Two mums, stickers and being an adult.

While we've had several conversations with Miss M (3.5yrs) about the different people in different families, we haven't yet had a chat specifically about our family.  We have two girls and they have two mums, and no dad, and so far no brothers.  We weren't really expecting any conversations about this for a few years yet, but Miss M decided to get a head start.

Miss M "mummy do you have a dad?"
Me "Yes, grandpa is my dad"
Miss M "mummy do I have a dad?"
Me "No, you have two mums instead, me and mumma"
Miss M "but I want a dad!"

While I love ABC kids TV shows, they leave a lot to be desired when it comes to anything out of the general norm.  For example there aren't many shows with homeschooled kids, or two mums, or autism (although sesame street does now have an autistic character, my autistic 3.5yr old doesn't really like sesame st).

I explained that every family is different, and this family just happens to not have a dad in it.  Some families have two dads, some only have a mum or a dad, and some, like ours, have two mums. Just like brothers and sisters.  Not everyone has a brother or a sister.  I have a brother and a sister, but mumma doesn't have either.  Then I talked about some of her friends who did and didn't have brothers or sisters.  She seemed happy with this explanation, so far. But watch this space, I feel there will be more on this at a later date!



One of Miss M's issues (as identified by the OT and Speech path) is her, for lack of a better word, inability to imagine and she struggles with imaginative play.  When given a picture, of anything, she struggles to come up with a pretend story.  If you tell her a story, you first have to tell her that it is pretend.  So most of the toys we buy and a lot of the things we do are around encouraging her to be imaginative.  One thing I've found to be fantastic is some reusable stickers with scenes. It helps that Miss M LOVES stickers, and because of this we have stickers on most surfaces in our house!

These ones are "Melissa & Doug" stickers.  There's a few different scenes and heaps of reusable stickers for each one.  Miss M and Miss F (1.5years) both love them - and they're not too hard for Miss F to do on her own.  After we had made the pictures, Miss M and I sat and talked about what the animals were doing, who they might be friends with and how they might be feeling.  We made up games that they might enjoy to play with their friends, we talked about what they might eat, and where they might sleep.  It was interesting that, to Miss M, only animals that looked alike could be friends, and then the odd ones out were teamed up.  For example the clownfish couldn't be friends with the octopus, it could only be friends with the other clownfish.  The Octopus was friends with the diver, because there was only one of each, and they were both lonely.  

We also try to do lots of different arty things.  This is something I struggle with.  I find a lot of things I want to do with the girls, or think they would enjoy, they're just too young to do.  They both still struggle with scissors - Miss M can use the special OT ones we got, but she has a short attention span with them, I think her hands get sore.  We try painting - neither of the girls like to get paint on their hands, and are very quickly done with it.  However we found these awesome painting textas that they LOVE! 

There's no mess, it's not sticky, they're perfect.  So now the art on our walls is growing every day! And, as we are not allowed to swap the pieces of art around, more and more walls around our house are getting covered with art.  And I wouldn't have it any other way.  💜

Miss M, thanks to her limited imagination, also has a wonderful view about what being a grown up means.  She asked me if one day she will be a grown up.  When I said that she would, she said oh good.  I asked her why -  

"Then I can do grown up things! Like drink coffee, and clean up broken glass, and rock babies to sleep".  

Apparently that's all we do! 😀💖

X-rays, puppies and silliness!

A lot of this week has been about bodies.  There's been the usual conversations about wee and poo - they're a staple in this house lately! But then there's the conversations about food and where it goes to (our bellies), as well as what muscles and bones.  When we do something that uses our muscles (like lifting something heavy) we've always said something like "wow look at your strong muscles".  Well Miss M (3.5yrs) will now tell you to look at her muscles, as she does something, usually a random pose.

Yesterday I was rolling around on the floor with Miss F (1.5yrs) and Miss M took a sudden interest in my ankles.  Ankles are very interesting.  Then she says excitedly "Oh my goodness!! Mummy!! You have bones in your body!!".  Yes, yes I do! And so do you!! So we Googled images of X-rays - we stuck to hands and legs, I think skulls can be a bit spooky.  She loved it.  Sat on my lap comparing her hands to the pictures of hand X-rays.

We looked at all the parts on our bodies where bones can be felt easily - ankle; hip; rib; jaw; feet; toes; knuckles; elbows etc.  All the ticklish spots!!

