Pinterest Speech Therapy?

Ok, let’s get real.  You and I both know that no one needs another reason to waste time on Pinterest.  It’s true.  It is a collasal waste of my time.  But, somehow it seems to be this guilt free cyber form of shopping that my husband can’t say no to.  So I do it.  I’m not proud, but there it is.

Now you may have read the title and thought, wow, what a great mom.  She’s using pinterest to find new forms of speech therapy.  I totally intend on doing that some time, but that is not what this post is about. 

It’s about Eli finding words on Pinterest.  As I scroll through the pages, Eli will often come up and stand beside me.  We will talk about the things he sees and he will say some of those things.  More popular and most often it will be kitty, doggie, puppy, candy or cake.   Tonight as we play this game Eli stunned me with two words I didn’t even know he knew.

A picture goes by of a woman leaning over a bathroom counter putting make up on in barely there panties and Eli says, “butt”.  I get excited and say to my husband sitting very near to me, “Did you hear that?  He said BUTT!”  Of course he doesn’t, nobody does.  But I swear he said it.

Then a few minutes later a cowboy boot comes up and he says, “boot”.  What the….??  I have to admit it is fun to be continually surprised by his constantly growing vocabulary.  Last night Eli said Marsha-meh-woh.  The thing with apraxia is you never know when the words are actually going to stick and he will be able to say them whenever he wants to or if they will be one of his “losing words”.  Words that happen only once.

Whichever, they are I choose to be thrilled with them and cherish those moments for all of the fun they are.  To really understand, if you are a parent, imagine those first few words you child said and how exciting it was.  It’s like we get to relive that moment daily.

Tags: apraxia, Childhood Apraxia of Speech, children, dissablities, funny parenting, homeschool, homeschooling, mom, oklahoma city, parenting, pinterest, shopping, silly, speech disorders, speech therapist, speech therapy, toddlers

The Potty Monster…

I would rather run naked through a stadium of people, eat hissing cockroaches and be a permanent contestant on fear factor than potty train.  In my opinion it is the worst part of parenting, and I have given birth eight times, six without drugs.  I would much rather do that again than potty train.

I’m not a first time mom, in fact in a country where 2 children are the average I’m sort of an expert.  It’s when you start to feel confident in life that it seems like God steps in and says here learn a new one.  So, Eli is my new thing to learn.

Why am I even thinking of training a two year old?  This is what I keep thinking to myself.  It has been my rule to wait until they are very VERY ready, which usually happens when they are three not two.  I was blessed to have one child potty train before he was two in one day.  The more kids I had, the more I learned what a miracle that was.

There are two reasons why.  One, Eli hates diaper changes.  Every time I tell him, let’s change your diaper, he runs away yelling, “No, chang-uh diaper!”  It’s the only three word sentence he never forgets.  The second reason is the LEAPS program that he is supposed to be entering in August.  They require them to be potty trained or a parent must stay for the entire class.  I don’t mind staying, but the crazy life of running eight kids around makes that almost impossible.

So, here I am.  I let Eli go naked.  He grabs a diaper and throws it at me and yells, “DIAPER” with the other hand covering his butt.  I try to explain that he is going to be a big boy and go potty.  We go to bathroom, I sit on the side of the tub and put the stool in front of the potty.  None of this calms Eli down, in fact it makes him angrier.  He is yelling/crying.  Then I say the magic words, “I know the potty is scary isn’t it?”  He stops screaming, gives me the saddest eyes and opens his arms for a hug.

It’s one of those moments that melts a mothers heart.  It tears at me to realize that even I think that my son doesn’t understand because he can’t speak.  This parenting a child that cannot communicate is hard.  I am constantly telling others that he is smart he just can’t talk, but to realize that I myself have let him down, hurts.  I know he IS smart and I know he understands a lot, but I don’t know how much and until he can communicate I don’t know how I ever will.

