So yummy! Dutch Chococcino Loose Leaf Tea

I have been using my new tea maker to make at least three pots of tea a day. I've tried several new loose leaf teas in the process. I intend to do a post about my favorites once my first wave of research is complete, but I wanted to share a new discovery that I particularly like.

I love the Dutch Chococcino from Vianne's Tea House. I opened the bag and it smelled heavenly. It smelled just like a really good dark chocolate bar. It also has an amazingly rich dark chocolate taste to it. It is the closest a tea has ever come to replacing a really good cup of hot chocolate for me. I made mine with plenty of raw sugar and a little milk in it.

If you enjoy making loose leaf teas and you enjoy chocolate you should definitely try this tea.

The Weekly Review: Week 47

Blog Post of the Week

I enjoyed Swistle's idea about spite charity. I love the way her mind works.

Weekly Pleasant Surprise

An old friend that I had lost touch with years ago sent me an email. Since then we have exchanged several more. It has been lovely catching up. It makes me sad that we are now living several states apart.

Ava this Week

Ava adapted to her cast amazingly quickly. She's capable of at least 85-90% of her usual activities with her right hand out of commission. Every so often, she'll want a little assistance though. She'll run up to me and ask for help, and then casually add on to the end of the request, "because I have a cast, you know." I love the way she continues to inform me as if I could possibly be unaware of the fact.

Weekly Michael

When Ava wants a snuggle, she'll come over to me and plop herself down in my lap. When Michael wants a snuggle he'll ask to be tickled. It's adorable. He'll come over and plop himself down in front of me demanding, "Tickle me Mama!" If he feels my initial tickle was too cursory he'll request, "Tickle me some more Mama." He also uses this as a delaying tactic after all the stories have been read and it is time to climb into bed.

Weekly Procrastination

Hmm... Ava's birthday is in less than three weeks. I should probably plan a party, order a cake, and think about a couple of presents.

Ava's Weekly Home Therapy Focus

This week we've dialed way back. We're taking a break from /k/. Ava's done so well with initial /s/ and /sh/ that we're taking a break in the initial position and just pushing those in final position. We're continuing to work on /l/. We're also testing the waters with s-blends. Specifically we're doing some /sn/ words.

Final S: Free Speech Therapy Articulation Picture Cards

Description

These articulation picture card sets are designed to be more comprehensive than the typical sets you might find elsewhere. The target audience for these sets are young children or children with more severe speech delays that need intensive practice with sounds at a one-syllable level. No blends or vocalic /r/ sounds are included in these sets. (Scroll down to preview set.)

Key Features

• This set includes 30 therapy cards with the target word and picture on the front, and the difficulty level and a carrier phrase on the back.
• The words are all VC or CVC in syllable shape.
• The words are simple and are easily understood by or easily taught to young children.
• Combines the target sound with all possible vowel sounds at least once.
• Words are sorted by difficulty level for an easy progression from easy to hard.

Permissions

I give permission to copy, print, or distribute this card set provided that:

1. Each copy makes clear that I am the document's author.
2. No copies are altered without my express consent.
3. No one makes a profit from these copies.
4. Electronic copies contain a live link back to my original and print copies not for merely personal use contain the URL of my original.

Looking for Feedback

I would love to hear back from anyone who uses this card set. Let me know if you find errors or there is anything you would change. Comment on this page, or send me an email at testyyettrying(at)gmail(dot)com.

Where can I find more?

More sets are on my Free Speech Therapy Articulation Cards page.

Card Sets

To download click on the image to open it full size. Then right click on the image, choose "save as" and save the page to your computer.

I recommend you print on cardstock and laminate for durability.

Why does preschool registration begin in late January?

We just finished registering both children for preschool. Why on earth am I making decisions now about preschool that doesn't begin until August? My daughter is two years old and I am supposed to try and decide how many mornings a week of preschool I think she will be ready for eight months from now. I am just supposed to guess whether or not she'll still be taking an afternoon nap so I can decide if I want to enroll her in the crowded morning sessions or the less crowded afternoon sessions. Sure, I could wait to enroll her, but the program fills up quickly. If I wait, I'll probably lose the opportunity all together.

