know she under some stress.
We went to Lowes next and went all over while I looked for something I could have found quickly by actually trying or by asking an associate, but since the goal was time and experience moving through the store, having large things clang about and people bustle around you, I meandered until I found the
bumpers I was looking.
An associate came over and said they had dog treats at the far register if she wanted one. I told her I wasn’t sure if she was going to eat it because we were working through some fear issues. She said, “wait here, I’ll be right back” and rushed off.
I was stuck waiting for a treat my dog was likely to rebuff but I didn’t have much else to do so we looked at the people passing by. Around the corner came an older gentleman with a very tall, mature boxer. He came over and Matisse and his dog Scout got to know each other. Matisse went through this interesting transformation at that point: here was a dog—a friendly dog—that she wanted to play with. She was excited, happy, back to being a puppy with no worries again.
Scout and she bounced back and forth within the tight radius of the aisle and our leashes. About that time the associate came back with that dog treat I suspected my dog would have no interest in—only I was wrong. Matisse was all about the treat. Scout wasn’t sure he wanted any so Matisse at it all. I checked and now she wanted my treats too. Scout had snapped her out of her anxiety.
We parted ways and I had a contented dog all the way to the car and then home. Her anxiety/fear was much better for the remainder of the day. I took her to several more places with me, including another pet store while my son was in session with Liz. I’m taking Matisse back to Day School tomorrow. Hopefully the day’s excursions around town today will help tomorrow at Day School.
The Big Boy Update: My son went to see Liz today for the first time in months. Both she and he were happy to see each other. I had Matisse with me and my goodness it is clear that dogs don’t forget the people they’ve met before. Matisse nearly bowled Liz over with excitement.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My husband has decided that since I’m not a big fan of Disney that maybe he’ll take the children there individually, without me. Tonight he asked my daughter, “sometime next year would you like to go to Disney, just me and you?” She said, “sure, but why not tomorrow?"
I had some errands to run today and decided to take Matisse with me and to go to some stops specifically for her. She looked out the window, watched me pick up prescriptions, place drive through orders and get food. Then I went to a pet store. It was raining but I stood there and waited for her to jump down from the seat and then out of the car. I stood still while she looked at the surroundings, watched the cars, smelled things and finally was ready to move in the direction of the pet store.
I waited patiently when she was spooked by the two sets of automatic doors at the entrance of the pet store and when she was ready, we walked in. I walked through aisles and told store employees I was fine, thanks for asking if I needed any help, we were mostly here to work through some recent fear developments with the dog.
I let people ask if they could pet her, explained what the breed was and watched as some people she took to very quickly while others she hid behind my legs. (I rather agreed with her judgement call on more than one occasion when she hid behind me). On the whole she wasn’t afraid of people and appreciated the attention, although she was very subdued and calm.
When I thought she was ready, I got a shopping cart, effectively upping the game. She got over the racket and size of the things pretty quickly. I checked out and we went back to the car, which she was happy to return to. She curled up on the seat and may have even gone to sleep almost immediately. Throughout all this time she didn’t seem overly fearful, but she wouldn’t eat a treat so I know she under some stress.
We went to Lowes next and went all over while I looked for something I could have found quickly by actually trying or by asking an associate, but since the goal was time and experience moving through the store, having large things clang about and people bustle around you, I meandered until I found the
bumpers I was looking.
An associate came over and said they had dog treats at the far register if she wanted one. I told her I wasn’t sure if she was going to eat it because we were working through some fear issues. She said, “wait here, I’ll be right back” and rushed off.
I was stuck waiting for a treat my dog was likely to rebuff but I didn’t have much else to do so we looked at the people passing by. Around the corner came an older gentleman with a very tall, mature boxer. He came over and Matisse and his dog Scout got to know each other. Matisse went through this interesting transformation at that point: here was a dog—a friendly dog—that she wanted to play with. She was excited, happy, back to being a puppy with no worries again.
Scout and she bounced back and forth within the tight radius of the aisle and our leashes. About that time the associate came back with that dog treat I suspected my dog would have no interest in—only I was wrong. Matisse was all about the treat. Scout wasn’t sure he wanted any so Matisse at it all. I checked and now she wanted my treats too. Scout had snapped her out of her anxiety.
We parted ways and I had a contented dog all the way to the car and then home. Her anxiety/fear was much better for the remainder of the day. I took her to several more places with me, including another pet store while my son was in session with Liz. I’m taking Matisse back to Day School tomorrow. Hopefully the day’s excursions around town today will help tomorrow at Day School.
The Big Boy Update: My son went to see Liz today for the first time in months. Both she and he were happy to see each other. I had Matisse with me and my goodness it is clear that dogs don’t forget the people they’ve met before. Matisse nearly bowled Liz over with excitement.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My husband has decided that since I’m not a big fan of Disney that maybe he’ll take the children there individually, without me. Tonight he asked my daughter, “sometime next year would you like to go to Disney, just me and you?” She said, “sure, but why not tomorrow?"
Wednesday, March 20, 2019
Fear Factor
Our dog has grown fearful and wary over the past month or so. I’ve been taking her to dog training classes and while initially she was curious and excited to be around the other dogs, she’s now not interested in participating, even if she’s very hungry. This past Monday she was showing a fear response, even though she’s been in the training room with most of the same dogs for three months now.
The two trainers there said her response is age-appropriate, but we want to do what we can to help her through the time by exposing her, calmly, to various environments and lots of people. On Tuesday I took her for a walk and saw a dramatic change in her: she watched everything around her and was spooked by a man in a parked car, looking back for almost a full block. A mother with a stroller a block off had her jumpy until we got out of sight of it.
I signed her up for “Day School” with one of the trainers. It’s at the veterinarian’s office and is designed to give the dog experiences around other dogs and people that she wouldn’t get with us here. We might only need a few days to get her more comfortable with her new level of puppy awareness.
I dropped the dog off this morning and Alexandria, the trainer, had to carry her to the back because she was cowering in the corner—something I’ve never seen her do before. At the end of the day Alexandria said she wasn’t going to charge me for a full day because they couldn’t get Matisse to do much more than edge towards the door of any room or area. She wouldn’t take food, no matter how smelly-dog delicious it was.
We’re going back on Friday for another day of Day School and then we’ll decide what to do next. If we don’t expose her to things now, if we coddle her and not help her through the fear, she might be stuck with it—and that’s a disservice to her. The flexibility of a growing dog’s brain is what we need to take advantage of now, while she’s young.
Hopefully this phase will pass as quickly as it’s come on. She was so incredibly laid back at first, it’s very strange to see her fearful.
The Big Boy Update: I was telling my son how I wasn’t impressed with the choice he had made for something last night. He knew he had chosen poorly, but he (successfully) changed my mind about his behavior when he offered up, “I haven’t pooped in my pants in a while though.” And he hasn’t, I realized. Sometimes you don’t notice a thing when it doesn’t happen anymore. He used to streak his pants all the time because he didn’t want to stop what he was doing to go to the bathroom. It’s been a good while though. I had to praise him for that.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter had homework to write a journal entry. She had several choices but selected writing a poem about thunderstorms. I wasn’t there when she wrote it but my husband got to see what likely happens at school when she has assignments. She sat down at the braillewriter and started typing very fast. There were several other people in the room, children over playing, but that didn’t stop her from coming up with the poem and calling it out as she typed. I think she had a two-page poem created in about three minutes. It was pretty good, too.
The two trainers there said her response is age-appropriate, but we want to do what we can to help her through the time by exposing her, calmly, to various environments and lots of people. On Tuesday I took her for a walk and saw a dramatic change in her: she watched everything around her and was spooked by a man in a parked car, looking back for almost a full block. A mother with a stroller a block off had her jumpy until we got out of sight of it.
I signed her up for “Day School” with one of the trainers. It’s at the veterinarian’s office and is designed to give the dog experiences around other dogs and people that she wouldn’t get with us here. We might only need a few days to get her more comfortable with her new level of puppy awareness.
I dropped the dog off this morning and Alexandria, the trainer, had to carry her to the back because she was cowering in the corner—something I’ve never seen her do before. At the end of the day Alexandria said she wasn’t going to charge me for a full day because they couldn’t get Matisse to do much more than edge towards the door of any room or area. She wouldn’t take food, no matter how smelly-dog delicious it was.
We’re going back on Friday for another day of Day School and then we’ll decide what to do next. If we don’t expose her to things now, if we coddle her and not help her through the fear, she might be stuck with it—and that’s a disservice to her. The flexibility of a growing dog’s brain is what we need to take advantage of now, while she’s young.
Hopefully this phase will pass as quickly as it’s come on. She was so incredibly laid back at first, it’s very strange to see her fearful.
The Big Boy Update: I was telling my son how I wasn’t impressed with the choice he had made for something last night. He knew he had chosen poorly, but he (successfully) changed my mind about his behavior when he offered up, “I haven’t pooped in my pants in a while though.” And he hasn’t, I realized. Sometimes you don’t notice a thing when it doesn’t happen anymore. He used to streak his pants all the time because he didn’t want to stop what he was doing to go to the bathroom. It’s been a good while though. I had to praise him for that.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter had homework to write a journal entry. She had several choices but selected writing a poem about thunderstorms. I wasn’t there when she wrote it but my husband got to see what likely happens at school when she has assignments. She sat down at the braillewriter and started typing very fast. There were several other people in the room, children over playing, but that didn’t stop her from coming up with the poem and calling it out as she typed. I think she had a two-page poem created in about three minutes. It was pretty good, too.