With that moment of Eli being scared I let the potty training go for another day and another potty.  For him I will use the dreaded toddler potty, that I detest cleaning.  I will also work on reminding myself that Eli is every bit as smart as I tell people he is.

Tags: apraxia, Childhood Apraxia of Speech, children, dissablities, funny parenting, homeschool, homeschooling, mom, parenting, potty training, speech disorders, speech therapist, speech therapy, toddlers

Even a 2 year old can fight hunger…

Eli joined in his sister’s Walk 4 Hunger this weekend.

He may only be 2 but he is not to young to be a part of a community raising awareness to fight hunger.  His big sister Elizabeth and three of her friends from school ran this event.  They had a walk along with an ambulance and police car tour, zumba, ballons, face painting and coloring.

Eli began the morning with coloring, as you can see he is a very talented artist.  Then he watched the zumba dancing.  I really hoped he would participate, but instead he stood there and gazed at us with a look of fascination and repulsion that only a small child can give.

How does Eli fight hunger? By stuffing his face with free chocolate!

After zumba everyone set out to walk.  That’s him sitting on Daddy’s shoulders at the front of the group.  For the first of the morning Eli had been completely silent.  However, that changed when we came upon a group of turtles by a pond. “Look tuttoh, tuttoh”  He loved the turtles.

When the walk was over he took a tour of an ambulance, which for Eli means, as his brothers and sisters sat and listened to the paramedic, he kept diving into a bowl of chocolate. Eating even the wrapper if Mommy wouldn’t help him.  After the ambulance Eli went and checked out the police car which made lots of great sounds.  He practically ran from it as fast as he could but then stopped and stared at it with fascination.  Two year olds are so funny.  You think they hate it and then they won’t leave it.

Eli and his apraxia control issues found a real problem with balloons.  He refused to let me tie a balloon on his arm.  He wanted to hold it.  So you can guess how that went, he got so mad when I tied it on that I took it off and handed it to him.  By that point he’s to mad to do anything but throw it.  So away it went.  He cried but was quickly appeased by watching his balloon float away.  The stupid thing on my part is that I thought he learned from the first balloon, but NO.  We went through the entire scene again.  Oh, well at least I learned the second time.

Tags: ambulance, apraxia, art, Childhood Apraxia of Speech, children, community, dissablities, fatherhood, funny parenting, homeschool, homeschooling, hunger, mom, oklahoma city, parenting, police, silly, speech disorders, speech therapist, speech therapy, toddlers, turtles, walk

Searching for Thine Words at the Fair…

If the unusual can inspire Eli to find words than the Medieval Fair in Norman, Oklahoma is the place to go.

Eli hopped in the wagon and away we went to see the fun and excitement.  There was singing and dancing as we ate our lunch.  Eli was truly speechless as they went on and on and on about the rules of love.  25 rules to be exact.  In hind site, my husband and I agree we should have left at 10.

There were many animals for Eli’s enjoyment, and elephant, camels, dogs, camels and snakes. Right next to the singing were birds and Eli said, “birdy”. 

“Look horsey!”  Eli has truly entered the world of two word sentences!  They usually begin with look, but I celebrate every language milestone.

The fair was full of excitement as well.  There was a true jousting tournament where a man was knocked off his horse in full armour, real sword fighting with protective suits on and a tent full of drummers.  Eli was invited to join in on the drumming.  They gave him a tiny drum and he held it as they played.  He didn’t say a word. I have found out that, even though these new situations may make him silent at the time, they do help him find words later.  As we look at the pictures and as I blog about them we talk about what he saw and then he has the courage and excitement to try the new words.  Today, as we go through the pictures most of what Eli says is jibberish.  This is not discouraging to me because 6 months ago he would not have made a sound.

We finished our adventure with souvenir shopping.  My sons joined in together and bought a sword, care of my husband.  I do not understand this purchase and have been assured it will be kept in a safe place far from the reach of little hands.  My teen girls bought a scarf with coins and a head piece. The little girls and Eli bought fur tails.  Which he spent the rest of the night parading around the house and shaking his tail.