We decided to play it conservatively. We enrolled both children five mornings a week. We can always change our mind later and decide to only send them three mornings a week, but if we don't reserve all five mornings we won't have the opportunity to increase our number of days after the spots have all filled up.

We decided to move Michael up from the explore classroom (a mix of 3 and 4 year olds who mostly attend part-time) to the discover classroom (a pre-school classroom of 4 year olds who are required to enroll for all five days of the week). I feel like he is getting a little bored at home and wants to spend more of his time with his peers in a social environment. Of course, as soon as I made that decision I began second guessing it. I don't really want him to go all five weekdays. I'd like to have one more year where the three of us (Michael, Ava, and I) have a full day at home together. Still, I remind myself, I can change my mind in the fall.

We decided to enroll Ava at a different school all together. We enrolled Ava at the same school she'll be receiving her IEP speech services from beginning in March. The preschool program there is supposed to be amazing and some of the rooms are co-taught by SLPs. They can just pull her out of her classroom for her speech session which will save me an extra trip twice a week. Of course, as soon as I made that decision I began to wonder if I should have just enrolled her at our local school (Michael's school) for preschool. We know and like the explore room classroom teacher. If we had done that she'd be going to the same school as her brother. I'd just drive her from one school to another two days a week for speech.

All of this would be more straightforward if I weren't forced to make these decisions eight months ahead of time based on information that will be outdated by the fall. What's done is done. Fall will come. Everything will work out. The children will be older and more independent as it should be. I just need to relax and calm the decision anxiety a little.

No-Cook Oatmeal Playdough Treasure Hunt

Today, during our occupational therapy session we made oatmeal play dough. It is a no-cook recipe and requires only three ingredients.

Oatmeal Play Dough Recipe

1/2 cup oatmeal
1 cup flour
1/2 cup water

Step 1
Our purpose in making and playing with the oatmeal playdough is to decrease Ava's tactile sensitivity by having her use her hands with a messy activity. So we began by putting a half cup of oatmeal into a mixing bowl and letting her explore the dry oatmeal with her hands. She enjoyed the oatmeal and took several tastes of the oatmeal.

Step 2
Then we added the cup of flour into the bowl. Again, Ava explored the flour with her hands and tasted it. Then she thoroughly mixed the two dry ingredients with her hand (one hand is in a cast, so we were doing this activity one-handed).

Step 3
Next we poured in the half cup of water. At first we just observed it. We watched the water pool on top for a few minutes and some oatmeal float on the top like tiny boats. We talked about how they would be perfect boats for ants. Then the water was slowly absorbed into the dry ingredients and we began to mix with our fingers. The mix was extremely sticky. This is part of why it makes such a great occupational therapy activity for children who are ready (if your child is still demonstrating extreme tactile defensiveness this isn't the right activity). Once the mixture seemed evenly sticky we removed it from the bowl and started to work with it/play with it on the table. (Note: Over the next 10-15 minutes, the oatmeal continued to absorb the excess water and the texture became much less sticky.)

Step 4
To extend the activity and continue to keep Ava's hand engaged in the dough we played a buried treasure game with the ball of play dough. I took several glass marbles and gems and a penny and hid them inside the play dough. Then Ava would dig around in the play dough to find the treasures.

Overall, the activity went extremely well. The oatmeal play dough has several advantages.

1. It is a no-cook recipe.
2. It is made with a small number of inexpensive, easy to find ingredients.
3. It goes through a variety of textures (dry, wet and sticky, traditional play-dough like).
4. The end product is pretty stiff making it a great medium for increasing hand strength as a bonus.