Tuesday, March 19, 2019
Picture By Number
My daughter has been recreating work she does at school at home. She learns how to do something at school, and then comes home and wants to make something up for her father or me to do. She made us a word search in braille the other day. There was a word bank of words to find and then a grid of letters on a second page for us to locate the words within. I was suitably impressed with the flawless execution of that particular piece of work but last night she did one even more complicated. Complicated in that she’s in first grade and blind. Not that being blind is a mental handicap to her, I think it’s has sort of the opposite effect on her—her mental skills are honed beyond what they would have been had she retained her sight.
Here’s what the sighted students got:
Here’s what the sighted students got:
My daughter’s brainiest created a grid of braille numbers on a sheet from 1-100. On the instruction sheets (it took more than one page because braille takes up space) she wrote the information you see at the bottom of the page.
Using a crayon of the specified color, you find the braille number and then color over it. When you do this, it pushes the braille dots back into the paper. When you’re done you have a picture in very low resolution that is the answer to the question posed at the top of the paper.
For sighted children there is the additional information of color which help delineate the areas of the drawing. But my daughter doesn’t seem to mind overly much. She doesn’t know what things are suppose to look like, so she takes in what information she does have and files it away, only to be refined later when more detailed information comes in.
This is what she wrote for me as instructions last night:
Some of the numbers are out of order. When I came home she was almost done. She was going back and forth from the instructions to her number grid to figure out which numbers needed to be colored in. She got every one correct. When I started to color in the pink I could see a pattern.
Then I got to the white and told her it was going to be hard to see the white crayon on the paper because it was mostly white. I don’t think she understood that well. She told me I could use grey, although the thing in the picture was pink and white. But grey would be okay too.
Here’s the final picture. She stapled the two pieces of paper together to accommodate the larger picture she’d created:
It’s a pink and white rabbit. We agreed that the two ears were a little too close, but the rest is a decent representation in ultra low resolution of a front-on view of a rabbit. And how does she even know what a rabbit likes like from that direction? She really amazes me on a regular basis.
The Big Boy Update: My son was going to go to a museum with my parents today but there was a snafu and their car wouldn’t start in the parking lot of the school after they’d picked him up. He wasn’t that bothered by it and didn’t seem to want to get out of the car when we came to get him because he’d gotten into drawing something on Mimi’s notepad. He told us they had rescheduled to Friday because it was a day off. A day off?! My husband and I got on the phone and checked calendars and didn’t have him off on Friday. He is though.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: I was walking my daughter back to her seat at dinner and was in rather a hurry so I moved her body in the direction I wanted it to go. She said in a mildly indignant tone, “Mom! That’s not how you do ’Sighted Guide’”. Sighted guide is a way a sighted person can guide a visually impaired person around. It’s a bit like ballroom dancing in that both parties have to know how to work together. When they do, it’s smooth and seamless. I apologized and told her she would have to give me a lesson.
Monday, March 18, 2019
Seismic Museum
I have that as a note in my “things I could potentially write about in the blog” spot where I jot things down. Sometimes I get autocorrect artifacts in my text and I don’t really know what I was trying not to forget when I typed it, because I’ve already forgotten it so well the trigger of something that looks or sounds like what I was thinking at the time rings no bell at all.
I know what this one is about though. My mother and father have been wanting to do something special with my son, similar to what they did with my daughter when they took her on a train ride. My son is older and sighted and a boy so his interests are different. He decided most recently that instead of going somewhere or doing something out with my parents, he wanted to have them come over here and have a sleep over with him and his friend, Rayan.
Tomorrow though, my mother and father are going to do something short-notice with my son for a bit of time right after school. They’re taking him to an exhibit at a local museum about seismic activity. From what my mother described about it, I’m rather sad I’m missing going myself. When I told my son about it he told me he knew about earthquakes. He even knew about tectonic plates. “See," I told him, "I knew you’d be interested.”
The Big Boy Update: My son got himself ready for bed without any help or reminders tonight. I told him he was own his own and could he get done by 8:10? He took care of everything and was dancing in his darkened room to pop music when I came in a short while later. Pop music doesn’t calm him down for bed, but he was ready in every other way.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: While I was at dog training class my daughter was working on a project for me. It’s complicated to describe without pictures, so I’ll save it for tomorrow, but I was so impressed with what she’d done and how much mental picturing and holding things in her head that I had to stay up late with her so we could finish it together. She was proud of herself, but not overly so—she says she does those things at school sometimes. Yes, I thought, but she completes one not unlike you would complete a crossword puzzle. Creating a puzzle from scratch is another level of complexity. Anyways, I’ll take pictures and hopefully write about it tomorrow.
I know what this one is about though. My mother and father have been wanting to do something special with my son, similar to what they did with my daughter when they took her on a train ride. My son is older and sighted and a boy so his interests are different. He decided most recently that instead of going somewhere or doing something out with my parents, he wanted to have them come over here and have a sleep over with him and his friend, Rayan.
Tomorrow though, my mother and father are going to do something short-notice with my son for a bit of time right after school. They’re taking him to an exhibit at a local museum about seismic activity. From what my mother described about it, I’m rather sad I’m missing going myself. When I told my son about it he told me he knew about earthquakes. He even knew about tectonic plates. “See," I told him, "I knew you’d be interested.”
The Big Boy Update: My son got himself ready for bed without any help or reminders tonight. I told him he was own his own and could he get done by 8:10? He took care of everything and was dancing in his darkened room to pop music when I came in a short while later. Pop music doesn’t calm him down for bed, but he was ready in every other way.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: While I was at dog training class my daughter was working on a project for me. It’s complicated to describe without pictures, so I’ll save it for tomorrow, but I was so impressed with what she’d done and how much mental picturing and holding things in her head that I had to stay up late with her so we could finish it together. She was proud of herself, but not overly so—she says she does those things at school sometimes. Yes, I thought, but she completes one not unlike you would complete a crossword puzzle. Creating a puzzle from scratch is another level of complexity. Anyways, I’ll take pictures and hopefully write about it tomorrow.
Sunday, March 17, 2019
Liar!
My son has started lying lately. Both he and his sister have been capable of lying for years now but in general they’re pretty honest children. Their lying mostly consisted of bending things in their direction. But my son has started lying in a different direction. He’s hearing things we say he can, can’t or must do and then later saying we never said that or directly defying us with his actions.
Today he’s highly disregulated. He’s spent a lot of the day watching YouTube videos of Fortnite. The channel he’s watching is clean language and content-wise and the videos are of challenges or experiments they’re trying out with the different items in the game. I’ve sat with him and been interested myself.
My husband is leaving to go visit his parents for three days this afternoon and to celebrate my father-in-law’s eightieth birthday. My children were tasked with making a meaningful card for their grandfather before their father left for the airport.
My son had a very difficult time doing this. He first tried to do something that was quick, taking only two minutes, so he could get back to his video watching. The thing is, he loves his grandfather and if he was taking the Adderall today he would most likely spent two hours making a beautiful card with drawings—but without the medication, he’s just not able to.
There were some words exchanged in which he accused me of not telling him things—things he had heard and agreed to—so he lost screen time. He went into the bonus room to spend time working on a card but was barely able to complete any content. I offered the Adderall but he didn’t want to take it. Our friend who is a physician stopped by and said the medication can make them feel differently and he might not have wanted to take it for that.
My husband came home and we had two more incidents where my son started to scream at us, saying we were the liars while not owning up to his own behavior and words. He was so vile to his father that I took him to the front door and told him he wasn’t allowed inside for a while.
That last bit was strategic because next door they have a bounce house inflated, the weather is nice and his friends are outside. In just a few minutes he calmed down and started playing with his sister.
I don’t think I handled it in the best way. As in I’m sure there is a better way to work with him when he’s like this. I’ll talk to Liz about it on Monday and see what she recommends.
The Big Boy Update: My son likes lots of cereals mixed together when he eats cereal. Only he’s found a new favorite: Captain Crunch. It’s always been one of my favorites too. He likes it with milk in the bowl instead of milk on the side. It’s so crunchy, we agreed.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter has been upset all weekend about their class picture day on Friday. She dearly loves her teacher but something happened where she was being asked to smile (which is very hard for her to understand how to do) and “got in trouble” for not doing so. She even talked to my mother and father about it last night. I sent an email to her teacher to let her know because I know she would have never meant to upset my daughter. I’m sure things will be fine tomorrow, but for right now, my daughter doesn’t want to go to school ever again and doesn’t like her teacher.
Today he’s highly disregulated. He’s spent a lot of the day watching YouTube videos of Fortnite. The channel he’s watching is clean language and content-wise and the videos are of challenges or experiments they’re trying out with the different items in the game. I’ve sat with him and been interested myself.
My husband is leaving to go visit his parents for three days this afternoon and to celebrate my father-in-law’s eightieth birthday. My children were tasked with making a meaningful card for their grandfather before their father left for the airport.
My son had a very difficult time doing this. He first tried to do something that was quick, taking only two minutes, so he could get back to his video watching. The thing is, he loves his grandfather and if he was taking the Adderall today he would most likely spent two hours making a beautiful card with drawings—but without the medication, he’s just not able to.
There were some words exchanged in which he accused me of not telling him things—things he had heard and agreed to—so he lost screen time. He went into the bonus room to spend time working on a card but was barely able to complete any content. I offered the Adderall but he didn’t want to take it. Our friend who is a physician stopped by and said the medication can make them feel differently and he might not have wanted to take it for that.
My husband came home and we had two more incidents where my son started to scream at us, saying we were the liars while not owning up to his own behavior and words. He was so vile to his father that I took him to the front door and told him he wasn’t allowed inside for a while.
That last bit was strategic because next door they have a bounce house inflated, the weather is nice and his friends are outside. In just a few minutes he calmed down and started playing with his sister.
I don’t think I handled it in the best way. As in I’m sure there is a better way to work with him when he’s like this. I’ll talk to Liz about it on Monday and see what she recommends.