We had a wonderful day and found some words that I’m sure he will soon forget.  But, perhaps next year when we go back to the fair he will be able to not only find the words but add them to his vocabulary. 

Tags: children, dads, dance, dissablities, fatherhood, funny parenting, homeschool, homeschooling, horses, jousting, medieval fair, mom, oklahoma city, parenting, shopping, silly, speech disorders, speech therapy, sword, sword fighting, toddlers

The days when you wish for “normal”…

I would not be honest with you, if I didn’t say that being a parent gets old some days.  I think every parent knows what I mean, especially the stay at home parents where it is a 24 hours seven days a week job.  I am the proud owner of teenagers, so my life is considerably easier than the years when it was just me and the little bitties.  I have the luxury of grocery shopping without children or taking time to go for a run. Even though, I do have the ability to leave the little ones at home, I am usually leaving to run an errand for someone in the family.  It’s really just a trade of what I am doing with my time.

The same issue holds true for all day every day speech therapy.  There are just days when I wish Eli could just be a normal two year old.  That I could let him play without thinking how will this help his vocabulary?  How can we use this outing to search for words?  What words will we work on at dinner, lunch and breakfast?  How will this toy bring new words for Eli?  I remember when I used to buy a toy because it looked fun not because I could use it for building a little guys vocabulary.

What do I do on those days, when I wish for easy?

Today is one of those days, but, the love of my two year old forces me to find a way even on these days.

First, time to breath on those days.  Let it go, refresh.  One day will not destroy a lifetime of speech therapy days to come. So, I step back and let the siblings, Noah and Gideon, take a turn at speech therapy.  I take out some of his speech therapy toys (play dough, dinosaurs, whistle) and tell them to keep track of what he says for me.  They love this idea and get a pencil out and start writing words:  Dophin, ducky, horsey, gaffe, elphant, paydough, dinosaur, tomp.  The boys had so much fun with this that I am surprised I didn’t think of it sooner.  We will definitely be adding it to Eli’s routine.

Tags: apraxia, brothers, Childhood Apraxia of Speech, children, funny parenting, homeschool, homeschooling, mom, oklahoma city, parenting, play dough, siblings, silly, speech disorders, speech therapist, speech therapy, toddlers, toys

Speech Therapy on location…

Crest grocery store in Edmond, Oklahoma is a speech therapist’s dreamland of words. So, that is where we went for speech therapy this week.

Jill, our wonderful speech therapist, met us at the grocery store with an interactive shopping list for Eli to use as we went through the grocery store.

Eli started out with pictures of stuff we needed to buy on the front.  As we went through the store he would take the item off the front of his shopping book and move it inside when we found the item.  It’s all velcro, so it’s easy for him to use.  He really liked his shopping book.  I’m not sure if it helped him say more, but it did help keep him occupied and reminded us all to keep working on finding words.

When he arrived at the store, Eli was asleep.  Usually, this would be a very bad for sign for the therapy session, but not at the grocery store.  Before we even enter the building he says “truck” because one is painted on the window.  The key to getting a good therapy session for Eli is getting those first words out.  Once he is comfortable enough to say the first words then the rest will flow more easily.

Crest, the grocery store, is full of large colorful wall murals with trucks, produce, cows and more.  The ceilings are covered with large hanging objects such as pop tarts, soda cans, cereal boxes, blow up soccer balls, flags, etc.  And if that is not enough to inspire Eli to find words then every box of cereal with a tiger or wolf, every bag of pet food with a kitty or dog on it, is. The words Eli found flowed for him, kitty, doggie, cow, apple, gapes, juice, ghetti, ausage, chips, pizza, soccer ball, cheese, and more. 

