Since the last post, I was successful in my endeavors with whatever I was doing with our school and our budget "issues". There has been a lot of budget difficulties in this country and our school district has not had to cut jobs for our teachers ever...until now. I'm not getting into too much but it was successful and the work that the parents of our district were very vigilant. Even though we are still going to be facing job cuts for our teachers. Our efforts are going to be presented at the Senate office, and more places in Washington DC, on successful cases where parents are fighting to keep the Arts in our schools. I'm kind of proud.
We bought Tanya a trombone so she can start playing this summer. We wanted to give her a head start because I really think it will be something she can really get into. I've never played trombone but I'm going to slowly help her as much as I can with the keyboard as a help. The only thing I'm going to have trouble with is slide positions. It should be something fun for both of us.
Carly came home last week and asked to learn the saxophone this summer. This one is going to be a little easier because I know how to play. I started teaching her and bought her an instruction book, and she's on her way. She got it right away and keeps just picking it up quicker and quicker. She likes having more than one instrument to play so she'll be more versatile as a musician. It will be really fun being able to play with both girls by this fall.
We have been taking Eden's behaviors one day at a time. She has been either very difficult or very good.
There doesn't seem to be a middle ground. She hasn't been sleeping very well, sitting at the table, even with preferred foods can be an issue, she is using her words more but also testing those words more and sometimes not in a good way. She has been in the 3:1 with more typical peers for almost 3 full weeks and is loving every second of it.
We are working toward getting her to understand feelings better. She has been really good at the common emotions: happy, sad, silly, and shy. We are trying to add to the list. The ones I listed are her "go to" emotions when we ask how she is feeling. She commonly confuses sad with angry and we are really trying to get her to use her words when she is having a difficult time.
Eden and I spent an afternoon making emotion cards to put on the refrigerator. We have a little frame that she can put her emotion in that best describes her. It's helped so much. She now expresses frustrated verbally and appropriately.
As you can see we used her as the model and we used the emotions from the book she frequently uses, "The Way I Feel". It was such a fun project, and she could really have a sense if ownership of the feelings. It has worked really well, as she goes to the pictures all the time, looking at them and picking the one that matches her feelings. She plays with the faces, her favorite is silly. She also has been expressing her feelings more and using all the feelings that she see's on the refrigerator. I'm so excited that she is picking up all of the modifications that we are using so quickly.
Another thing that has been going on is Eden's pica has increased. Thinking back in previous times, Eden does automatically turn to eating things as a tool to calm down her body and to help her cope with stress. It's so frustrating to have a child that is almost 6 years old and I'm constantly having to check things in her mouth and sticking my fingers in her mouth to "fish" things out. I have to kind of treat her like a baby. Here is an example of the things I took out of her mouth when I came home from a weekend away. From Sunday evening until Wednesday:
And if you were wondering there are two bites taken out of the toilet paper roll that I found hid in a drawer in the bathroom. A balled up tissue that I had to take out of her mouth as well as those balls which are magnetic. I found 2 of the balls in her mouth at one time and the other 3 were individual (I've read the stories about the batteries and magnets found in kids bellies and it scares me to death). Who knows what she has actually eaten and if it has passed. I'm just hoping that the laxative that she's on will help her get rid of those things sooner rather than later.
I think that's about all the update I can find time for right now. I'm going to try to update as much as I can but the older girls are on vacation for the summer as of tomorrow. We'll see how this goes. We have a bunch of plans for the summer, I'll try and keep you updated.
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