The Big Boy Update: My son likes lots of cereals mixed together when he eats cereal. Only he’s found a new favorite: Captain Crunch. It’s always been one of my favorites too. He likes it with milk in the bowl instead of milk on the side. It’s so crunchy, we agreed.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter has been upset all weekend about their class picture day on Friday. She dearly loves her teacher but something happened where she was being asked to smile (which is very hard for her to understand how to do) and “got in trouble” for not doing so. She even talked to my mother and father about it last night. I sent an email to her teacher to let her know because I know she would have never meant to upset my daughter. I’m sure things will be fine tomorrow, but for right now, my daughter doesn’t want to go to school ever again and doesn’t like her teacher.
Saturday, March 16, 2019
Auctioneer
Yikes, I’m supposed to be at the school’s auction venue in twenty minutes. This is going to be a fast post. I worked this morning to get prepared to introduce the auction items. I made some index cards with specifics on each item. I’ve got a partner I’ll be running the auction with. I had heard he would be doing the bid calling, something I’ve never done, but it turns out he hasn’t either.
So we’ll be learning together tonight it appears. We’ve raised a good bit of the goal via online silent auction items, but we have the bulk to go with the live auction. I’d better do a good job.
The Kite Flying Children Update: My son and daughter are at a Y-Guides kite flying event. My daughter didn’t want to go and my son didn’t want to stop what he was doing to get ready. My husband sent pictures of them holding the kite and then the string spindle once the kite was in the air. They look like they’re having fun now. I wonder what my daughter thinks about how the kite pulls on the string?
So we’ll be learning together tonight it appears. We’ve raised a good bit of the goal via online silent auction items, but we have the bulk to go with the live auction. I’d better do a good job.
The Kite Flying Children Update: My son and daughter are at a Y-Guides kite flying event. My daughter didn’t want to go and my son didn’t want to stop what he was doing to get ready. My husband sent pictures of them holding the kite and then the string spindle once the kite was in the air. They look like they’re having fun now. I wonder what my daughter thinks about how the kite pulls on the string?
Friday, March 15, 2019
The Nature Tribe
My son came in from outside yesterday afternoon telling us he and Whitaker needed crazy glue. After some inquiry as to why, we told him crazy glue wasn’t the best choice for connecting two sticks together. Next he wanted tape.
We settled on some yellow tape that we weren’t using for any other purpose, primarily because I thought they could tear it without help and secondarily because I wanted them to work on whatever it was they were working on without needing an adult by their side. Additionally, I didn’t mind if they exhausted the full roll of tape, something I felt was fairly likely.
They came back in and wanted some string. I found some nylon cord we had in bulk, cut some sections and met them outside. It was then that I saw their proud handiwork. They had created a bow from a stick, using iris leaves for the string. They had made arrows which looked more like small crosses, using more tape and some string. They were very proud of their work.
My son told me they had created a Nature Tribe and they were going to invite Reese in, since she was now busily working on creating something herself with sticks, string and tape.
This morning my son and I talked about where good locations would be around our house to find sticks this afternoon because he had more plans for the Nature Tribe when he got home. My primary suggestion was, “the woods directly behind our house” which for some reason he hadn’t thought to check.
The Big Boy Update: Today my son brought to school some apple sauce pouches for snack time. He’s not been wanting to stop working during work cycle at school and has pushed himself too hard, becoming mentally exhausted and cranky. I told him I thought he could eat one of those in a quick minute. He said, “not even that, Mom, I can eat one in thirty seconds!” Hopefully the fast calories will help and let him keep working.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter was sad this afternoon. They had class pictures today and she got in trouble for not smiling. I feel bad about it—my husband and I had tried to give her some smiling advice this morning before she left and I’m afraid it backfired.
We settled on some yellow tape that we weren’t using for any other purpose, primarily because I thought they could tear it without help and secondarily because I wanted them to work on whatever it was they were working on without needing an adult by their side. Additionally, I didn’t mind if they exhausted the full roll of tape, something I felt was fairly likely.
They came back in and wanted some string. I found some nylon cord we had in bulk, cut some sections and met them outside. It was then that I saw their proud handiwork. They had created a bow from a stick, using iris leaves for the string. They had made arrows which looked more like small crosses, using more tape and some string. They were very proud of their work.
My son told me they had created a Nature Tribe and they were going to invite Reese in, since she was now busily working on creating something herself with sticks, string and tape.
This morning my son and I talked about where good locations would be around our house to find sticks this afternoon because he had more plans for the Nature Tribe when he got home. My primary suggestion was, “the woods directly behind our house” which for some reason he hadn’t thought to check.
The Big Boy Update: Today my son brought to school some apple sauce pouches for snack time. He’s not been wanting to stop working during work cycle at school and has pushed himself too hard, becoming mentally exhausted and cranky. I told him I thought he could eat one of those in a quick minute. He said, “not even that, Mom, I can eat one in thirty seconds!” Hopefully the fast calories will help and let him keep working.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter was sad this afternoon. They had class pictures today and she got in trouble for not smiling. I feel bad about it—my husband and I had tried to give her some smiling advice this morning before she left and I’m afraid it backfired.
Thursday, March 14, 2019
Prior Auth
We’ve been having fun with prior auth, otherwise known as, “prior authorization” with the nerve medication I take for my spinal cord damage. I take Lyrica for the neuralgia I have. For historical purposes, I’ve had two cervical spinal fusions. Three years after the second surgery I was able to get off the panoply of medications I was taking. That was a great time in which I got married and had two children.
Today I still have the husband and two children but I have progressing degeneration in my spine. I started taking Lyrica about five years ago and it’s been very helpful. This year we had no choice but to change insurance companies and when that happens, every medication you have has to go through a justification process to show you match their formularies for needing it.
The insurance company has been declining the lyrica since the start of the year. Two providers have been working on it and time stretches out between some of the steps, making things take a good while. It’s one of those things where everyone wants to help, but I have to stay on top of it, making calls and politely asking what the status is to get things moving again.
Fortunately, I had some extra Lyrica due to dosage changes over time, which has lasted me through the two months I’ve been without a prescription filled. But that only lasted so long and now I’m on samples while they try again with different/more information.
There is an alternate medication, Gabapentin, but that one they declined as well. Fortunately the Gabapentin is inexpensive (unlike the costly Lyrica) and I may need to do a stint on it to provide data to the insurance company that it does or doesn’t work as well before they’ll approve the Lyrica.
I just got off the phone with the spine clinic asking just that: do they want me to come pick up samples for another week or call in a Gabapentin prescription I’ll self-pay for now while the drawn-out prior auth process continues.
The Big Boy Update: We met with my son’s teachers today. They had a lot of positive things to say about how well he’s doing with the Adderall. He has some challenges though when he’s mentally tired but trying to keep working and when he’s hungry. We’ll be working with Liz again per their suggestion on how he can recognize when he needs a break or when he’s hungry and how to handle situations more calmly. Overall, a very good report on him.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter loves, “the puppy” as she calls Matisse. She says good morning to her and wants to hug her before she leaves in the cab every day. When she comes in in the afternoon she wants to greet the dog first, we humans are a lower priority. We don’t mind that one bit, the dog was to help her and I think she’s doing just that.
Today I still have the husband and two children but I have progressing degeneration in my spine. I started taking Lyrica about five years ago and it’s been very helpful. This year we had no choice but to change insurance companies and when that happens, every medication you have has to go through a justification process to show you match their formularies for needing it.
The insurance company has been declining the lyrica since the start of the year. Two providers have been working on it and time stretches out between some of the steps, making things take a good while. It’s one of those things where everyone wants to help, but I have to stay on top of it, making calls and politely asking what the status is to get things moving again.
Fortunately, I had some extra Lyrica due to dosage changes over time, which has lasted me through the two months I’ve been without a prescription filled. But that only lasted so long and now I’m on samples while they try again with different/more information.
There is an alternate medication, Gabapentin, but that one they declined as well. Fortunately the Gabapentin is inexpensive (unlike the costly Lyrica) and I may need to do a stint on it to provide data to the insurance company that it does or doesn’t work as well before they’ll approve the Lyrica.
I just got off the phone with the spine clinic asking just that: do they want me to come pick up samples for another week or call in a Gabapentin prescription I’ll self-pay for now while the drawn-out prior auth process continues.
The Big Boy Update: We met with my son’s teachers today. They had a lot of positive things to say about how well he’s doing with the Adderall. He has some challenges though when he’s mentally tired but trying to keep working and when he’s hungry. We’ll be working with Liz again per their suggestion on how he can recognize when he needs a break or when he’s hungry and how to handle situations more calmly. Overall, a very good report on him.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter loves, “the puppy” as she calls Matisse. She says good morning to her and wants to hug her before she leaves in the cab every day. When she comes in in the afternoon she wants to greet the dog first, we humans are a lower priority. We don’t mind that one bit, the dog was to help her and I think she’s doing just that.
Wednesday, March 13, 2019
Word Search
My son and I were doing some math and word puzzles together the other day. He’s good at crossword puzzles, picture path and picture cross puzzles and he picked up Suduko the first time I showed it to him. The other thing he likes is word searches.
We sit in front of the iPad and work together to complete or solve each challenge. He picks up what to do from watching me very quickly. We particularly like doing Picture Path puzzles together, both of us completing a number path as quickly as the other one takes their finger off the screen.
His sister does word search puzzles at school. I get the sighted version (printed page) of the word search with horizontal, vertical and diagonal words. Her braillist has translated it into braille format with words all horizontal and forwards. Since my daughter can’t scan over the page visually, this is a reasonable change to how the words are “hidden”. She always finds all the words, underlining them with a crayon.
Tonight she disappeared upstairs after dinner and was gone for a good while. She came downstairs and said she had created a word search for dad and me to do. Dad could do it first since he was learning braille and I could help if he needed it.
