Cloudy Thursday...

Yep, it's a cloudy Thursday here. I'm home with Katie today because she is supposed to have a picnic with her class this afternoon. I hope it clears up because I'm a wimp when it comes to having picnics in the rain!

On some brighter notes, Katie is adjusting to her new meds fabulously! We are so thrilled. Hopefully once she is completely off the risperdal we will see the weight she has gained from the meds start to slip away! We have already noticed a decrease in her appetite and I personally am really excited to see the cool gestures she is making and new sounds she is saying on this new med (abilify).

Also, Mary had her awards ceremony for girl scouts this week. Due to another commitment I was not able to attend :(, but my awesome parents filled in for us and my Dad took some great pics.

Oh, and by the way, gas is back up to 2.66 here. Bummer!

The World in Which We Live...

Well it's been another week in our world....Gas is "cheap" 1.63 here. I can't even remember the last time gas was that price. That has definitely been the highlight of the news lately. It is nice to be able to drive around town without feeling guilty about "wasting" expensive gas.

We are getting ready to start Katie on a new med. We are also increasing her risperdal, so we'll see how that goes. There are concerns whenever we adjust Katies' prescriptions, so we're hanging on for the ride to see how things go. The risperdal is the one that gives her such terrible constipation, so we are a little concerned about how the dosage increase will affect her. The new med is commonly used for ADHD - we are giving it to her to try and decrease her OCD which has become completely out of control. ADHD meds aren't commonly used in autistic kids - because it's a different part of the brain - but for OCD this one is supposed to be helpful. I'll keep you all posted on how it goes. We are hoping to start it on Monday. Bill has the week off, so if we have any issues/side effects with the medicine, Bill will be around to help.

Well..not much else happening here. I have a busy weekend of work in the world of retail.....More later.

Brrrrr..

Well with the beginning of October, cold weather has descended upon Michigan. That makes life a little more complicated for us. No more outdoor swimming for Katie -- she was still "swimming" as of last week -- it was still in the high 70's here - even though our pool has been down for several weeks now. It also means that Katie has to wear socks -- which is on her list of "dislikes" - but she is becoming more tolerant of them as she gets older. They fly off of her feet the second she gets in the house after school! Cold weather also means that these are not a good option for her - even though they are her favorite.. She likes to wear them all winter -- but we often get weird looks for that! (and no, I don't buy the brand name ones, Family Dollar has great ones for 2.99 -- and sometimes Meijer has them for 4.00 - so that is usually my preference -- HELLO! we're on a budget people! Although I must say that now that gas has come down under 3.50 a gallon here - our budget is much improved !!!

Not too much else to report. The girls have a big walk at school tomorrow - it's the fundraiser for the parents club, of which I am the Sr. Co-chair, so I'll probably be spending a few hours at school tomorrow. I'll try to take some new pics -- it's been awhile -- and I need a new profile pic for my facebook page, too!

Weekend Update...Wow Do I Need Coffee...

This hasn't been a big blogging week for me. My hours are starting to increase at work as we head into back to school time...we do more hiring and that means more hours for me:). That is a good thing.....but it also means that I'm more tired and less motivated to do anything when I'm home.....

When you put on top of that the fact that it has been 90 degrees with high humidity for the last 2 or 3 days...(which isn't really that typical for a Michigan summer), you recognize that my kids have hit the mid-summer -- I'm bored-- phase, we havent' gone on vacation yet and the fact that gas in our area hit 4.25 for a 3 day stretch this week (although I hear it may be headed down under the 4 dollar mark after yesterday's drop in oil prices ) -- well, I'm spent. I feel very human -- or maybe I just feel like every other mom out there who works outside the home - torn between work and home -- wanting to be super mom when I am home, but not always feeling emotionally or physically able to be that person. Let's face it, the art of motherhood is a lot of work...especially if you want to do ...well, the best job you can do.

I know, this is getting deep for a weekend update -- but it wouldn't be my blog if it wasn't real, would it.? I think I just need to make today about the girls and I. Bill is at work. The dishes and laundry will be there tomorrow - or tonight after the go to bed. Maybe we'll hit the park before the heat index hits 110. :) ..and maybe I'll take some pictures or even think about re-kindling my love of scrapbooking... but first, I definitely need my coffee.

Wherever you are, have a good day...and remember, that laundry can wait, but your kids can't. And maybe, that's really the key.

