#blogjune2013 Day 9: In which I meet some unexpected issues

A few posts back I mentioned Mr9's tentative diagnosis of dyspraxia. Since then we have been trying to move forward with testing and finding ways to help him.

We have been helped by the SPELD association who gave him a comprehensive test that revealed some strengths and weaknesses. He now has a SPELD tutor who works with him once a week.

A friend has screened him for Irlen and we see a diagnostician this week.

I am still trying to find an OT for him that will help him and hopefully give a definitive diagnosis. The closest one is too busy - too many ACC cases.  Another recommended one has yet to get back to me so I fear the same will hold true of her also. I may yet have to find someone myself. As this is one of the key things he needs I am feeling frustrated!

It has not been cheap either and he doesn't qualify for any funding.  It worries me that it will be difficult for us to get assistance like reader-writers when his condition is not considered "severe" enough.

One good thing is that the school have been very helpful and co-operative.  His teacher has a 2 other students with learning difficulties so she is open to exploring ideas and ways to deal with this.  Additionally, she is trying to incorporate some elearning into the class which is a challenge in a small school with limited funding.  She approached us about the possibility of purchasing Mr9 an iPad as she has found some of the apps useful in assisting her to teach her students with learning difficulties - the other 2 in her class have them.

We were hardly a "hard sell" given the geekiness of our family so we agreed and today Mr9 got an iPad2 (wifi only).  It will live at school most of the time, locked away in a secure place when not in use. It can come home when he wants to bring it home though.

Here he is "unboxing" his iPad.

We needed to set an email for him as some of the work he will do on the device will be emailed to his teacher rather than submitted on paper.  We assumed a gmail would be fine, but we discovered he is too young for one!  We went back and forth about options and in the end we found Yahoo! allows a child account if you set up a "family account" arrangement.

I am just hoping we'll be able to find a similar thing for gmail because I suspect he will need to use some of the Google apps like docs.  Perhaps the school has Google for schools?  I don't know but will have to find a way to work around this.  In the meantime, the Yahoo! address will have to do.

One of the apps I installed for him is the Overdrive one for borrowing library ebooks and audiobooks.  Of course, it needs to have an Adobe ID.  Mine has been used on too many devices so I had to make one for him as well. 

It both amuses and alarms me that Mr9's digital footprint is already growing as a result of this purchase we've made.

Here are my loves heading out to this morning's fellowship. Miss6 is not impressed she didn't get an iPad.  Mostly because she wants to play Fruit Ninja.

Put a ring on it

Miss 4 came home very proud of herself.  "Jason gave me a wing!"

It's a little cardboard tube.  I didn't realise courting started this young.

I made afghans tonight.  Miss 4 hopped out of the shower and said, "What's that delicious smell?" and on discovering them later she asked if she could have "one of dose chocolate fings."  Which she proceeded to eat in the washing basket.

Mad inventor

Mr 7 is obviously going to follow in Gyro Gearloose's footsteps.

Below - diagram for his invention.  A whistle.

And the diagram realised.  Not sure why a whistle has guitar like strings though.

 

His parents look forward to being kept in the style to which they would like to become accustomed through the royalties from his patents.

Day 5: Saturday swimming

Saturday means swimming lessons round here.  I've enrolled the kids for this term and will probably re-enrol for next term too.  It cuts into my "free" time but it is important to us that our children gain water confidence and respect.  There are too many drowning accidents in New Zealand.  Some of those accidents could have been prevented by basic respect for water and some swimming skills.  (Of course, swimming skills are not always going to be helpful in bad situations but still ... YKWIM).

This one used to be terrified of the water.  His first swimming lesson when he was 3 1/2 was a disaster.  He clung to the teacher the whole time and screamed nonstop "I want my mummy" in her ear.  The poor girl!  Before his second lesson I took him to the local pool and swam around with him, played floating games and after that he was happy to get into the water with the teacher and actually learn some skills.  These days he seems to spend a lot of time under the water when he isn't being supervised to do some activity. His skills are slowly improving.  He still pokes his bum in the air when trying to stroke freestyle!

This little monkey has a blast!  She has a very experienced, gentle teacher called Matt who does a great job with the littlies, some of whom are very afraid. They play cool games like Jungle River and pretend to be crocodiles.  They have rides on a floating device (Tommy the Turtle) to practice kicking.  They fetch rings from under the water to practice putting their faces underneath.  She has had a small falling-over-under-the-water accident since and although it gave her a fright I am glad because she now has a bit more respect for the water environment than before.

It's worth missing out my sleep in for.

Day 4: Incredible sulk

Miss 3 sulking because I told her to change her clothes prior to going out. Apparently if you can't wear a dress with cherries on it your life is not worth living.