With the weather settling down a bit this week we've been outside heaps more.  The girls have loved playing in the sandpit.  Miss F is slowing learning not to throw sand at everyone.  The dogs have enjoyed having us outside too.  We play 'find the buried treasure' in the sandpit. We bury barbie dolls, sticks, sandpit toys, my feet.  They love digging up a treasure.  So the girls did this, so I could find her....

                                

I think she actually enjoyed it! She didn't move once.  

Miss M LOVES taking photos.  My phone is always telling me my storage is full and I have to go through all the photos and delete hundreds of random photos (I do keep some).  She loves her own feet! Lately it's been shadows.  Lots of photos of shadows.  And random exclamations of having found her shadow.  We've talked about something blocking a light and that makes a shadow... but I don't think she understands.  She likes watching Peter Pan chase his shadow! 

                                    

One of the things Miss M struggles with (being autistic) is creative play.  Playing with things in a different way to what they were designed for is always a fun conversation.  I'm always doing the wrong thing and being told I'm silly - silliness is underrated! It feels really strange having to teach my daughter how to be silly and random, and not always so completely serious and black and white.  It's not something I ever though parenting would look like.  Don't get me wrong, it's sometimes fun being the silly one, and being able to justify it to unknowing onlookers! 

We recently got a beautiful wooden rainbow puzzle.  It's brilliant for encouraging creative play.  It can be anything you want.  It took a fair amount of convincing to get Miss M to let me make them bridges on our road rug.  I was silly and wrong and all sorts of things! But in the end she loved it and actually spent ages playing with the cars, going under the bridges and over them! 

                                         

I feel like these blogs neglect Miss F lately.  Grated she doesn't talk much, but she's trying! Most of our conversations with her are very repetitive or are telling her not to bite (yes, she's a biter!).  Today the dog (featured above) actually managed to steal a soft toy (a puppy) out of Miss F's hands and ran off with it. It was good to see Miss F get a taste of her own medicine for a change (usually she's the snatcher!).  She was very upset and for about an hour the conversation was "Daisy! Puppy! Gone!"  While she stood next to our dog pointing at her.  We got the toy back straight away (otherwise she would have eaten it!).  But it didn't calm the drama in our poor tormented bub! lol!

Pom poms, shapes and squishy beads.

We've had quite a few windy and wet days lately.  Even when it wasn't wet it was really windy. Miss M (3.5) is quite freaked out by the wind, so we do things inside - much to the disgust of Miss F (1.5yrs) who, much like a puppy dog, has energy to burn and needs to 'run' it off.  So we find things to do inside that keep both happy.

This week we found some coloured electrical tape and made shapes on the floor.  Together with different coloured bean bags the girls had a ball.  They threw bags, and jumped, and hopped, and crawled like dogs, and retrieved bean bags in their mouths like dogs.  It was very entertaining.

Miss M surprised me again with her knowledge, this time of shapes.  We counted sides of squares and rectangles and triangles and talked about the differences, she was all over it.  Then we made harder shapes and she knew the names of those... hexagon, octagon.  I got her with one though - she didn't know what a pentagon was ... although she does now!

 

Something Miss M doesn't like very much is getting wet, she will tolerate it for a bit and then demand a towel, or completely loose her plot!  Miss F, however, would happily spend her life running through sprinklers, or chasing her sister with a hose.  Water beads has been a fantastic discovery for this family! They challenge Miss M to touch wet things - as well as sparking conversations about colours and texture.  We've talked about water being a liquid (and milk, and coffee, and wee! amongst other things), and the beads being solid but soft and slimy - and great fun to squish and break and crumble! And it keeps Miss F happy because she's touching something wet and weird, without creating too much mess (so also keeping mummy happy!).  It's really lucky the girls like them because my wonderful wife bought some from an online wholesaler... so we have a lifetime supply! 

Miss M has almost no interest in letters or writing, most of the time.  She likes numbers, but not really letters.  I don't think she understands that they are two different things, letters and numbers.  Every now and then, while drawing, one of us will write her name, or Miss F's name on their artwork.  Miss M knows that her name starts with 'M', and that's about it.  She has never tried to write it, or wanted to trace our writing.  Until this week.  While drawing, Miss M wanted her name written, Mis F's name written, our names written.  Then she wrote her name on the paper and was so proud.