This shows you where we've come to at this point in the summer. Laying on the island in the kitchen to watch T.V..... oh well, she's happy. :) Have a great day!

Weekend Update - Holiday Edition

Well, it's been quite the week....

Mary & I went to see Wall-E on Monday while Katie was at respite. Cute movie with a good 'earth-friendly' message. We will definitely buy the DVD ....so if you get a chance to take a child (or even by yourself) go see it!

Wednesday brought a massive rain/hail/thunderstorm to our area. We were without power from dinner time Wednesday until noon on Thursday. Autism and no electricity don't really go very well together (I think I have blogged on that previously -- as in last summer when we were without power for 4 days). About 2 hours after the power had gone out, Katie was so crazy..she was beside herself b/c her precious videos wouldn't play. I literally sat at the table with her curled around my legs. I was rubbing her back and I prayed, "Lord, I need you to take over here. Please either turn the power back on or do something to help Katie." Within 15 minutes she was asleep, and she slept all night. Thank-you God.

The other good thing that came out of the storm is our new generator. My parents bought us a generator as an early/late birthday, anniversary, Christmas present. They know that with Katie, it is too difficult for her to not be able to watch TV and to not have lights on. She is very OCD and she has to have lights on/off at specific times. Autism is (as I always say) such a complicated illness. So now, we are all set for future power outages (and I won't lose the food in my fridge/freezer, as we have a deep freeze that I use to stock up on meat when it goes on sale..so we really didn't want to lose that either.) Thanks Mom & Dad.

The power came back on and we had a good Thursday. Katie didn't get to go to speech either time this week which was kind of a bummer. Ruth was sick on Tuesday and on Thursday we were without power and trying to get the generation situation under control. She goes back Monday before respite. I'm hoping to get an update on how Ruth thinks she 's doing with the blending of the two different vowel sounds. I'm not too overly optimistic as I personally have not seen a lot of improvement with that at home....

Gas continues to hover anywhere from 4.04 to 4.19 in our area....thank goodness for Bill's motorcycle. It's saving our gas budget in a big way!

Oh, and by the way HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!!!!!!!

P.S. The tooth fairy also came this week - I'm not sure how I forgot that. Earrings were the "prize"...good thing the tooth fairy is so educated about what children want when their teeth fall out that she keeps a supply on hand.....

One of Those Days...

Yesterday was one of those days that I was glad to have be over. I was tired and feeling sorry for myself. As gas prices soared again I was depressed by Jim Cramer (host of Mad Money) who expects gas to be at 5.00/gallon by the 4th of July. I began to question how in the world people are supposed to afford it. What is happening to our world?

I tried to put myself together, went and grabbed an ice cream cone and came home to start cleaning. I almost immediately recieved a call from school that Katie had managed to "escape" the classroom and was unaccounted for for almost 10 minutes before she was found. This has happened before, so I'm never really shocked by the call, but am always anxious to make sure that she has been reclaimed in an unharmed state. 10 minutes is a long time for an autistic 5 year old to be unaccounted for at a school that is right on the river.

After the day I had been through, my mom and I started to talk about Katie and how that her life is so simple. She lives to play outside and play with water. She is unconcerned with the daily burdens of life such as gas prices, disease and illness, and the many ofther things that make my life at times miserable to bear. She doesn't worry how the bills are paid (nor would any 5 year old..but this will be Katie's life for the foreseeable future.) or that we have too much laundry to do. She is carefree. She is happy. She is Katie.

Fast forward to this morning. It was Mary's last soccer game of the season. She was so excited. Unfortunately with the sudden spurt of 90 degree days that we have had it was too busy at the marina for Bill to make it to her game. She was a little disappointed, but we worked through it. He will be able to come to her big carnival at school Monday. so that helped to ease her pain a little. We are hoping to get our pool up this weekend which will also put smiles on both of the girls faces :)

Happy weekend....

Post-Weekend Update - Gas is 4.10/gallon

Well, another week has passed. They are flying by at an astounding rate. Only 6 1/2 days of school after today. As I have previously said, I am ready for school to be over. Katie cried and cried again as we walked into school today. She is done, too. Mary seems to be enjoying the end-of-school festivities as most 7 year olds do. For that I am thankful.