Journal draw results

Assisted by my beautiful assistant we drew two names for the journals I covered.  Mel and Amie - let me know which one you'd prefer and I'll send them your way.  Amie I will also need your address.  (Think I've got your one somewhere Mel).

Speaking of my beautiful assistant - she decided to make herself more beautiful by cutting her own hair on Sunday after we got home from our church meeting.

Le sigh.

In other news:

• I have made 6 bottles of plum jam, 6 bottles of strawberry jam.  Chelsea's jam setting sugar is good for the strawberries since the extra pectin helps.
• The whanau appears to be afflicted with some tummy bug.  I'm expecting to be smitten forthwith
• DH lost his $800 tripod off the rocks at O'Neills Bay, Bethells Beach/Te Henga.  If you find a tripod washed up on the sand he'd love to see it back but we're not hopeful.  An unexpected gust of wind blew it over.  Fortunately the camera wasn't on it, and fortunately AMI looks like it will play nicely and help us replace it.  And fortunately DH had enough sense to not go diving for it because it's a washing machine of waves & rocks in that area.  I'd rather have my husband and lose the tripod.
• I did one layout on the weekend. Whee.

Getting things together for my trip to Melbourne next week to attend a conference there.  I'm excited to go and nervous too.  New faces, different environment, having to make conversation... all things I'm not so good at.  But thanks to Twitter and blogs there will be people I have chatted with and am now going to meet IRL and that always helps.  I have been to Melbourne BK (before kids) so it won't be entirely unfamiliar.  Hope it won't be too hot.

Train trips and Christmas morning

Took a trip into town on the train the other weekend. Mr 6 was delighted! Had the most delicious gelato from Valentino's in the Ferry Building.

Thought this sequence of photos was quite amusing...

The night before Christmas

Mr 6 wakes up at 6am - starts sorting his into a pile...

Mum persuades him to just open one while waiting for Missy Moo to wake up. ('Scuse the jammies). *yawn*

Mummy gets dressed and caffeinated...

Missy Moo modeling her front pack I made (needs some adjustments) while picking her nose... charming.

I'm busy relaxing.... toodle pip.

Impossible

Trying to get photos of Miss 2 is nigh on impossible. Check out this series...

A pensive look













"Smile for mummy?"













"No! Open your eyes!"













*sigh* "You are a wally"













"Okay - one more chance"













*gives up in disgust* LOL! I have every respect for people who successfully take photos of their children without coming away with no hair left on their heads.....

The future is rosy

Conversation with Tim this morning on the way to school...

Tim: I'm going backwards.
Me: Why?
Tim: Because your feet go further than mine.
Me: That's because my legs are longer than yours - see? *demonstrates* When your legs are as long as mine you will be able to keep up. In fact, you'll probably be taller than Mummy. You might even be taller than Daddy.
Tim: But I will still hug you because I like you so much.
Me: *melts* Oh good, I'd like that.

Spring in the air

The daffs are out along Twin Oaks Drive in Cornwall Park so thence we went to try and get a decent photo or two for Aunty N who is off overseas next month. And also to allow the Man-Flu-afflicted to have a sleep. I have the same disease but seem to be less stricken with it.

The kiddoes seem to have fun anyway!

I've created a monster

I finally let DS have at the lego collection my sisters and I had when we were younger. The first thing he does in the morning is dig it out. As soon as he is home he is playing again. I'm continually getting pestered to "help" i.e. make things from the "constructions" he's found in there.

I surprised myself when I did actually sit down with him and make some stuff up - remembered how much fun it is to build things.

Parenting Fail

DD is toilet training her baby.

I had a little pony

I made a little pony
I hoped you'd let it stay
'Cause Mummy has been anxious
For some cute hair dressing play

I've seen you by the mirror
Admiring your pretty self
I think that you resemble
A pixie or an elf






























Oh - and that is a ginger beer bottle she's holding. An empty one.

Here are some layouts I managed to do on the weekend instead of weeding the garden.

"Bur-day 2u": this is what DD says when she sees a birthday cake. In fact, ANY cake is a birthday cake. If you ask her who's birthday it is, she will say, "Yidia!"

In case you didn't know you must sing "Burday 2 you, hip ray hip ray hip ray" whenever you have cake. I am sure you will do that now. Don't let me down.

I broke out the BG Lime rickey for this one. Love the paper, not sure I am happy with the layout.




























This one is an attempt to scrapbook those inevitable "school" photos. I've created a pocket for the class one to go on the same layout (behind the pink dot PP). They laminated the class one much to my disgust. Again, this one didn't really turn out how I envisioned but never mind!

cute things they say + make your own tartan

DD is coming along with her vocab and sentence making. She copies things we say - it's like there is an echo in the house sometimes.

With her face right up close to mine while I'm resting with my eyes closed she says in a big loud voice:
"Mummy seeping!" not anymore baby, not anymore..