There were three pages. The first page was instructions, with very detailed, full sentences of how to do the work. There was a “word bank” on the next page of words we were to search for on the third page which was the grid of letters with the words hidden. We would use a crayon to underline the words we found.
My husband was slowly reading through the instructions so my daughter went around the corner to the bathroom—but she was listening to him spell out the words. If he got stuck, she would call out what the word or braille symbol was. My husband is getting pretty fast though and only needed help with the contractions he didn’t know yet.
She came back in and wanted to read the word bank words to us. We ran out of time to do the search itself, but it’s sitting on the counter for tomorrow morning (should we not be running late). My daughter continues to impress me with her school work and how very detailed her memory is.
The Big Boy Update: My son and I did a crossword puzzle that had only one clue—a picture of sushi. He and I had to figure out what the twelve interlocking words were. He had some good guesses. We had to use a clue to get one of the words, but we figured the rest out. He’s fun to play games with where you have to think.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter suggested something for Aunt Martha and my mother to do with her. When they told her they were going to let her do it and they would pass, she said, “well, suit yourself.” The way she said it made them both laugh.
We sit in front of the iPad and work together to complete or solve each challenge. He picks up what to do from watching me very quickly. We particularly like doing Picture Path puzzles together, both of us completing a number path as quickly as the other one takes their finger off the screen.
His sister does word search puzzles at school. I get the sighted version (printed page) of the word search with horizontal, vertical and diagonal words. Her braillist has translated it into braille format with words all horizontal and forwards. Since my daughter can’t scan over the page visually, this is a reasonable change to how the words are “hidden”. She always finds all the words, underlining them with a crayon.
Tonight she disappeared upstairs after dinner and was gone for a good while. She came downstairs and said she had created a word search for dad and me to do. Dad could do it first since he was learning braille and I could help if he needed it.
There were three pages. The first page was instructions, with very detailed, full sentences of how to do the work. There was a “word bank” on the next page of words we were to search for on the third page which was the grid of letters with the words hidden. We would use a crayon to underline the words we found.
My husband was slowly reading through the instructions so my daughter went around the corner to the bathroom—but she was listening to him spell out the words. If he got stuck, she would call out what the word or braille symbol was. My husband is getting pretty fast though and only needed help with the contractions he didn’t know yet.
She came back in and wanted to read the word bank words to us. We ran out of time to do the search itself, but it’s sitting on the counter for tomorrow morning (should we not be running late). My daughter continues to impress me with her school work and how very detailed her memory is.
The Big Boy Update: My son and I did a crossword puzzle that had only one clue—a picture of sushi. He and I had to figure out what the twelve interlocking words were. He had some good guesses. We had to use a clue to get one of the words, but we figured the rest out. He’s fun to play games with where you have to think.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter suggested something for Aunt Martha and my mother to do with her. When they told her they were going to let her do it and they would pass, she said, “well, suit yourself.” The way she said it made them both laugh.
Tuesday, March 12, 2019
The Stealth Stick Attack
Our dog loves to chew on things. She’s lost her last puppy tooth, a final canine that the veterinarian wiggled out when she was under for her spaying (which we saved for the Puppy Tooth Fairy). She likes to chew on lots of things, deer antlers, bully sticks, rawhide, duck feet, and, of course, sticks.
She’s gone through all she can find in our front yard while she’s on her runner leash outside and moved on to large pieces of mulch bark. Sticks are an all time favorite though. A few days ago I was playing fetch with her and we strayed into the neighbor’s yard. On their ground they had a decent number of small to medium-sized sticks.
As I picked them up, I would throw them into our yard and Matisse would run after them, picking the most recently thrown stick to carry around in her mouth. I made a decent pile of sticks under a tree where she could get to them and told everyone to leave them there, as it was her, “stick pile”.
Every time she’s been out she takes turns chewing on one or another. They’ve gotten spread out over time and are dwindling in size and number, directly proportional to the amount of stick shreds our yard is gaining.
We have to be careful though, as she sometimes does a, “stealth stick attack” on us, carting a smaller stick in her mouth, hidden under her growing beard, when we bring her in. This morning while I was out running errands she managed to bring one in, unnoticed by my husband. I came home to bits of stick on the bed, on the bedroom carpet, in the bathroom on the chair in the living room and at the front door.
I didn’t see the offending stick…there was nothing left.
The Big Boy Update: This morning my husband was telling my son how he wanted to lose some weight. My son had this advice for him: "Okay, then cook spinach more often. Because one, it’s yummy. And two, because it’ll make you lose weight.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter asked me, “When I talk to Alexa does someone have to be there, on the Internet?”
Non-shedding: We heard Wheaten Terriers were low-shedders but weren’t completely non-shedding. I started brushing her regularly, mostly daily, since we got her in early November. I haven’t seen a dog hair on anything yet and surprisingly, not much in the dog brush either. I just cleaned it out for the first time after four months. She may not be shed-free, but it’s good enough for me.
She’s gone through all she can find in our front yard while she’s on her runner leash outside and moved on to large pieces of mulch bark. Sticks are an all time favorite though. A few days ago I was playing fetch with her and we strayed into the neighbor’s yard. On their ground they had a decent number of small to medium-sized sticks.
As I picked them up, I would throw them into our yard and Matisse would run after them, picking the most recently thrown stick to carry around in her mouth. I made a decent pile of sticks under a tree where she could get to them and told everyone to leave them there, as it was her, “stick pile”.
Every time she’s been out she takes turns chewing on one or another. They’ve gotten spread out over time and are dwindling in size and number, directly proportional to the amount of stick shreds our yard is gaining.
We have to be careful though, as she sometimes does a, “stealth stick attack” on us, carting a smaller stick in her mouth, hidden under her growing beard, when we bring her in. This morning while I was out running errands she managed to bring one in, unnoticed by my husband. I came home to bits of stick on the bed, on the bedroom carpet, in the bathroom on the chair in the living room and at the front door.
I didn’t see the offending stick…there was nothing left.
The Big Boy Update: This morning my husband was telling my son how he wanted to lose some weight. My son had this advice for him: "Okay, then cook spinach more often. Because one, it’s yummy. And two, because it’ll make you lose weight.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter asked me, “When I talk to Alexa does someone have to be there, on the Internet?”
Non-shedding: We heard Wheaten Terriers were low-shedders but weren’t completely non-shedding. I started brushing her regularly, mostly daily, since we got her in early November. I haven’t seen a dog hair on anything yet and surprisingly, not much in the dog brush either. I just cleaned it out for the first time after four months. She may not be shed-free, but it’s good enough for me.
Monday, March 11, 2019
She Was Hungry
The dog has been interesting for the past several weeks. We train and I have her in dog training classes where we learn additional things and work around other dogs who are also in training. Matisse is fairly food-driven and doesn’t seem to turn away any treats. She’ll even work for her dog food kibble. But lately, she’s been a different dog.
She’s been more aware of her surroundings. Whenever she hears or sees anything she’s easily distracted and doesn’t have any interest in working. It’s like the other thing has an overriding level of interest for her at the time and all else is less-important.
It’s made me look bad in class three times now. Not bad, but like I haven’t been doing any training at all whatsoever. I’ve tried changing treats to newer, more “stinky” treats. I’ve come to class with several options but I can barely get her attention. When the trainer comes over, she’ll pay attention, but only somewhat and then wants to look around the room again.
I’m pulling her food up mid-day so she comes to class hungry. I’m not over-exercising her so she isn’t tired. She just wants to watch the other dogs and would like to interact with them if I didn’t have her on a tight leash. I wondered if she had gotten more food than I realized today as the children put dog food in her bowl when it’s empty. When we got home I put the food down and watched her eat an entire day’s portion in one setting. So she was hungry—very hungry—but food wasn’t as interesting as the other dogs apparently.
A lot of this change is age-specific: her world-view has been expanded and she’s noticing things differently than she did when she was younger. This will pass. Through everything though in the class, she just looks like she’s either overly tired or the most laid back dog you can imagine. She sits and then goes into a down position. Getting her to stand to do anything is challenging, but letting her watch and she’s happy.
The trainer came over tonight and said, “you have no idea how lucky you are. There are so many people who would love a dog this calm.” We did ask for a calm dog when the breeder was selecting which was the best puppy for us, so we’ve got her to thank for that.
The Big Boy Update: My son has been doing so well after school and on the weekend with the change in his medication (which he only takes mornings before school). He seems to be adjusting to the medication well. We’re meeting with his doctor tomorrow and will see what he thinks about the results we’ve seen and if he had anything different to suggest.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter told me tonight, "Hey mom I think dad and I have a lot more in common than you and I do. He and I like to cook together and do projects together and you and I just do art together and dog stuff. You and Greyson have more in common; you guys like to do games together and you both yell a lot."
She’s been more aware of her surroundings. Whenever she hears or sees anything she’s easily distracted and doesn’t have any interest in working. It’s like the other thing has an overriding level of interest for her at the time and all else is less-important.
It’s made me look bad in class three times now. Not bad, but like I haven’t been doing any training at all whatsoever. I’ve tried changing treats to newer, more “stinky” treats. I’ve come to class with several options but I can barely get her attention. When the trainer comes over, she’ll pay attention, but only somewhat and then wants to look around the room again.
I’m pulling her food up mid-day so she comes to class hungry. I’m not over-exercising her so she isn’t tired. She just wants to watch the other dogs and would like to interact with them if I didn’t have her on a tight leash. I wondered if she had gotten more food than I realized today as the children put dog food in her bowl when it’s empty. When we got home I put the food down and watched her eat an entire day’s portion in one setting. So she was hungry—very hungry—but food wasn’t as interesting as the other dogs apparently.
