Back to Normal

Many things have been happening that have thrown our family threw a loop this year.

Slowly, things are settling and getting back to normal. It is never fun having life interrupted, but we learn to adjust and re-settle.

The kids are home, Xavier is out of his cast, and Derric is back to being Derric. School has started and the kids are slowly falling back into a school routine. The hardest hit has been Dokota. With no sleep schedule during the summer, he is now finding it hard to sleep at night and actually get up in the morning. I had hoped I could get him back to being close to adjusted in the two weeks he was home before school started, but it is just not happening. It is going to take a lot of time and hopefully it wont effect him to much with school.

Xavier goes in on Monday to get his thumb looked at, but in all honesty, he will have to attend physical therapy. He found many ways to get around using his thumb, even when giving him things to do to work on it. Took away the motion controlled games and gave him old school D-Pad games, but he still found ways to not use his thumb and play them. Reminding him daily, hourly, sometimes minutely did nothing. So, not listening to anyone, he has let his thumb sit. Monday we will get the referral to physical therapy and he will be forced to work it. He will learn that we were not lieing and it will be painful because they will not be nice about it.

Kauchana seems happy to be home, back in her bed, with her stuff, meeting up with her friends. Being able to disappear for hours and not be bothered, headphones in her ears just like Dokota. (tho she will scowl if told that) And like Dokota, her nose is stuck to the iPod, texting and playing games. Or head phones in listening to music while she is curled up on the couch reading a book. Ever so much the teenage girl she is.

The biggest adjustment has been with Derric. He has latched to Dokota and Kauchana like glue. He can't really handle them being out of his site for long now. He has to be near one of them almost at all times.

School:
there really isn't much to say in that field yet. Today is only their third day and everything is still settling with classes. There were a couple of teachers for Xavier I just didn't care for, Kauchana seems to enjoy most of her teachers, and Dokota is, well, Dokota. He is working on getting out of one class and also seeing about getting things set up so he can have Senior status after the semester so next year he can spread his classes out and get a job.

Well, that is about it. Time for me to get back into my morning routine and get out the door soon for physical therapy. Oh the joy.

Goodnight

It's been a rather busy week here. Nights like this, sitting around a fire, teenage kids arguing, and a good drink... Yes, we have a good life.

A Spring Day

After school today, I took the kids to the big park on base. It was a fight to get Derric to go, one that resulted in him having a major meltdown and crying fit. I think four years in an apartment wasn't that great for him, he doesn't like going outside now. It is such an odd behavior. I think the meltdown was a mixture of him just not wanting to go to the park, and me trying to get him into sandals. Whenever we change his shoes, even when he out grows a pair, it is always an adjustment and lots of meltdowns. So the sandals were just a cherry to the top of an already meltdown.

Once there, he opened up and started playing with the rest of us. First it was fun with Cody pushing Xavier on the tire swing. Then we moved over to the swings, and from there the marry-go-round. We spent a good hour and half having fun. Pictures are posted on the picture site, stop by and take a look. The kids have grown so much!

Fun Weekend

Wow! We had such great weather this past weekend!

Friday, Kevin asked what I wanted to do this weekend. I said I want to run by Costco and get some bulk shopping done, BBQ, then veg the rest of the weekend. Made plans with friends here for them picking up the bed they loaned to us and seeing about us getting the Fridge they are selling us.

Saturday rolled around and most of us slept in a bit. I ended up waking up around 9, but lounged in bed until my back couldn't take it any more. Waited for Kevin to get up so we could head out. He finally got up around 1, and we were off to Costco by 2:30. Since Costco is in Boise, it was a good 45 minute drive, which I really don't like driving. Very flat, very dull, very straight.

Saturdays are probably NOT good Costco days. That place was packed and tho I probably wanted to look around more, we got a few items and left, fast. Neither of us could take the crowd. If not for the BBQ meat, and some Dinosaur Chicken Nuggets for Derric, I would feel the trip was wasted. But we got some good meat for the BBQ, enough that we managed two days!

Got home and started the grill. Had some yummy steaks, hamburgers, and baked beans. Yum. Managed to get some family gaming in, then little ones wandered off to bed. I followed not too long after. Talked Kevin into playing on the PS3 so I could fall asleep listening to him play. All in all, Saturday was a very relaxing day.