Don't tell her, but other than the 'M' it looks nothing like her name! But it was still a proud mummy moment! 

One of the things recommended by the occupational therapist was using some specially designed chopsticks to move things around to improve her pencil grip - which is more like a fist grip at the moment.  So we found some pom poms and she had a ball! No pun intended. She moved the pom poms around and sorted them out, sometimes she used the chopsticks the right way, other times she had them however she wanted to.  

                                 

It also followed well with her recent theme of things being bigger/smaller, longer/shorter and so on. We've talked a lot about one person being shorter, or a truck being longer than another, Miss M being taller than her sister (and marking it on the wall).  It started with a study ladder activity (https://www.studyladder.com.au ) where she had to pick which item was bigger or longer etc.  Even though we like the unschooling model of homeschooling, I find study ladder is something Miss M loves and will ask to do. Like just now. I guess that's the end of my turn on the computer! 😀

YouTube, chasey and Autism.

Since I can remember, and certainly since Miss M (3.5yrs) can remember, she had needed extended periods of 'down time'.  Quiet time where no one interacts with her, unless it's on her terms.  Usually that means she is watching something on the iPad, or playing a game on it.  Some days, especially after an upheaval in routine, this down time can last for hours and hours, sometimes most of the day.  Early on we chose to let her self regulate 'screen time' and not force a limit on it for her - a contentious issue I know - as we recognised that it seemed to help her cope with things outside her control, even before she was diagnosed as ASD.

Well this weekend we have been out in the caravan for a little change of scenery - something that is always a challenge for Miss M.  Usually when we go away Miss M spends her time doing solo things, likes puzzles, playing with toys, making 'collections' of randoms things (shells, leaves, stones etc), drawing with chalk, colouring.  You get the idea.

This holiday Miss M did her best to interact with the other kids there.  We talked about how to introduce ourselves.  Miss M has always liked to say her full name - because that's her name! We had a discussion about how just her first name would be enough because otherwise it is a lot of names for the other kids to remember.  And Miss M agreed that we only really call each other by our first names anyway.

So today I had one of those 'ah' moments.  The kind of moment you have, as a parent, where you swell with pride and think, especially as a mum of an ASD kid, that they're going to be ok, they're starting to figure it out.  Even more so, that the things you say, as a parent, really do, eventually, sink in!

My little aspie walked right up to the other kids and introduced herself, and then asked the other kids what their names were.  She had taken her dummy out to do this (we frequently tell her to take it out when she talks so other people can understand her).  A couple of the older boys there (maybe 7 or 8 years old) started a teasing rant "dummy baby dummy baby, why do you have a dummy, baby!".  Miss M looked at them matter of factly (without really understanding they were not being nice) and said "um, well, we have dummies for sucking on sometimes, and because I like them.". Of course/thankfully the boys backed down and went about their own games.

Then I watched Miss M play a game of hide and seek and then chasey with the other girls.  Yes she got completely over excited and took a bit of effort and planning to calm down before dinner, but I was amazed that she knew how to play these games.  We have never talked about them, and we have only really played chasey once for a very short time.  And I know she didn't just figure them out. I feel I have YouTube to thank.  YouTube taught Miss M how to brush her teeth, and now it's taught her how to play with other kids, and apparently to count to 10!

Well kudos to you my independent learner.  You amaze me every single day.  💗

Magic, numbers and puzzles

Miss M's (3.5yrs) latest favourite thing to do is to "beshooom" something for you.  Except when she says it, it sounds a bit like "becharm".  She will do this hourly, or more.  Anything that she perceives that you might need in the moment.  This week I have been lucky enough to get new clothesline pegs, after she watched two in a row disintegrate; a foot stool for my, apparently, tired feet; dinner so I didn't have to cook; a remote control for her sister Miss F (18 months) after I said I wished she had a mute button for a few minutes! And a million other things I clearly needed.  If only her magic had some substance to it! I think I have a few different TV shows to thank for this! Ben and Holly is one that comes to mind... 