Revising Our At Home Day

I have observed that when Michael is engaged in a planned activity he is an angel. He is engaged, focused, enthusiastic, and respectful and has a beautiful attention span. When left to his own devices to simply play with the many available toys in his home his behavior starts out fine and spirals downwards towards a hyperactive, attention-seeking, disrespectful mess. I think he is bored. I wish he could independently choose and engage in one of the many activities available to him, but he is just not doing that yet.

Without realizing it, over the past few weeks I have been coping with this behavior by slowly increasing television time to give myself a break. I think it has ultimately been counterproductive. He walks away from the tv even more wound up than before. This week I am going to attempt a detox. We will have little or no tv this week and a significant increase in planned activities.

In order to make the planning manageable I am going to try to hit several types of activities each day: art, physical activity, music, science, reading, and a fine motor focus activity. I will fill in an activity in each of those categories on each at-home day this week.

Today, for example, art is going to be making a collage. I'll give the children scissors, glue, paper, and lots of things to cut and glue onto their paper. This particular art project will be about process rather than product. For a physical activity we will play our run-around-the-circle game (our first floor has a continuous path through all the rooms around a central staircase). I sit in the playroom holding a play golf club about 3-4 inches off the floor and each time they run by they jump over the club. Then to change things up I'll raise it several feet off the floor and they crawl under it. They can keep this up for at least 15 minutes running around the circle a good 30 times. It is great exercise.

For music we will play the piano. For science we are going to try trapping alka seltzer tablets in a small container with a cap and watch the tops pop off. We'll talk about why that happens. We'll have a reading time with as many books as they'll listen to in one sitting. They can usually do that for at least half an hour. For a fine motor activity I'm going to get out the sand on the light box and we'll do a copy the pattern game.

I'm hoping that the plan will keep everyone happily engaged all morning without anyone getting crazy (myself included). Then we'll have lunch followed by nap. Wish me luck.

Pinning Version 2.0

At the beginning of December we did a pushpin activity that was a huge success with the kids. The activity is wonderful because it is a great fine motor activity and allows work on concepts and patterns as well.

I decided to revisit the activity with a cardboard box instead of cork coasters. I took a big cardbox box and taped construction paper to it. I traced simple shapes onto the paper with stencils. Then I gave each child a bowl of pushpins and let them go to it. They loved it. Ava needed help because she was forced to use her left hand. I pushed each pin in halfway for her and then she pushed it the rest of the way. The kids loved the activity and spent at least half an hour the first time we played with it. They've revisited the activity several times since then as well.

Unintended Realism

I wanted to do a volcano experiment at home. We had played around with baking soda and vinegar before, but not in volcano form. I knew the children would really enjoy it. I just wanted to do it in a way that the model could be reused time and time again.

I had a brilliant idea. I took a plastic needlepoint sheet and made a cone out of it. I held it in shape with fishing line. Then I hot glued glass gems all over it and glued the thing into a plastic container. It was all easy to rinse, let dry, and use again.

See...here it is. I thought it turned out pretty well for about an hour of work. Note: Exhibit A

I gathered the vinegar, baking soda, and food coloring and filled a flower vase tube with some baking soda and inserted it into the top of the volcano. Note: Exhibit B

We mixed up some red vinegar and poured it in. It worked beautifully. Note: Exhibit C

I was feeling pretty good about the whole thing. The children were asking to see it again and again. I knew that the whole thing would rinse easily and dry in a couple of hours. I was mentally patting myself on the back.

Then suddenly there was a loud cracking sound and one of the glass gems shot off the side of the mountain. This was quickly followed several more. And then many more. Apparently the baking soda and vinegar reaction was releasing the hot glue. They achieved a pretty surprising distance. I told the children it was like a real volcano shooting out rocks. I suppose the effect of shooting rocks fit the volcano theme rather well. And the children absolutely loved it. But my volcano was disintegrating before my eyes.

And this is what was left. Note: Exhibit D.

Sigh. Any suggestions for a better method of attaching the glass gems?

The Weekly Review: Week 46

This week's weekly review sponsored by:
Injury, Illness, Injury, and more Illness

Weekly Trauma Winner

Coming in with a total score of three, Ava is the clear winner with one late night on-call pediatrician phone call (croup and stridor), one pediatrician office visit (ear infection), and one specialist visit (orthopedist for broken hand).