Two forms of encouragement were key to getting Eli to speak at the store.  The first one, having him look and find the item.  The second one, making him mad because he didn’t want to play the game, which made him say the word anyway.  A huge milestone was reached in our shopping experience. This happened as Eli would get mad at me.  He would fuss, then I would tell him to stop and not be grumpy and HE DID!  Yeah, happy dance!!  Eli is learning to control his temper.  This is so huge in his survival, in “Mommy can’t take it any more land”.

Anger management was not the only big thing discovered on our trip.  It has also been realized by both Mommy and the therapist that I have all of the necessary skills to do therapy with Eli myself.  More often than not, 1/2 of our therapy sessions would be me working with him, and Jill watching and encouraging.  I do have some experience in the field of speech therapy and working with children has been a life long occupation of mine in one form or another.  So, with this in mind, we have decided to scale back Eli’s therapy to every other week.  I think at this point in his developmental abilities it is best for him.  When he is old enough to focus on placement of sounds and repeating upon command, then we will revisit how often he attends therapy.  But, for now, Eli’s best teacher is also his favorite teacher, Mommy.

Eli hits the Ocean … part 2

A St. Paddy’s day parade beachside and Eli finds a new like, MOTORCYCLES!

While sitting and waiting an HOUR for the parade to start several motorcycles came by and Eli was fascinated with these loud machines.  From then on he spent the rest of the vacation finding motorcycles, and with such great weather there were many to be seen.

We went on a family shopping trip to load up on souvenirs and you guessed it he found a motorcycle sitting on the sidewalk.  With his new like he found a new word, “mowercyle”.

When he came up to this motorcycle up close he did exactly what you see in the picture, stare as if it was some strange creature.  I think he could have stood like that for an hour, if I let him.  Even as I type this blog, Eli is standing next to me saying very excitedly over and over, “Mommy, me an mowercyle! Me an Mowercycle!”  as points at my screen.  He has never until this moment referred to himself with words, not an Eli and not a me.  Yea!

Remember that crazy over zealous side of me.  Well, Eli is so excited about saying motorcycle if I had the money available I would run out and by one right now.  That is how adorable he is right now.

The rest of the shopping trip was successful in many ways.  All of the children found souviniers.  Eli found a new choo choo train that makes sounds.   He rode a dolphin with his big sister, posed with a giant mouse and ate / wore some ice cream. 

So the real question is how to you let a two year old ride a motorcycle.  (that is a joke, of course)

Tags: apraxia, beach, Childhood Apraxia of Speech, children, dissablities, funny parenting, homeschool, mom, motorcycle, oklahoma city, parenting, shopping, silly, speech disorders, speech therapist, speech therapy, texas, toys, train, trains, vacation

Eli goes to the OCEAN….part I

Ocean.  Ocean.  Ooooocean.  Yep, I tried it all week long and never got it.  But there were plenty of other words to add to Eli’s list this last week as we went on a family vacation to Surfside, Texas.

The first part of every trip for our family begins with a car ride.  I think that taking Eli to Kansas City a few months ago was great training, because my little two year old was a perfect car rider.  He had lots of fun hanging out in the back of the mini van with his two brothers on each side watching movies, singing with the music and talking.  I was amazed at how well he did for our 10 hour drives.  I wish I could tell you what was said between those little boys, but I was not privy to their crazy conversations.

Eli does now have the desire to have conversations, I have noticed on our trip.  He has started talking in a mix of words and babble to people.  Of course, if they stop and pay attention to him then he will quit because he gets embarrassed, unless it’s his siblings or kids.  I think he gets that from me.  I could do almost anything in front of kids with no fear, put an adult in front of me and everything gets so serious.  What is that about?

Eli is not so sure about the ocean, but he loves the sand.  He would go into the water as long as he was holding a hand, but would only go to his waist.  After that the waves would splash in his face and he did not like that.  This was wonderful news to me.  It meant Mommy didn’t have to constantly worry about him going in the water.  Some of his beach side words include fish, cab (crab) and spash.