Numbers is a big thing at the moment for Miss M.  Anything numbers is completely amazing.  It started with having to change the way we transition Miss M from one thing to the next.  As a kid on the spectrum this is always a challenge.  We used to write them on a white board (didn't matter that she can't yet read) and rub each thing off as we did it - that lost it's charm recently.  So this week's style is to point to the clock in the living room and say "when the big hand reaches the top, it's time to get dressed/get in the bath/ have dinner/ go to bed .... ".  The only draw back to this is that you need to be watching the clock and not say it at 5 past something (e.g. 7.05) because, as it was pointed out "the big hand has already passed the top!".   A positive for this method (other than the simple fact that after five days it's still working!) is that she's becoming more aware of numbers.  After you point out the clock and the impending activity, she will stop whatever she is doing and climb onto the couch and watch the clock with huge levels of excitement (flowing over to her sister who also climbs the couch to watch).  It kind of defeats the purpose of having her finish of her previously enjoyed activity to sit and watch the couch... but whatever works! 

So from this she has developed a love of numbers.  I found some books (possibly bought ages ago, or given... I can't remember that far back!) that have dotted lines of numbers so they can be traced over with a whiteboard pen, over and over and over again.  Well they came out today and the two girls had an absolute ball.  Miss F drew crazy lines and was giggling hysterically - then I realised she was drawing on the table, herself, the chair - basically anything but the book! Miss M however traced over every number in order for several pages.  Delighting when she got the numbers right and at the same time getting seriously upset when her tracing went off the line - massive A type personality there! 

Today we got out the jigsaw puzzle box.  I'm sure we're not the only ones to have one of these? A big box full of those toddler appropriate puzzles (with the little handles on all the pieces)- and more recently a few big kid type ones - 12 or 16 pieces.  Well we have about 25 toddler puzzles.  None of them had all their pieces.  All the boards were nicely piled up. All the pieces were hidden underneath in a tormenting mountain.  (not sure if I thank my wife or my mum for this!).   Eventually (once I had sorted them all out) we had a great time with the puzzles.  Miss M has always loves puzzles.  Miss F prefers to just throw them.  Today, however, we managed to get Miss F enjoying the puzzles and cheering after every piece she put in.  Miss M managed to do a big puzzle (? 24 pieces) all by herself - and it didn't even have the cheat picture underneath! 

protectors of... plants and caterpillars!

While hanging out the washing the other day we became distracted by the amazing amount of weeds that had invaded my garden.  So the three of us (Miss M 3.5yrs, Miss F 18months and myself) took it upon ourselves to attack the weeds.  This led to conversations about which plants were weeds, which were plants, what was the difference and why we had to remove the ones called weeds.  After explaining that the weeds were unwanted plants in our garden and would eventually kill the plants we had planted, Miss M took on the "hero" position and went out to save all the plants.  "PROTECT THE PLANTS!!" was yelled over and over.  Miss F wasn't sure what to do, but helped by removing random leaves.... most were weeds.  

While gardening we found a few bugs, and watched then crawl away.  Miss M became upset that, in protecting our plants, we had destroyed the bug's homes.  So she 'built' bug homes in the piles of weeds now on the path beside us.  Such a beautiful soul.  

We also found a caterpillar in the strawberries in the fridge (Yay right!), so he is now living in a glass jar with random bits of food.  The jar regularly gets shaken up when either Miss M can't find him, or Miss F climbs up and reaches the jar.  Otherwise he seems quite happy! 

Being 18 months old Miss F thinks everything is her's and she a right to grab and play with everything.  This is quite concerning for Miss M, as a concept. She is very worried about Miss F taking everything and making everyone in the world very unhappy.  We have had lots of conversations this week around this topic.  While driving - "what if (Miss F) thinks that house is hers?".  And "Mummy you would be very sad if (Miss F) thought your stitching(knitting) was hers, because then you would have none!".  What if she thinks all the flowers are hers? All the puppy dogs? All the TVs? I feel this issue has more to come.  

We watched a documentary about the Great Barrier Reef this week.  It was amazing.  We watched a mummy turtle crawl along the beach and lay her eggs, and then crawl back to the water (if she could).  Miss M was very concerned that the mummy turtles 'just left' the babies in the eggs there alone.  So we talked about different animals and the different needs of their babies.  

The documentary also showed robots that dived down into the depths of the ocean.  That sparked a conversation about how robots work - waaaaay out of my depth here!! I didn't even get a chance to google as she moved onto another topic about sharks.  