A lot of this change is age-specific: her world-view has been expanded and she’s noticing things differently than she did when she was younger. This will pass. Through everything though in the class, she just looks like she’s either overly tired or the most laid back dog you can imagine. She sits and then goes into a down position. Getting her to stand to do anything is challenging, but letting her watch and she’s happy.
The trainer came over tonight and said, “you have no idea how lucky you are. There are so many people who would love a dog this calm.” We did ask for a calm dog when the breeder was selecting which was the best puppy for us, so we’ve got her to thank for that.
The Big Boy Update: My son has been doing so well after school and on the weekend with the change in his medication (which he only takes mornings before school). He seems to be adjusting to the medication well. We’re meeting with his doctor tomorrow and will see what he thinks about the results we’ve seen and if he had anything different to suggest.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter told me tonight, "Hey mom I think dad and I have a lot more in common than you and I do. He and I like to cook together and do projects together and you and I just do art together and dog stuff. You and Greyson have more in common; you guys like to do games together and you both yell a lot."
Sunday, March 10, 2019
One Thing to Know
I started a new game with my daughter today called, “One Thing to Know”. It was an idea I had after yesterday’s experience with the my daughter’s lack of knowledge on where the milk was located every single day for years in our refrigerator. How many other things in our house does she have no recollection of? She says she doesn’t remember seeing anything, ever. What does her mental map of our home look like? I’m guessing it’s only things she’s touched and had direct experience with. And I want to change that.
This morning I said I had a new game called, “One Thing to Know”. When we played it, we’d learn one thing about our house. She wasn’t exactly sure she wanted to play the game with me because it sounded boring I suppose, but I told her we should try it and see what she thought.
I took her into the dining room to the buffet cabinet and asked her if she knew what was on top of it? She didn’t know. That told me that in her mind, there was a simple rectangular box in the dining room with no details at all. I had her start at the right side and feel. She found a bust of a child’s head that was very heavy. I pulled it down so she could feel the head, face, shoulders and clothing carved into the sculpture.
Next she found a long glass tube with five inset tea light candles. Behind that was a tall, fluted thing that seemed to her like a large wine glass but inside it was a pillar candle. Then in the middle of the cabinet was a pottery bowl. After that she found some of the same items, positioned in a mirror image fashion on the left side. There were more tea light candle and another pillar candle in a tall candle holder. At the far left end there was a tray in a metal carrier with some little items in it.
I had her come back to one place she had missed and told her this was the most special thing here. I pulled down a crystal decanter and had her take out the stopper. I said inside there was some wine Papa had bought the year dad was born in 1977. I asked her if she could figure out how old the wine was but she was more interested in getting the stopper back into the decanter because she didn’t like the smell of the wine.
Then I said to her, “oh, and I almost forgot, we have this displayed as well” as I brought down a poster board that was in the back, leaning against the wall. It was of a tactile snowman she’d made before the holiday break. I didn’t tell her what it was, but she recognized it as soon as she touched it, going over it with her hands and telling me about what all the different parts were and where they’d come from such as the arms that were sticks from the playground.
I told her we could play, “One Thing to Know” any time. She giggled and said, “we could look in your underwear drawer.” I said, “I think that’s a great idea. I could show you how I have my underwear drawer organized. It’s different than how yours is. And do you know what? Your brother has no idea what’s in my underwear drawer.”
I think my goal is to have her go through the whole house and learn what’s in it. There are so many things that I imagine are just blanks in her mind. She loves finding out things and trying new things.
The Big Boy Tiny Girl Dirt In The Mouth Incident: My daughter came in this afternoon covered in black dirt on her face and shirt. She was crying. I yelled, “stop, don’t move, let me help you.” I walked her into the bathroom and lifted her into the tub and then I brushed it all off her. She was upset but told a story of how her brother and friend had told her to do something like throw the ball and hold her mouth open. And then they threw dirt in her mouth. They had definitely taken advantage of her inability to see—which is something I’ve never seen them do in a negative way before. And knowing my daughter, she was probably frustrating them in some way.
Her brother came in later and I had him come to see all the dirt in the tub. I had him explain, in front of his sister, what was going on. He admitted to doing it, and it was in part because my daughter was irritating them. I worked on the guilty angle and asked him why he wasn’t protecting his sister? I asked if it was revenge? And I knew in part it was to look cool in front of his friends. He admitted to being frustrated and even said it was probably in part revenge. And he apologized to her. She didn’t accept the apology, which upset him, but I told him that was okay, that was her choice and I didn’t know if I could forgive him if he’d thrown dirt in my face. All ended well though as they were friends a few minutes later.
This morning I said I had a new game called, “One Thing to Know”. When we played it, we’d learn one thing about our house. She wasn’t exactly sure she wanted to play the game with me because it sounded boring I suppose, but I told her we should try it and see what she thought.
I took her into the dining room to the buffet cabinet and asked her if she knew what was on top of it? She didn’t know. That told me that in her mind, there was a simple rectangular box in the dining room with no details at all. I had her start at the right side and feel. She found a bust of a child’s head that was very heavy. I pulled it down so she could feel the head, face, shoulders and clothing carved into the sculpture.
Next she found a long glass tube with five inset tea light candles. Behind that was a tall, fluted thing that seemed to her like a large wine glass but inside it was a pillar candle. Then in the middle of the cabinet was a pottery bowl. After that she found some of the same items, positioned in a mirror image fashion on the left side. There were more tea light candle and another pillar candle in a tall candle holder. At the far left end there was a tray in a metal carrier with some little items in it.
I had her come back to one place she had missed and told her this was the most special thing here. I pulled down a crystal decanter and had her take out the stopper. I said inside there was some wine Papa had bought the year dad was born in 1977. I asked her if she could figure out how old the wine was but she was more interested in getting the stopper back into the decanter because she didn’t like the smell of the wine.
Then I said to her, “oh, and I almost forgot, we have this displayed as well” as I brought down a poster board that was in the back, leaning against the wall. It was of a tactile snowman she’d made before the holiday break. I didn’t tell her what it was, but she recognized it as soon as she touched it, going over it with her hands and telling me about what all the different parts were and where they’d come from such as the arms that were sticks from the playground.
I told her we could play, “One Thing to Know” any time. She giggled and said, “we could look in your underwear drawer.” I said, “I think that’s a great idea. I could show you how I have my underwear drawer organized. It’s different than how yours is. And do you know what? Your brother has no idea what’s in my underwear drawer.”
I think my goal is to have her go through the whole house and learn what’s in it. There are so many things that I imagine are just blanks in her mind. She loves finding out things and trying new things.
The Big Boy Tiny Girl Dirt In The Mouth Incident: My daughter came in this afternoon covered in black dirt on her face and shirt. She was crying. I yelled, “stop, don’t move, let me help you.” I walked her into the bathroom and lifted her into the tub and then I brushed it all off her. She was upset but told a story of how her brother and friend had told her to do something like throw the ball and hold her mouth open. And then they threw dirt in her mouth. They had definitely taken advantage of her inability to see—which is something I’ve never seen them do in a negative way before. And knowing my daughter, she was probably frustrating them in some way.
Her brother came in later and I had him come to see all the dirt in the tub. I had him explain, in front of his sister, what was going on. He admitted to doing it, and it was in part because my daughter was irritating them. I worked on the guilty angle and asked him why he wasn’t protecting his sister? I asked if it was revenge? And I knew in part it was to look cool in front of his friends. He admitted to being frustrated and even said it was probably in part revenge. And he apologized to her. She didn’t accept the apology, which upset him, but I told him that was okay, that was her choice and I didn’t know if I could forgive him if he’d thrown dirt in my face. All ended well though as they were friends a few minutes later.
Saturday, March 9, 2019
Where The Milk Is
My daughter wants to do things for herself. She wants to be independent. And my husband and I want her to be as much as she can. We try to never coddle her while balancing being there for her when she has an emotional need. We each want to be that secure attachment for our child, because a child that feels secure will be willing to take risks to try new things. My daughter needs to have the confidence to try things and fail, and then try them again.
My husband and I do have a downfall though, which I think any parent might agree they have too: it’s easier to get the toothbrush out and put the toothpaste on it for my daughter than it is to have her do it herself. Can she do it? Yes, but she has to feel when the toothpaste comes out with her finger, she misjudges amounts and it’s gotten everywhere, not to mention taken twelve times as long to do.
I realized the other day that I think my daughter could be more independent if she knew more—specifically knew where things were. She wanted cereal for breakfast and wanted to get it herself. I told her she could get up in the morning and get her own bowl of cereal. She said, “but I can’t, I don’t know where the milk is.”
It’s basic things like this that get you as a parent to a blind child. We put things in the same place every time so my daughter can find them. The is a spot in the door of the refrigerator where her and her brother’s water bottle sots; She can find it and put It away with ease.
The shelf right above where the water bottles are always contains three things, in this specific order: whole milk, orange juice, skim milk/. Then I realized my daughter had no idea where the milk was, I showed her. The next morning she made her breakfast without any help.
How many things about our house do I take for granted my daughter knows about that she doesn’t even know exist? I’m going to make a point of showing. her something every day.
The Big Boy Update: My mother and father’s sister watched the children last night. My daughter went to sleep early which left my son up to entertain the adults. They played a game of Katan Junior and then my son pulled out the Twister game next. He wanted both my mother and aunt to play with him. He told them though, “this may be a little rough on your bodies.” They decided to watch some television instead when they weren’t quite up for a game of Twister.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter and I plated an app on the iPad today. You get a collection of letters and you see what words you can come up with that can be spelled by the letters. I’d played the app before but this version was for children. My daughter is a good speller and sh has a decent vocabulary. She was getting all the answers plus some bonus words on
My husband and I do have a downfall though, which I think any parent might agree they have too: it’s easier to get the toothbrush out and put the toothpaste on it for my daughter than it is to have her do it herself. Can she do it? Yes, but she has to feel when the toothpaste comes out with her finger, she misjudges amounts and it’s gotten everywhere, not to mention taken twelve times as long to do.