If you see my new header picture above, it was taken this morning. That is Katie in Mary's soccer jersey from last year. Katie would not leave for school without wearing it. She pulled it out of the laundry basket (no, I am not caught up on laundry, and as usual have many baskets to put away!) and threw it at me..which in Katie speak is "Mom, I'm wearing this and I need you to help me put it on!"

Our weekend was fairly uneventful. Mary's soccer game (she only has one left,) Church, we finished planting the garden, put up the kiddie pool that my mom bought for the girls. We have a 1000 gallon pool that isn't up yet. My mom saw this pool (see pic) in a Land's end catalog and apparently thought it was a lot bigger than it was. Too funny, but the girls liked it anyway. We will try to get the big pool out this weekend. It is supposed to be hot here all week (86 on thursday, so yes, summer is coming), so I think it is finally time for the pool!

And as a final note, yes, gas is 4.10 here. Thought it would go down a bit after the holiday, but apparently not.

Weekend Update..Memorial Day Special Edition --Gas is 4.10 a gallon!

Well once again it is the weekend, and I finally have found time to do a good detailed blog update. I must admit that it has been a difficult week -- in many aspects.

Katie's school situation continues to be complicated. They have begun interviewing for a new teacher for next year - and have allowed parents to be involved in the interviews (which is an amazing opportunity) - but I still have concerns about how that will pan out for Katie next year. We did have a funny Katie story on Friday -due to circumstances "beyond their control" there wasn't an aide available to take Katie to kindergarten on Friday am. The Kdg. teacher decided to come get Katie and let her be in class without an aide. She did amazingly well -- but when "circle" time was over and the teacher started to get into the nitty gritty of the lesson, Katie looked at the teacher (Deb) and said "Bye, Bye." Deb asked her, "Katie, do you want to go back to your classroom?" She looked at Deb and said "Bye, Bye." The fun was over, she didn't feel like working and she was ready to go back to the AI Classroom. I got a good kick out of that story :) It just reconfirms to us that Katie is really catching on -- she likes the "fun" activities and knew it was time to really dig in and work on cognitive skills - so she was done!

The girls have two and a half weeks of school left. I'm frantically trying to put together summer activities that don't involve extensive driving...yes gas is 4.10 here... UGH!!! Word on the street is that we are beginning a rapid incline to 5.00 a gallon. I wonder if it would be cheaper if we lived closer to the refineries? All I do know is that this whole gas thing is upsetting to me.

Happy Memorial Day to everyone. The weather is supposed to be warm here tomorrow - so I'll try to get some pics of the girls. Katie is already sporting a mid-summer tan -- and yes, it's only May. Mommy on the other hand is still pasty white!!! :)

Tuesday, Tuesday.... Gas is 3.99

Well, it's Tuesday. Therapy day for Katie --and it was a hard one this morning. Because Katie is now learning to speak words through imitation, she is struggling to find the words for herself when she doesn't hear the word to repeat. She and I were both crying this morning. Katie out of frustration - and me, because I would trade places with her in a heartbeat if I could. It is hard to watch your child so trapped in themself. But that is the evil-ness of autism. Watching your child caught within themselves with no easy way out. The blessing is that Katie has a phenomenal speech therapist who is truly gifted and has a fabulous connection with Katie... this is an older picture of Ruth (the therapist) and Katie. (This was taken about 5 months ago...just before Katie started to connect a little more with being photographed -- so we weren't able to get a good shot of her looking at the camera.)

As you can see by the title of this post, my other big news is that gas here has now crested the 3.99 mark. I never dreamed that in my lifetime (or at least in my 30's) we would see gas at this price. I was talking with a friend of mine this morning -- and we were talking about how we don't know how anyone (including ourselves) can absorb the increased gas prices as well as the resulting increased grocery prices, utility charges, etc. I remember a little over a year ago that gas here was actually 1.99 for a few weeks. (Yes, that is the bonus of living in rural Michigan). I don't anticipate gas under 3.00 a gallon ever again. I guess we'll be doing a lot of walking this summer. :) What does gas cost where you live? And how are you compensating for the increased costs? We are definitely trying to drive less...and I am hoping to alter my work schedule so that I am not driving 20 miles each way more that 2 or 3 days a week. There comes a point where (when you are working short shifts especially) it isn't profitable to go to work. And that is a sad point that this nation is coming t0. What happens when people can't afford to work?