Dinner time is always a challenge in our house.  Miss F will eat almost anything (unless she's pushing out teeth), but Miss M is another story.  If it's something that has the ingredients all mixed together (spag bol, shepherds pie, etc) she won't touch it.  So this week I had a stroke of genius and used ice cube trays for a dinner plate (we have a lovely expensive, bought sectioned plate - she doesn't like it).  

The ice cube trays were a hit! Miss M ate almost everything in her ice cube tray plate! Miss F ate the corn (blaming the new eye teeth here!). And then discovered it was fun to throw her food on the floor for the lizard to eat (yes we have a free ranging lizard, or two!).  

Bedtimes are also a bit of a struggle.  Miss F is going through a clingy, cuddly stage.  Miss M just takes ages to wind down and stop her crazy brain.  The other night, after a busy social day, there was a huge list of things on her little brain.  It started with "mummy, what's in snot?" (we currently have a cold making it's way through the house), that one took a while to explain (little germs, and fluid to help push the germs out??).  Then it got harder.  "what's in guts?", "what's in horses?", "what's in people?".  After talking about food, digestive juices, organs and bones, she moved onto things.  "What's in houses?", "What's in pillows?", "what's in curtains?".  This started after saying curtains were in houses, and then led to "what's in material?", "what's in fibres?", "where do fibres come from".  Ummmm, sheep, cotton plants, plastic?? Thankfully she finally fell asleep thinking about curtains.  

😀

Poo, poo and more poo!

This week Miss M (3.5yrs) has had a fascination with poo.  So, sorry for those who find poo offensive - you may want to skip reading this post!

Every time I have changed Miss F's (18months) nappy, Miss M would like to see the poo.  I'm ok with that, but I draw the line at touching it, or poking it with things - much to Miss M's frustration.  When we have done a dog poo scoop in the yard, Miss M delights in finding all the poo, standing over it, point at it and yelling (at the top of her voice) "POO!!!).  Such a great help - sorry neighbours!

Miss M is not yet "toilet trained" - I personally hate that phrase, but that's for another conversation.  She has shown interest a few times, but not for quite a while.  This week we were all about undies and using the toilet and not nappies, so it was a nice change.  But the poo fascination continued.  The poo in toilet required everyone to look at it - "it's a beautiful poo" she exclaimed! The  poo that didn't quite make the toilet wasn't so nice "I don't like poo in my undies".

Today we are back in nappies, but the poo fascination continues. "what is in poo?".  😐 So we talked about how what we eat gets churned up in our bellies, our body sucks up all the goodness and nutrients from the food to make energy (she's all about energy at the moment) and then what is left becomes poo.  Not a bad explanation I thought? Then she wanted to take a photo of a "beautiful poo" in a nappy and send it to her aunty so she too could admire the beauty.  Yes we took the photo, but we talked about how poo is not something most people would like to look at, so perhaps this could just be a photo for  you to look at (you're welcome sis)- and no maybe not on our wall, how about we just keep it in my phone?

It's ok, I won't share that particular 'beautiful' photo on this post... here's a beautiful flower instead.

We drove to playgroup this week - about 30mins away - and Miss M was very concerned that her little sister thought everything was hers.  The drive consisted of questions like "what if F.... thinks that house over there is hers?", "What if she thinks that truck is hers?" "what if she thinks the trees and sky are all hers".  Trying to explain to a 3 year old that a 1 year old doesn't really understand ownership and thinks everything is hers to enjoy and look at and play with, is oddly frustrating.  So after trying for some time, we started singing play school songs instead - very thankful for Justine's CD being in our car!

Miss M has, until recently, never really been one to play imaginary games or play.  A new game this week has been 'library / pet store'.  In this game (invented by Miss M) Miss M asks us what book we would like to borrow from the library / or what pet we would like.  We are not allowed to say one already done (!) and then she magically finds it for us.  Its quite fun, but gets very hard when you're into the second hour and have asked for a book on everything you have knowledge of existing, or have asked for a pet of every animal you can think of.

It did highlight one thing to me, Miss M's knowledge of animals is a lot more than I gave her credit for.  For most of the animals I asked for, she could tell me where they would live and what they ate.   Kids really are sponges for information.

Thanks for reading.  Hope you didn't get too squeamish with all the poo talk - that's toddlers for you!
Cheers!