Sunday turned out to be just beautiful. Kauchana was able to talk Derric into playing at the Park (with the promise of bubbles). So those two disappeared for a couple hours. Xavier didn't want to give up his DS, which he managed to finally bring his grades up long enough to have his game this weekend, so he didn't go out. Dokota and Kevin slept most of the day.

Enjoyed some more family gaming until the internet went down, then Kevin decided he was hungry. There wasn't much left over from the BBQ, so he fired up the grill to fix the rest. Since it was so nice and warm out, I wanted to head to the BX to get a sprinkler the kids could play in, but they only had cheap plastic ones that wouldn't last more then a day. Headed to WalMart, but they didn't have any better of a selection, almost ended up getting a blow up pool for the kids to play in, until we get the garage cleared and can get a good look at our old pool. But Derric managed to find a water toy that looked fun for him.

Got home in time for the back yard to be in shadow, and to find out that I need to get a work order in for the back faucet, water seems to be coming out around the spiket, not threw it. So even when we hook the hose up to it, no water actually goes into the hose. Grrr. Guess we will need to wait on any back yard fun until we can get that fixed. Hopefully the weather will stay nice so we can enjoy it.

My physically therapy got approved to continue, so I will be continuing that this week. Not sure how many more weeks the insurance has approved, but just glad I get to continue.

Not much else going on. Kauchana has her dental today, so I will be heading out to that soon. Derric's next IEP meeting isn't until the 26th, so got a bit to wait on for that. All in all, the kids are doing really good.

Priced it out, and might be able to get the kids into swimming lessons again this summer. The pool on base is open, and they have some Family Splash Nights coming up, I think the kids would really enjoy heading to those.

Well, that is all for this update. Once I know more, I will post more. Have a good week.

Spring Update

Well, I think we are in Spring Time, but I am not too sure here.

The weather here is never one to set a trend, it is a guess each day how it will be. And forget weather apps and websites. They never help.

The kids had their Spring Break, but it rained and was almost too windy most of it, for them to go out and enjoy it. Which didn't bother the kids too much. Right before Spring Break, the 3rd Quarter ended. Grades were sent out. I know, I had meant to get them posted, but honestly, when the kids are on break, my mind tends to head that direction too. It was rough getting up on my Physical Therapy days....

But, Kauchana and Xavier's grades have been posted. I didn't get a report card for Dokota ...... hmmm? And I miss placed Derric's. Ooops. Links to their grades are up top, just click their grade level. I will see about logging onto the online site for their grades and getting them posted.

Not much has been going on. Kevin has been working, the kids going to school, if I am able to move after PT, I try to get chores done. It is pretty much the same. I do want to see about take the kids up to see a movie this weekend, but not sure if Derric will be able to handle the movie everyone wants to see.

Speaking of which, did you know this month is Autism Awareness Month? I only found out about it due to a few favorites on FaceBook constantly posting about it. It is interesting to see the sudden jump in care, just because of this Awareness Month. Some online support groups talked about "writing letters" to their kids. I thought that was kinda a neat idea, but then I realized, I actually suck at writing letters. Really I do. I mean come-on, I can hardly write a blog post without months going in between... How would I be able to write a letter? Plus, I see him, daily. What would I write about? What would I write to a future him about today?

Instead, Dokota wrote a beautiful peace. I got his permission, so I am going to post it. It really touches the heart. So I am going to end this post with Dokota's writing.

