Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Proper motivation

Part of the journey of parenting a child with special needs does involve some different forms of reflection. Not that parents of all typically developing children do not do this but I think it is a bit different. With Ayiana I look back and wonder where the time went how last year at this time she had not gone to Kindergarten and I a bit worried, now to find that was for nothing...probably normal mommy anxiety about taking your baby to school for the first time. With Liam it is so different in an incredibly good way, it hit me yesterday that Liam has been walking officially for a year now! I looked through those first wobbly videos from April 27-May 4 were I made him stand up and walk if he wanted to go outside and smiled and laughed, proper motivation is really what he needed then...and for all intents what he still needs! But it took me back to when I wondered how much longer it would be before he walked, those days seemed to drag on and how unsettling it was for us to have a non-ambulatory 27 month old. For now that experience is my biggest help in knowing he will talk to us too, our biggest motivator For now is the iPad :) his speech teacher wt school told me that she got to watch him Monday with the technology assisting team and Liam, and he was passing pecs cards and using the Ipad with amazing attentiveness, lol....oh and the PEZ candy he receives works well too hehehe... His tescher told me after last weeks seesion she had to have them move to the conference room because he was so loud that it was a distraction for the other children...I could not help be smile at that, I am so glad that he gets to use an IpAd at school at least once a week too! As for Ayiana she was up motivated to learn how to knitt this morning at 6:15 that's a record, she is not a morning person but had just gotten her package we had ordered around bed time the night before. Yes that is when UPS delivers in our neighborhood! So what did all of us do this morning? Thomas, Ayiana, and I learned to "cast on" :) We shall see if this truly becomes a hobby for her, she loves the sewing kit we got her for Christmas, maybe she will be more craft-abled then her mother....and for her sake I hope she is!