Em, those little figurines from William's party now live in the dolls house, and get taken to bed on occasion which resulted in:

"Bob anna Wenny in bed!" (Bob and Wendy in bed!)
DH in the background: Naughty Bob!

DH had some music on:
"I yike mooscit" (I like music)

She knows most of the names of her little playmates at daycare.
Sheeta (Ashita)
Baco (Paco)
Connor
Yiza (Eliza)
and also her teachers
Yinda (Linda)
Bekky
Heada (Heather)
Manyo (Manjo)

It's funny to listen to the two kids play together. DD bosses her around a bit and controls the "game" but she certainly can make her opinions felt. The other day she annoyed DD, so he said to her, "I'm going to cross you off my list!"

I hope I'm still on his list. ;-)

Now to something completely different.

I subscribe to a blog called Popgadget, a blog about tech for women. Actually they have more stuff than that, but I digress. Anyhow, the poster pointed me to Pattern Pulp, a blog about... you guessed it ... patterns, by a New York designer. Fun!

She pointed me to a Stripe Generator site where you can make your own stripey patterns.

And it links to a Tartan making site where you can make your own tartan and unleash your inner Scott. Och aye!

today's post is brought to you by the letter S

DS had a mufti-day yesterday with the required .50c "donation" and $1 sausage sizzle.  So I wrapped up his money and told him what it was for etc.  When I got home I asked him:

"So did you get a sausage today?"
DS: Yes
Me: So you gave the money to Miss B___?
DS: No
Me: Well how come you were allowed a sausage then?
DS: You can't have a sausage unless you have an 'S' on your hand.
Me: *giggles* Right... so Nan gave Miss B___ the money then?
DS: No, she gave it to the office. *found out later this wasn't true, she did give it to the teacher*
Me: And the office ladies wrote an 'S' on your hand?
DS: No, the office ladies don't know how to write 'S'
Me: LOL!

Slandered!  Those poor office ladies ;-)  So if you know how to write an S on your hand you can have a sausage.  Just thought that little tip might be helpful.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Hanging on

by the skin of my teeth until I finish work Thursday afternoon.
Who knows if I will blog anything worthwhile between now and Christmas. Haven't even thought about the November Reading Round up - I think I did read something though.

The kids and I put the tree up and I took photos for the SBO challenge but never got time to make the LO for it. I'm giving up on the rest of the challenges - it's just too hard for me to get time to do it. In my more frustrated moments I consider packing up all my scrapbooking and sewing and giving it away because I despair of finding time! But... mustn't give in to self-pity.






Last week was insanely busy with work and school Christmas parties left right and centre. I did get the Christmas cake made, some chocolate panforte made for presents and on Thursday I made the Christmas pudding (aka the Scarlet w*ore of Babylon). True, I did have to get up at 1am to turn off the oven when it was cooked but it is done!

On Friday I made some gift Christmas cakes and lemon cordial. Saturday was the daycare Christmas party and Missy Moo once more demonstrated how different she is to her brother. While he clung to me like a burr, she was up on the stage boogying to the music. Even Santa didn't bother her. Here she is (in the red dress) singing about Santa Claus... he's outside ringing his bells.

I then went to find some summer clothes for the kids because DS only has about 3 pairs of shorts that fit him that don't have holes in the wrong places! And Missy Moo really doesn't fit size 1 anymore however much I try to deny the fact she is growing up. DH needed a couple of new go-to-church-shirts too; the Barkers outlet store had buy one get one half price so I managed to sort that out easily.

Saturday afternoon we went to a wedding.


DS wanted to know what it was all about.

Me: We have to get dressed to go to the wedding.
DS: Whats a wedding?
Me: It's when people get married. You know, like Mummy and Daddy did.
DS: Why?
Me: Ummm.. well, Fred and Julia fell in love and so they decided to get married.
DS: Why?
Me: *inside: aaaarggghh!! So they can't be accused of living in sin? They want to make it legal? They felt like a party?* Just get dressed okay? It's at the beach and there will be sausage rolls.

The latter mention of sausage rolls was a mistake because he then spent most of the ceremony asking me where the food was and when he could eat it.

And there were no sausage rolls.

Fortunately there were sufficient sandwiches to cope with his appetite. I think he's having a growth spurt. He ate 4 helpings of lasagne last night.

Missy Moo enjoyed the cupcakes, and they both liked the beach.





Now the lovely Rachel has kindly awarded me with this Kreative Blogger award. Thank you!


The rules for the award are this:
.
1. The winner may put the logo on their blog.
2. Put a link to the person who sent you the award.
3. Nominate 5 blogs.
4. Provide links to their blogs.
5. Leave a message for your nominees.

I'm going to have a think about this one and get back to ya!