My Brother Is Disabled

By: Dokota
My brother has Autism. To be specific, he has high functioning autism, which means he is really hyper all the time. He doesn't realize that everyone else sees the world different than him. I have best heard it described like this: how we view the world is like a movie projector, with the pictures on the film in order. How People with autism see it is the same, but the pictures aren't in any order. My brother is eight, and has the mentality of a kindergartner. He loves to have fun, play, question the world around, laugh at his older brother, eat dessert all day, have friends, enjoy school, love his family, and just live life. He is in his own world, one that makes sense to him. We realize this, and all hope that he will invite us in, it is all we can hope for. Why would we want to change him? Putting him in classes only would only be trying to force him into our world so he is 'normal' and can interact 'normally' with others. He does that just fine, he sees the truth of the matter more often than I ever could, and people call me a genius. I have lived with him for all his life so far. It hurts to see kids avoid him because he wants to run around and pretend play Stormtroopers or Transformers. It hurts to have his peers come to me and say he is weird, that all he does is talk about Star Wrs or Transformers, that he is annoying. I have stopped caring, for I learned from my brother. As an adult, I learned from my (at the time) six year old brother. He didn't care. If they didn't want to play, he would expand his world, and he would put himself in the middle of a titanic struggle between clones and giant robots, with him being th center of it all. He doesn't care what his peers think, never has. He has taught me far more about life and how I view it than any other person could. He has a disability. The world states that a disability is a limit or difficulty of some form. Yes he has trouble understanding the way the rest of us do, but that doesn't limit him from being the best teacher I have ever had. It is because of my goofy, spontaneous, insane, lovable, cute, Autistic brother that the world makes sense. It is because of him that I can proudly hold my head high and say with vast pride and love that "Yes my brother has a disability, a mental handicap. Yet he doesn't care, for he views everyone equal, and this has never had to be explained. He doesn't discriminate, hold grudges, or care. What's your excuse?" Thank you dear brother of mine. You will reach the sky Little One.

And Dokota says he isn't a writer....

 

Out of the Systems

On Monday, I had Kauchana's, now, last IEP meeting. She is now out of the Special Education system.

According to the nation wide tests that they did with her, she now falls in the "Average" range. Due to the way the system here tests, her scores would have actually been even higher in some areas, but due to the format, she sits a little on the lower end.

Instead of being in the Special Ed room for a class period to catch up and process everything, she now attends a Study Hall. The team did state that her processing speed and short term memory are her only hindrances, but they are not enough to warrant being in the special ed system.

So, Kauchana has "graduated" out and is now fully in regular classrooms with normal assistance. No more behind the scenes help.

All teachers stated that Kauchana has been a very open and easy going child, asks questions and participates in the class. Her only downfall is not turning in her note folder for credit weekly in one class. She is making friends and is working hard.

Honestly, after everything I heard, I started to wonder if they were talking about a different child.

I hope all goes well with her and she can keep up.

A new base, a new start, a new...

Well everyone out there, I am going to sit here and say I am rather sorry that it has taken this long for an update.

We are back in the states, we flew in on the First of January. Kevin's parents and our sponsor met us at the air port and helped get us get back down to base. Since Kevin's parents were loaning us their truck until our van arrived, they did not stay for long. But we were able to spend a couple days with them as we visited Boise and did some window shopping/pricing of appliances that we would need to buy.

Pretty much everything was closed, military wise, on the second, so we headed to Boise. It was a relaxful end to the full day of traveling that we had done the day before.

The next day, still on German time a bit, Kevin and I woke up rather early and called up the housing office to find out when they would be open. We got lucky and they were already open. We headed over rather early and checked in. They offered us two houses to choose from, so we went and took a look, deciding on one.

This was rather nice, as the TLF we had on this side was rather small. We were very thankful that Kevin's parents were here, allowing us to let kids sleep in there TLF room, giving everyone an actual bed. The day Kevin's parents left we checked out of the TLF and moved into the house.

Everyone has been sleeping on air mattresses right now, as our household goods still have not arrived.
At WalMart one day, Kevin and I found a rather nice bunk bed for Xavier and Derric, rather decently priced. So we went ahead and picked that up, putting their air mattresses on it. But all the playing around those two do on it, popped Xavier's and it has required a fill up on air just about nightly.

Thanks to the travel money paid, we were able to pick up a washer and dryer, which has been really nice! I am sad to say, I am honestly happy I can do laundry whenever needed, instead of loading up the vehicle to drive it to a laundry mat. Kevin got me a rather nice set, one big enough to wash our King size bedding.

We are still waiting on the Tax refund to arrive to pay off credit cards, put away for when we need to go pick up the van, and also buy Kauchana's new bed. Hopefully this will all be able to be taken care of soon. (Tho the van is still not at the port of call, so still unable to go pick it up.)

Today we did manage to pick up two small mattresses, for the bunk bed, allowing the boys to sleep on something a little more solid and also (honestly) cut down on the noise at night. Found a couple different beds I thought Kauchana would enjoy, but Kevin and I both agreed, it would be much better for her to go pick it out and get a bed she liked then paying the money for one she will hate.