I realized the other day that I think my daughter could be more independent if she knew more—specifically knew where things were. She wanted cereal for breakfast and wanted to get it herself. I told her she could get up in the morning and get her own bowl of cereal. She said, “but I can’t, I don’t know where the milk is.”
It’s basic things like this that get you as a parent to a blind child. We put things in the same place every time so my daughter can find them. The is a spot in the door of the refrigerator where her and her brother’s water bottle sots; She can find it and put It away with ease.
The shelf right above where the water bottles are always contains three things, in this specific order: whole milk, orange juice, skim milk/. Then I realized my daughter had no idea where the milk was, I showed her. The next morning she made her breakfast without any help.
How many things about our house do I take for granted my daughter knows about that she doesn’t even know exist? I’m going to make a point of showing. her something every day.
The Big Boy Update: My mother and father’s sister watched the children last night. My daughter went to sleep early which left my son up to entertain the adults. They played a game of Katan Junior and then my son pulled out the Twister game next. He wanted both my mother and aunt to play with him. He told them though, “this may be a little rough on your bodies.” They decided to watch some television instead when they weren’t quite up for a game of Twister.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter and I plated an app on the iPad today. You get a collection of letters and you see what words you can come up with that can be spelled by the letters. I’d played the app before but this version was for children. My daughter is a good speller and sh has a decent vocabulary. She was getting all the answers plus some bonus words on
Friday, March 8, 2019
The Focus Gear
We’ve sent my son to school for two weeks now after taking a six-hour duration Adderall pill each morning. The first day I wasn’t certain if he was going to fare well with it at school because he was telling his teachers he wasn’t able to control his emotions, but they wanted to continue it to see how it went. And it was a good decision. My son is able to focus at school. He’s working intently during work cycle and is excited about his work.
There are some challenges though: he does have an anger management problem we’re going to hear more about in a teacher conference next week. Apparently he gets quite upset when someone interrupts his work. Which is singular given that prior to the Adderall my son would interrupt his classmates fairly regularly.
He and I have talked about it a bit And it’s been intentional that it’s only a bit. I’m trying to casually talk about things that happen at home and relate them to how his day in the classroom goes without letting him know I’m getting a detailed account from his teacher.
When we were talking on the ride to school we were talking about what the Adderall helped and what it made more difficult. I asked him if it helped him to focus more because his teacher had said how intently he was working on his assignments. My son said, “the Adderall unclogs my focus gear. Because it always gets clogged with other thoughts.”
I asked him if it made him angrier and he said sometimes it did. We talked about how we’d been working on using kind words at home and that using a calm tone and nice words to talk to someone when they’ve upset you. He said he was going to work on it. I know this is going to be hard for him because he has a sudden and dramatic reaction to minor things,
Next week we go back for a month follow-up with the prescribing psychiatrist and will see what he suggests. I’m not keen on making any medication changes if we don’t have to though; my son has adapted well to it, including coming down from the medication at the end of the school day. He was blowing up for very minor things a week ago, acting almost like a child several years younger in age. He’s suddenly a lot more mature acting in both behavior and words.
It’s working, this unclogging of the focus gear. I’m so glad for my son. I think a lot of the anxiety he had has decreased too because he’s being successful at school. He’s much calmer and is acting several years older mentally. I think he’s proud of himself. I’m proud of him too.
The Big Boy Update: My son and I play Fortnite Monopoly the other night. After we finished the game my son said, “we might have to play another round. Because my body is just exploding with being ready.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter wants to feel like she can help. She has to accept help from people every day and all day long. She wants to feel like she knows things and can do things. One of the best things we do to help her mental state right now is to have her help us with something. She is a feisty one, but she needs to feel like she’s contributing…like she’s needed…like she’s not a burden.
There are some challenges though: he does have an anger management problem we’re going to hear more about in a teacher conference next week. Apparently he gets quite upset when someone interrupts his work. Which is singular given that prior to the Adderall my son would interrupt his classmates fairly regularly.
He and I have talked about it a bit And it’s been intentional that it’s only a bit. I’m trying to casually talk about things that happen at home and relate them to how his day in the classroom goes without letting him know I’m getting a detailed account from his teacher.
When we were talking on the ride to school we were talking about what the Adderall helped and what it made more difficult. I asked him if it helped him to focus more because his teacher had said how intently he was working on his assignments. My son said, “the Adderall unclogs my focus gear. Because it always gets clogged with other thoughts.”
I asked him if it made him angrier and he said sometimes it did. We talked about how we’d been working on using kind words at home and that using a calm tone and nice words to talk to someone when they’ve upset you. He said he was going to work on it. I know this is going to be hard for him because he has a sudden and dramatic reaction to minor things,
Next week we go back for a month follow-up with the prescribing psychiatrist and will see what he suggests. I’m not keen on making any medication changes if we don’t have to though; my son has adapted well to it, including coming down from the medication at the end of the school day. He was blowing up for very minor things a week ago, acting almost like a child several years younger in age. He’s suddenly a lot more mature acting in both behavior and words.
It’s working, this unclogging of the focus gear. I’m so glad for my son. I think a lot of the anxiety he had has decreased too because he’s being successful at school. He’s much calmer and is acting several years older mentally. I think he’s proud of himself. I’m proud of him too.
The Big Boy Update: My son and I play Fortnite Monopoly the other night. After we finished the game my son said, “we might have to play another round. Because my body is just exploding with being ready.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter wants to feel like she can help. She has to accept help from people every day and all day long. She wants to feel like she knows things and can do things. One of the best things we do to help her mental state right now is to have her help us with something. She is a feisty one, but she needs to feel like she’s contributing…like she’s needed…like she’s not a burden.
Thursday, March 7, 2019
Wax Museum
My daughter participated with all the first graders today in a wax museum event at her school. Parents and grandparents entered the gymnasium to find it filled with children, standing very still, holding a sign with their famous American on it, waiting for their button to be pressed.
There were a lot of astronauts, famous politicians, sports players and even notables like Walt Disney and Charles Schultz.
The children didn’t look nervous even as the crowd of adults swarmed in and around them. They had memorized and rehearsed their lines and were dressed as their character. We went around pressing buttons and without fail, the child launched into their short speech, most in a quiet but confident voice.
My daughter’s speech was:
The Big Boy Tiny Girl Four-Thirty in the Morning Update: This morning at four-thirty I heard the children come downstairs together. They never do that. Then I heard them shut the door to our bedroom. They don’t do that either. I heard them in the living room talking quietly, but before I could rouse myself out of bed to investigate I fell back asleep.
When we got up at seven, my daughter was excited for us to come see the living room. They had been up since four-thirty, watching television and making a fort with chairs, blankets and pillows in the living. Oh, and they’d decided to serve themselves breakfast. They had eaten all the marshmallows out of the Lucky Charms cereal. Without milk. And while I was proud of the fort construction, I was not happy about the other choices they made and talked to them about the meaning of a good breakfast and how marshmallows alone did not qualify. They helped clean everything up and agreed to some penance (eating the remaining oats cereal without marshmallows this weekend). I was proud of their initiative and cooperation I told them, but next time do it on a weekend, please?
There were a lot of astronauts, famous politicians, sports players and even notables like Walt Disney and Charles Schultz.
The children didn’t look nervous even as the crowd of adults swarmed in and around them. They had memorized and rehearsed their lines and were dressed as their character. We went around pressing buttons and without fail, the child launched into their short speech, most in a quiet but confident voice.
My daughter’s speech was:
Hi, my name is Amelia Earhart. I was born on July 24th, 1897. I am famous because I was the first female pilot to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. I was flying around the world when my plane disappeared over the Pacific Ocean and I was never found. I died on January 5th, 1839.My daughter asked how they knew what day she died. I told her I had that same question. Perhaps it was the day after they lost contact with her?
The Big Boy Tiny Girl Four-Thirty in the Morning Update: This morning at four-thirty I heard the children come downstairs together. They never do that. Then I heard them shut the door to our bedroom. They don’t do that either. I heard them in the living room talking quietly, but before I could rouse myself out of bed to investigate I fell back asleep.
When we got up at seven, my daughter was excited for us to come see the living room. They had been up since four-thirty, watching television and making a fort with chairs, blankets and pillows in the living. Oh, and they’d decided to serve themselves breakfast. They had eaten all the marshmallows out of the Lucky Charms cereal. Without milk. And while I was proud of the fort construction, I was not happy about the other choices they made and talked to them about the meaning of a good breakfast and how marshmallows alone did not qualify. They helped clean everything up and agreed to some penance (eating the remaining oats cereal without marshmallows this weekend). I was proud of their initiative and cooperation I told them, but next time do it on a weekend, please?
Wednesday, March 6, 2019
Dinner Phone
I put my phone up to charge a lot of the time before we sit down to dinner but I’ve had to stop the habit because my phone is a necessary thing for the content of this blog. My children say the best things while we’re at dinner. All of the content for this post was captured at dinner. About the time I’d put the phone back in my pocket, someone would say something else and I’d pull the phone back out to get their wording down so I’d remember it correctly for later.
Tonight my son was sitting up at the bar, because he didn’t want to sit with us. Who knows, he’s a boy and eight-years-old and sometimes parents are just not that cool. My daughter, on the other hand, wanted to pick who she got to sit by and then was having none of the adult conversation, because it wasn’t what she wanted to talk about.
We did “up and down” where we list something we liked that happened in the day and something we didn’t like. My son would be fine with the game being as advertised meaning an ‘up’ and a ‘down’. My daughter, however, likes to have more than one up and down—sometimes lots of each even.