I would have to say that the best part of vacation for Eli was a week in a house with all of his family and cousins all the time.  The total number of kids in our beach house was 17.  It was non-stop fun and chaos.  Which was great for him, because he found some words from his cousins.  However, hearing those words in a house with 29 people is a whole other matter.

Tags: apraxia, beach, boogie board, Childhood Apraxia of Speech, children, dissablities, funny parenting, homeschool, homeschooling, mom, ocean, oklahoma city, parenting, sand, speech disorders, speech therapist, speech therapy, texas, toys, travel, vacation

Eli Goes Wild…

Meet Elizabeth, Eli’s oldest sister who is 16. She is a Jr. Currator at the Oklahoma City Zoo.Today, Elizabeth was working with the elephant keepers at the zoo.  So, we loaded up the fam and went to see the elephant show.  The elephants come up to the pen you see behind her and show their skills off, including Maylee the newest elephant born April 15, 2011.  Elizabeth and I had the privilege of volunteering for the birth watch team and were there 4 hours after Maylee was born.  Therefore, Maylee, the elephants and their keepers have an extra special place in our hearts.

Eli was so excited to see the elephants and their tricks.  Especially, when they threw a ball into the cage and one of the big elephants went to retrieve it and give it back to the keeper.  I wish that I could tell you that this excursion was like the grocery store, but I think it was to much stuff that was new and exciting for him.  He did see a squirl and say “quirrel go up tee”.  That is one of his newest hurdles that is he has been working on this week, sentences!  I’m really noticing Eli trying to put some of his words together and it is very exciting.

The other word he said was one of his favorite animals, tigers.  Our zoo has 4 baby tigers and he loved those.  Watching Eli at the zoo made me realize that going to new places is fun and educational, but it is not a good way to do speech therapy for him.  He thrives in environments where he is more familiar with the objects and the words that go with them.

In other words, if I want Eli to become articulate about zoo animals I had better start making more trips to the zoo.  It’s a good thing I love this little guy, because he is really taking a lot of my time each week with his activities.  And in a house with 8 children, there’s not a lot of that to spare.

Tags: apraxia, baby elephant, Childhood Apraxia of Speech, children, dads, dissablities, elephants, fatherhood, funny parenting, homeschool, homeschooling, mom, nap time, oklahoma city, parenting, silly, speech disorders, speech therapist, speech therapy, tigers, time, toddlers, volunteer, zoo, zoo keeper

Dreaming of Speech Therapy…

Sometimes you win and sometimes you loose with a two year old.  This weeks speech therapy was a wash.  As you can see in the picture, this is how Eli spent his speech therapy session this week.

After a long morning of fun at the zoo, he was gone and there was nothing I could do to wake him up.  Believe me, I tried.  I washed his feet and hands, sat him up, and spoke loudly.  Not to loudly, because a sleeping two year old is WAY better than a pissed off two year old. Eli has been doing therapy for 5 months at 3:30 in the afternoon.  I’m really surprised this is our first session that he has slept through.

However, I did have a good conversation with the speech therapist, Miss Jill.  We  went through my blog, it is the easiest way to update her on Eli’s week.  Honestly, I gave birth to my brain and have yet to figure out how to put it back.  I’m not sure what I did 2 hours ago, much less what Eli did for a whole week.

When Miss Jill saw the post about our trip to the grocery store, she suggested we meet at the there next session.  I am sending her a list of things we usually buy and she is going to make a picture list for him to help with shopping.  I’m really excited about this idea.  I’m so thankful that we have a speech therapist that will go on special outings and be flexible for Eli.  It’s such an important part of his learning process.  If this is a success, I may ask to do more therapy outings.

So, while Eli didn’t learn anything in speech therapy today, but Mommy learned a little more about how blessed Eli is with the people in his life.

Tags: apraxia, bed time, Childhood Apraxia of Speech, children, dissablities, funny parenting, homeschool, mom, nap time, parenting, shopping, silly, sleep, speech disorders, speech therapist, speech therapy, toddlers