I need to start doing better on the blog. It's just that I've been so tired and I always seem to have so much to do. Let's do a quick rehash of the last couple weeks. Aiden went to his very first roller skating party. His friend, John Britton (JB), just turned 5 and Aiden went to celebrate with him. Here he is playing games with JB's older sister. She was so sweet with Aiden.
It was pizza time and of course Aiden will not eat Pizza. He had a granola bar I had in my purse. He also got to try Sprite for the first time. He knew it was a kind of soda so he wanted so bad to like it but his face screamed "This is sour but I will love it because big kids like soda." It was too funny.
I was not sure if Aiden would even try roller skating. He said he wanted to try so we just got some of the skates that go over your shoes. The picture below is the first time he stood up. I was taking a gamble because I literally helped him stand up, told him not to move, and then stepped back for a minute to take a picture.
He did much better than I ever thought he would. He said he really liked it and "wanted to get some skates for home." The only thing he doesn't realize is there are no smooth surfaces near home and it will only be that smooth in the roller rink. This poor child will not even ride his bike on the road because it is "too bumpy." He would let go of my hand and do short sections by himself. I was really thankful that it was a small enough place that they let me go out in my shoes on the rink and hold Aiden's hand.
Here is a quick picture with the birthday boy! John Britton tried the next step up from Aiden's skates. Aiden asked why his were a different color and when I explained it to Aiden, he said he would rather be safe in the orange skates. The kid cracks me up. He said he didn't want to "go too fast" in black beginner skates.
After Aiden decided he had enough skating, he played a few more games. Did I mention they have tickets with all these games? Needless to say, he counted up all his tickets and was only off by one!! That's pretty shocking. He told me had 86 tickets and he ended up having 87. Not too shabby for a 4 yr old.
We have found a game that Eli really enjoys. It's a story-telling game. He's got such a fun imagination that he enjoys coming up with stories and taking turns with us sometimes.
Therapy is going well for Aiden. He is getting so much stronger now and the focus has shifted from fine motor control/strength to more gross motor control and sensory stuff. Here he is below pinning crabs onto his shirt. The pinning is great fine motor control but the fact that he didn't mind pinning those to his shirt was quite amazing to me. He normally doesn't like stuff pulling/tugging on him so I was quite surprised when he loaded his shirt up with crabs.
He had to find the crabs before he could pin them on and he had to do that by digging through some beans (sensory).
Of course Mrs. Rusty turns everything into a fun game and adventure so Aiden doesn't realize he's doing all the these things that make him work and be uncomfortable (which is awesome). Here he is looking out a periscope. He thought that was pretty cool.
Once he had collected all the crabs he needed and then the rocks he needed to build a campfire, it was time to start a fire by rubbing the fire sticks together (they were rhythm sticks with lots of grooves in them; sensory again). He had fun doing that. As always, he had a fun adventure with Mrs. Rusty being a pirate for the morning.
And then there is Eli. Poor Eli. He's been a tad emotional lately. Here he is in the van after a complete breakdown before I failed to exit his door at daycare first. Both of the boys were holding open a door and due to logistics of the building and what doors you can enter/exit through, I needed to go out Aiden's door so I could come back in Eli's door and then go out Eli's door again. Well, Eli wanted me to go out his door first. Wow. You would have thought I had tortured the kid. He screamed the whole block home. I tried to rationalize with him (for some odd reason, that didn't work) and also promised he I would go out his door first the next day but that didn't do anything. He refused to get out of the van when we got home. I would unclip his seatbelt and he would buckle back up and scream that he wanted to go back to daycare. This went on for a while. Brad came out and we tried switching places/roles for a bit. Needless to say, Brad finally kinda convinced Eli to come in after about 30 minutes of screaming outside (and eventually getting him out of the van and locking him out so that he would have to come inside). He is a persistent little booger. A few weeks ago he did something similar about getting a piggy back ride to bed. He pitched a huge fit and had a breakdown before bed about not getting a piggy back ride. We explained he chose that option (we are heavily focusing on giving the boys options and making them realize they are in control of the outcome because they know what it is going to be) and maybe next time he should chose a different option. Needless to say, he put up a great fight and cried himself to bed that night. Well, he also woke up at 3:00am crying so I run into his room. I ask him what is wrong and he says, "I want a piggy back ride." Are you kidding me????? Nope, he was not kidding.
While Eli has his rough moments, he also has his great moments. He LOVES bath. We had a great time together the other night playing. I played with him for about 30-40 min in the bath and it was great for both of us. He does fine playing by himself so I just let him do that often forgetting that playing with me could actually be fun. Um. I have no fun pictures to post of Aiden. He is still crying/screaming through a good portion of his bath time. Sometimes his bath lasts 15 min and it's all screaming and sometimes is lasts 40 min (with about 10-15 min screaming).
God blessed us with a neat opportunity to go see a monster truck a few weeks ago. We were literally on our way to dinner and there was a giant monster truck parked by a business a few blocks down from our house. The boys thought it was amazing and had never seen one this close up. They were letting them even climb up in it.
Aiden thought sitting on the tire was pretty fun. It was so huge. Eli was scared to death for me to try and lift him up on the tire. Brad lifted Aiden up so he could see inside/underneath the monster truck.
Aiden really wanted to get up in the drivers seat. Eli was way too scared but once he saw Aiden up there, he decided it would be okay ... for about 2 minutes.
We got them down and then Eli just wanted to play with the spinner wheels on the monster truck and Aiden wanted to go eat dinner.
I picked up the boys early from daycare the other day and had their bikes in the back of the van. We went to park down the street and rode around for a while. Eli is really starting to get the hang of using the pedals!! We ran around the playground for a while putting pretend fires out and getting some exercise.
In the academic world, we have a huge breakthrough: Eli can write his name. It's pretty crazy to watch because he switches between his right and left hand. On this one he wrote the first two letters with his left hand and then switched to the right. On the paper he did after this one, he wrote his name using his right hand for the first two letters and then switching to the left. Crazy. He doesn't want to hold the pencil/crayon/chalk the "right" way yet but at least he's making some letters.
Aiden has learned all about logos and started getting a little obsessed with Fords (those who know Brad know he LOVES Ford trucks). So, I taught Aiden Toyota (our minivan). Well, he also knows Chevy ("short for Chevrolet" he will tell you) and he follows that up with "daddy doesn't like Chevy's." It's too funny to hear him say it.
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