We got into a discussion about my daughter’s school tomorrow in which her class will be wax models of famous people in American history. She practiced her Amelia Earhart lines for her brother and then told us her braillist wasn’t going to be there tomorrow because her husband’s uncle had died. My husband asked if they were going to the funeral and we found out my children didn’t really understand what a funeral was.
We talked about how it’s a way for people to gather together and remember the person who had died. And that transitioned into a ceremony my husband had attended while on the ski trip. My best friend’s brother-in-law had died and had asked that some of his ashes be spread on Solitude Mountain. They all gathered at a copse of trees on the mountain and Matt spoke about his brother, Carlos, and then they spread the ashes.
You know children, right? This brought up more questions about what happened when you died. The ashes part was easy because we have a Lucy tree in the back yard with Lucy’s ashes under it. This was Carlos’ ashes on the mountain.
My husband said there were two main things that happened to someone after they died: they were buried, "in a box, underground,” he said, Or your body was burned in a hot fire and the ashes that were left over afterwards could be put wherever the person wanted.
Honestly, both options sound sort of horrific if you’re not sure at all about death and you’re a child, but my children didn’t seem overly bothered by it. My daughter said she would rather be buried underground. My son said, “I don’t want to be cremated. I want to be used for experiments like mom."
Ah, yes, the donating your body to scientific research option (that I have a specific will for). We had forgotten all about that route. I told him that sounded like a generous idea. Honestly, I’m not sure if he didn’t like either of the first two options or if he just liked the thought of being part of experiments.
The Big Boy Update: My son wanted to play blindfolded Twister with me the other night while his sister and my husband were at a Y-Guides event. Only my son had some new rules. The rules went on and on and I had to stop him short, saying we weren’t ever going to get around to playing if we added any more rules. It was a mashup of Twister and Fortnite. You started off with one hundred health and would lose or gain health from certain colors. Then there was the attack phase which deducted points for any limbs adjacent to another. You could level up your attack damage if you got to one of the circles. It sounds crazy, but the game held together and was a lot of fun. The only challenging part was totaling up all the damage done to each person when we had arms and legs all in proximity to one another. I’d play it again.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: I’m not sure how, but the number twelve came up tonight at dinner. My daughter said, “No! That’s my least favorite number.” I’ve heard of lucky numbers and favorite numbers, but never a least favorite one. When I asked her why though, she had a very specific reason: “because of a worksheet in kindergarten where almost every answer was twelve. There was only one answer that was not a twelve, and that was a nine.”
So Fluffy: I took the dog to get groomed today. I give he a bath and brush her fur regularly, but the hair around her face was growing in a way that I wasn’t sure how to handle. It was blocking her vision and flopping around in a way that made her look scruffy. Tonight, she can see again—and she’s very fluffy. This is her, “please can you let me out again, didn’t you hear me ringing the bell?” face.
Tonight my son was sitting up at the bar, because he didn’t want to sit with us. Who knows, he’s a boy and eight-years-old and sometimes parents are just not that cool. My daughter, on the other hand, wanted to pick who she got to sit by and then was having none of the adult conversation, because it wasn’t what she wanted to talk about.
We did “up and down” where we list something we liked that happened in the day and something we didn’t like. My son would be fine with the game being as advertised meaning an ‘up’ and a ‘down’. My daughter, however, likes to have more than one up and down—sometimes lots of each even.
We got into a discussion about my daughter’s school tomorrow in which her class will be wax models of famous people in American history. She practiced her Amelia Earhart lines for her brother and then told us her braillist wasn’t going to be there tomorrow because her husband’s uncle had died. My husband asked if they were going to the funeral and we found out my children didn’t really understand what a funeral was.
We talked about how it’s a way for people to gather together and remember the person who had died. And that transitioned into a ceremony my husband had attended while on the ski trip. My best friend’s brother-in-law had died and had asked that some of his ashes be spread on Solitude Mountain. They all gathered at a copse of trees on the mountain and Matt spoke about his brother, Carlos, and then they spread the ashes.
You know children, right? This brought up more questions about what happened when you died. The ashes part was easy because we have a Lucy tree in the back yard with Lucy’s ashes under it. This was Carlos’ ashes on the mountain.
My husband said there were two main things that happened to someone after they died: they were buried, "in a box, underground,” he said, Or your body was burned in a hot fire and the ashes that were left over afterwards could be put wherever the person wanted.
Honestly, both options sound sort of horrific if you’re not sure at all about death and you’re a child, but my children didn’t seem overly bothered by it. My daughter said she would rather be buried underground. My son said, “I don’t want to be cremated. I want to be used for experiments like mom."
Ah, yes, the donating your body to scientific research option (that I have a specific will for). We had forgotten all about that route. I told him that sounded like a generous idea. Honestly, I’m not sure if he didn’t like either of the first two options or if he just liked the thought of being part of experiments.
The Big Boy Update: My son wanted to play blindfolded Twister with me the other night while his sister and my husband were at a Y-Guides event. Only my son had some new rules. The rules went on and on and I had to stop him short, saying we weren’t ever going to get around to playing if we added any more rules. It was a mashup of Twister and Fortnite. You started off with one hundred health and would lose or gain health from certain colors. Then there was the attack phase which deducted points for any limbs adjacent to another. You could level up your attack damage if you got to one of the circles. It sounds crazy, but the game held together and was a lot of fun. The only challenging part was totaling up all the damage done to each person when we had arms and legs all in proximity to one another. I’d play it again.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: I’m not sure how, but the number twelve came up tonight at dinner. My daughter said, “No! That’s my least favorite number.” I’ve heard of lucky numbers and favorite numbers, but never a least favorite one. When I asked her why though, she had a very specific reason: “because of a worksheet in kindergarten where almost every answer was twelve. There was only one answer that was not a twelve, and that was a nine.”
So Fluffy: I took the dog to get groomed today. I give he a bath and brush her fur regularly, but the hair around her face was growing in a way that I wasn’t sure how to handle. It was blocking her vision and flopping around in a way that made her look scruffy. Tonight, she can see again—and she’s very fluffy. This is her, “please can you let me out again, didn’t you hear me ringing the bell?” face.
Tuesday, March 5, 2019
What a Great Idea
When I was in Cancun with my girlfriends we went out to eat several times and each time there was something available, all around the seating area I’d never seen before: a purse rack. It was like a coat rack, only at chair height, for ladies to hang their purses on. Here’s what they looked like:
This is such a great idea. I’m always figuring out where I can put my purse. Sometimes it will hang on the chair, but that doesn’t work on a lot of chairs. Sometimes I put it beside my chair but that can interfere with traffic patterns. Sometimes we’re in a booth and the cleanliness of the floor under the booth is in question or it’s cramped under the table. With booths, the width of the seat can make having the purse beside me cramped. There are all sorts of things we do as ladies to find a place for our purse given different seating scenarios.
But this purse stand is great. It worked well everywhere we went. I wonder if it will start to be adopted in the United States in the future?
The Big Boy Update: My son and daughter like to have Alexa play something on the Amazon Show screen while they’re eating breakfast. My son gets into the show and can lose track of time—but he’s responsible for getting himself ready for school to depart at eight o’clock. This morning I could tell he was watching a Miles From Tomorrowland show that wasn’t going to end until two minutes before we left—and that wasn’t going to leave him enough time to get his teeth brushed, shoes & jacket on and icepack in his lunchbox and then into his backpack. I paused the show and told him not brushing his teeth wasn’t an option. So he multitasked. He ran into the bathroom and brought his toothbrush and flosser back into the kitchen. He got his lunch box ready and put his socks, shoes and jacket on at his chair. He got everything done in time with a lot of running back and forth. We’ve been working on complimenting him and even though it wasn’t my ideal way for him to get ready, I told him I was impressed at how he got everything done in time when we got in the car—right at eight o’clock. Instead of getting in trouble, he was praised for his creativity. It was a positive morning instead of a potentially negative one.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter had a paragraph she had to memorize for the Famous Americans event her class is having on Thursday this week. She took memorizing her lines very seriously. She reviewed and practiced for about a half-hour this weekend and got the lines down. She has complete confidence for the upcoming event on Thursday in which she’ll be dressed as Amelia Earhart and have a button on her shirt. When someone presses the button she comes to life and recites her lines. She’s looking forward to having her father and me come to see her at school for the event.
This is such a great idea. I’m always figuring out where I can put my purse. Sometimes it will hang on the chair, but that doesn’t work on a lot of chairs. Sometimes I put it beside my chair but that can interfere with traffic patterns. Sometimes we’re in a booth and the cleanliness of the floor under the booth is in question or it’s cramped under the table. With booths, the width of the seat can make having the purse beside me cramped. There are all sorts of things we do as ladies to find a place for our purse given different seating scenarios.
But this purse stand is great. It worked well everywhere we went. I wonder if it will start to be adopted in the United States in the future?
The Big Boy Update: My son and daughter like to have Alexa play something on the Amazon Show screen while they’re eating breakfast. My son gets into the show and can lose track of time—but he’s responsible for getting himself ready for school to depart at eight o’clock. This morning I could tell he was watching a Miles From Tomorrowland show that wasn’t going to end until two minutes before we left—and that wasn’t going to leave him enough time to get his teeth brushed, shoes & jacket on and icepack in his lunchbox and then into his backpack. I paused the show and told him not brushing his teeth wasn’t an option. So he multitasked. He ran into the bathroom and brought his toothbrush and flosser back into the kitchen. He got his lunch box ready and put his socks, shoes and jacket on at his chair. He got everything done in time with a lot of running back and forth. We’ve been working on complimenting him and even though it wasn’t my ideal way for him to get ready, I told him I was impressed at how he got everything done in time when we got in the car—right at eight o’clock. Instead of getting in trouble, he was praised for his creativity. It was a positive morning instead of a potentially negative one.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter had a paragraph she had to memorize for the Famous Americans event her class is having on Thursday this week. She took memorizing her lines very seriously. She reviewed and practiced for about a half-hour this weekend and got the lines down. She has complete confidence for the upcoming event on Thursday in which she’ll be dressed as Amelia Earhart and have a button on her shirt. When someone presses the button she comes to life and recites her lines. She’s looking forward to having her father and me come to see her at school for the event.
Monday, March 4, 2019
Interested in Books
The Big Boy Book Update:
At the end of the night my son likes to read books. He sometimes does this in the closet because the light is bright and the books are stored in the built-in shelves there. For the past few nights, I’ve noticed he’s laid out a few books on the floor, putting them beside each other in a grid pattern. These were some comic-like books and of course the 2018 Guinness Book of World Records book, which is one of his favorites.
He asked me if I thought there was a Guinness World Record for the most books laid out? I said I wasn’t sure and then left, reminding him to not stay up too late. As I came downstairs to write this post I heard a flurry of activity coming from upstairs, notably from the closet-area of the children’s room.
A while later my son came down, asking where dad was? When I told him dad was at a neighbors helping out with something he asked me if I could come upstairs, he had something to show me. I said, “well, I’d better bring my phone in case I need to take a picture” and smiled at him.
As we came into his room he said, “you sort of have to step carefully” and fractionally opened the door. He had done what I’d surmised he was doing: he’d laid books out fully covering the floor of the closet. He wasn’t sure if it was a record or not, but he was thinking about continuing the spread into their bedroom tomorrow.
He was so proud, he wanted to get in the picture I told him I had to take of his handiwork.
The Tiny Girl Book Selection:
My daughter brought new library books home from school today. She came inside just as I’d gotten on the phone with Uncle Bob and said, “back pack heavy!” After I got off the phone I opened her back pack up and pulled out all the things she’d had added to it through the day, including completed work, the new book she and her VI teacher have been working on for two weeks on Cultures of Kindness and the new library books.
Two of the books were the next in a series we’ve been reading at home. She remembered what book was next and had asked for them. The next book though just made me laugh. If she were a sighted child that could visually peruse the library shelves and pick out something of interest, I’d have been proud of her, but as a blind child, how in the heck did she find this book to check out?
It turns out her teacher had suggested non-fiction and then they figured out cars might be interesting. This was all done via the card catalog apparently. Ms. B. asked my daughter what kind of cars she was interested in and my daughter said Tesla. When I told her I liked her choice she told me she though I might want to do some more research about Tesla. I told her we would definitely read this (chidren’s) book together.
At the end of the night my son likes to read books. He sometimes does this in the closet because the light is bright and the books are stored in the built-in shelves there. For the past few nights, I’ve noticed he’s laid out a few books on the floor, putting them beside each other in a grid pattern. These were some comic-like books and of course the 2018 Guinness Book of World Records book, which is one of his favorites.
He asked me if I thought there was a Guinness World Record for the most books laid out? I said I wasn’t sure and then left, reminding him to not stay up too late. As I came downstairs to write this post I heard a flurry of activity coming from upstairs, notably from the closet-area of the children’s room.
A while later my son came down, asking where dad was? When I told him dad was at a neighbors helping out with something he asked me if I could come upstairs, he had something to show me. I said, “well, I’d better bring my phone in case I need to take a picture” and smiled at him.
As we came into his room he said, “you sort of have to step carefully” and fractionally opened the door. He had done what I’d surmised he was doing: he’d laid books out fully covering the floor of the closet. He wasn’t sure if it was a record or not, but he was thinking about continuing the spread into their bedroom tomorrow.
He was so proud, he wanted to get in the picture I told him I had to take of his handiwork.
The Tiny Girl Book Selection:
My daughter brought new library books home from school today. She came inside just as I’d gotten on the phone with Uncle Bob and said, “back pack heavy!” After I got off the phone I opened her back pack up and pulled out all the things she’d had added to it through the day, including completed work, the new book she and her VI teacher have been working on for two weeks on Cultures of Kindness and the new library books.
Two of the books were the next in a series we’ve been reading at home. She remembered what book was next and had asked for them. The next book though just made me laugh. If she were a sighted child that could visually peruse the library shelves and pick out something of interest, I’d have been proud of her, but as a blind child, how in the heck did she find this book to check out?
It turns out her teacher had suggested non-fiction and then they figured out cars might be interesting. This was all done via the card catalog apparently. Ms. B. asked my daughter what kind of cars she was interested in and my daughter said Tesla. When I told her I liked her choice she told me she though I might want to do some more research about Tesla. I told her we would definitely read this (chidren’s) book together.
Sunday, March 3, 2019
A Sit on My Butt Day
Yesterday morning my daughter and my parents went on a train ride to a nearby city. My parents had the idea to do this with my daughter because it was something involving motion and sound while not being as much of a sight thing. They picked her up at nine o’clock and my son and I were at home together alone until later in the day when my daughter would return and my husband would get in from his week of skiing.
Earlier in the week my son had asked me if maybe on Saturday or Sunday we could see if his sister would want to go to Biscuitville. My son and I love breakfast there, but it’s more of a drive than we’d do on a school morning and we reserve it for weekends every now and again. I was expecting my son to be excited about the idea but when I initially brought it up he wasn’t so sure. He didn’t want to get dressed and he also said it was farther away and maybe we could just do McDonalds instead?
I told him that either was fine, it was something he and I would get to do together and he could let me know what he’d decided when his sister had left. About an hour later my parents and daughter departed and as I was shutting the door from waving goodbye, I turned to my son and asked him what he’d decided and where did he want to go for breakfast?
He sat down on the stairs and said with a tone of despair in his voice, “I don’t want to go anywhere. I just want to have a sit on my butt day.”
I laughed and told him that was fine with me, we could just stay at home and relax and eat breakfast in. Where did he hear that phrase? From me. I made it up some time ago and I think I say it in about the same tone of voice to my husband when I’ve been going non-stop for too long. I’ll say, I would just like to have a sit on my butt day and do nothing.” As parents of young children, especially when one needs lots of help, weekends aren’t really days off and weekdays can be just as busy. I never realized my son had paid attention to the phrase when I said it—or that I’d even said it in front of him. It’s my version of “couch potato”. I don’t watch television much but I’m excellent at sitting around and doing nothing important if I get the chance to have a day off.
The Big Boy Update: My son told me tonight he wanted new books. I could tell he wasn’t tired even though it was past bedtime. I told him to hold on and I’d go get him a book. I came back with a large paperback book and met him up in his bunk. When I told him this had been my book when I was younger I got one of those, “ugh, this is going to be boring” sighs from him. I told him this was a comic book and I knew he liked cartoons. It was about a boy named Calvin and his stuffed tiger named Hobbes who came alive with his imagination. I read the first few pages to him, explaining what a transmogrifier was (a cardboard box) and how it changed Calvin and Hobbes into anything their imagination came up with. He was hooked in three pages. I haven’t heard a sound from him since I left the room. I loved the Calvin & Hobbes books when I was younger.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter and husband went to a Y-Guides event today to see a women’s basketball game. My husband wasn’t sure she would like it at all since it’s largely a seeing thing. He was surprised to find her loving it. There was the popcorn and the cheering and then the chants they were doing to cheer on the team. She wants to go back and see more games.
Earlier in the week my son had asked me if maybe on Saturday or Sunday we could see if his sister would want to go to Biscuitville. My son and I love breakfast there, but it’s more of a drive than we’d do on a school morning and we reserve it for weekends every now and again. I was expecting my son to be excited about the idea but when I initially brought it up he wasn’t so sure. He didn’t want to get dressed and he also said it was farther away and maybe we could just do McDonalds instead?
I told him that either was fine, it was something he and I would get to do together and he could let me know what he’d decided when his sister had left. About an hour later my parents and daughter departed and as I was shutting the door from waving goodbye, I turned to my son and asked him what he’d decided and where did he want to go for breakfast?
He sat down on the stairs and said with a tone of despair in his voice, “I don’t want to go anywhere. I just want to have a sit on my butt day.”
I laughed and told him that was fine with me, we could just stay at home and relax and eat breakfast in. Where did he hear that phrase? From me. I made it up some time ago and I think I say it in about the same tone of voice to my husband when I’ve been going non-stop for too long. I’ll say, I would just like to have a sit on my butt day and do nothing.” As parents of young children, especially when one needs lots of help, weekends aren’t really days off and weekdays can be just as busy. I never realized my son had paid attention to the phrase when I said it—or that I’d even said it in front of him. It’s my version of “couch potato”. I don’t watch television much but I’m excellent at sitting around and doing nothing important if I get the chance to have a day off.
The Big Boy Update: My son told me tonight he wanted new books. I could tell he wasn’t tired even though it was past bedtime. I told him to hold on and I’d go get him a book. I came back with a large paperback book and met him up in his bunk. When I told him this had been my book when I was younger I got one of those, “ugh, this is going to be boring” sighs from him. I told him this was a comic book and I knew he liked cartoons. It was about a boy named Calvin and his stuffed tiger named Hobbes who came alive with his imagination. I read the first few pages to him, explaining what a transmogrifier was (a cardboard box) and how it changed Calvin and Hobbes into anything their imagination came up with. He was hooked in three pages. I haven’t heard a sound from him since I left the room. I loved the Calvin & Hobbes books when I was younger.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter and husband went to a Y-Guides event today to see a women’s basketball game. My husband wasn’t sure she would like it at all since it’s largely a seeing thing. He was surprised to find her loving it. There was the popcorn and the cheering and then the chants they were doing to cheer on the team. She wants to go back and see more games.
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