Weekly Trauma Runner-Up

Coming in a distant second with a total score of one, Michael is the runner-up with one late night on-call pediatrician phone call for suspected head injury symptoms. He does get bonus points for behaving bizarrely enough that I was seriously concerned I had managed to cause a frontal brain injury by slamming a doorknob into his forehead.

Bonus Pictorial Review of Star Illness of the Week - Broken Hand

Lesson learned. (Or - How we called our pediatrician three times in five days and yet managed to miss calling the most important time.)

Let's start this story from the beginning. As I believe I already mentioned, Ava tripped at the play place in the mall Friday night. She fell rather oddly onto her arm and was significantly favoring her right hand. After determining that there was little or no swelling and her fingers seemed to move fine, we decided that a pediatrician call for that incident was unnecessary.

The next day Ava woke up from nap with a croupy cough. That was followed by labored breathing and we made an after-hours call to the pediatrician. A late night dose of steroids obtained from a 24 hour pharmacy saved us a trip to the emergency room. Our sincere thanks went out to the on-call pediatrician.

Monday, I was walking into a room when Michael was walking out and I managed to slam him in the forehead with the doorknob. I hit him hard enough that he fell back onto his butt gasping for breath before the screaming began. I comforted and hugged and felt around the forehead for lumps but found none. I mentally moved on once the crying stopped.

It wasn't until some extremely bizarre behavior began at bedtime that I remembered the bump on the head and became concerned. He was scared and asking to sleep with us (never in his entire life has he been afraid at bedtime - never). He was desperately thirsty and drank so much water that we had to change his clothes twice in a row. Again, very odd. I was worried about some kind of brain injury. Another late night call. We got the same on-call pediatrician. Who knows what she was thinking of us at that point, but she decided at home observation would be adequate. Turns out, he was fine thank goodness.

Yesterday Ava had a fever. She was complaining that her right ear hurt. At least it was during regular office hours this time. We went to the pediatrician and sure enough, she has an ear infection in her right ear. Ten days of antibiotics here we come.

As we were about to leave, I remembered Ava's hand and quickly told our pediatrician the play place story and showed her the bruising on Ava's hand. At this point, all four knuckles have dark bruises and the bruise shows up on the palm of her hand as well.

Our pediatrician took one look and sent us down for an x-ray. Our pediatrician's office is adjacent to the hospital, so at least this trip only involved an elevator ride and walk down a long hallway. She told me to just go home after the x-ray. She would call me and let me know. Well, I told the x-ray technician that we were just going to take off per our pediatrician's advice. He gave me a significant look and asked me to stay just 10 minutes while he made a quick phone call. I knew right then that the x-rays showed something and that he didn't want me to leave until he got a doctor to take a look.

As it turns out, there is at least one and probably two fractures in the bones of her hand. Just give me a parent of the year award. Yes, I let my two year old daughter walk around with a broken hand for five days. I only found out because I mentioned it in passing during the pediatrician visit in which her ear infection was diagnosed.

Here's her x-ray. It's pretty subtle. At least, it is subtle to my completely uneducated eye. But, I'm told there is a fracture. I have learned that it is possible to have a broken bone with no swelling and no restriction in movement. Our pediatrician told me that as soon as I noticed the significant bruising I should have called. Ahh, hindsight.

Later today I'll be setting up an appointment with a pediatric orthopedist. Let the fun and games continue.

Initial S: Free Speech Therapy Articulation Picture Cards

If you like this free S set you might want to check out the comprehensive S Speech Therapy Kit now available in the Testy Shop.

Description

These articulation picture card sets are designed to be more comprehensive than the typical sets you might find elsewhere. The target audience for these sets are young children or children with more severe speech delays that need intensive practice with sounds at a one-syllable level. No blends or vocalic /r/ sounds are included in these sets. (Scroll down to preview set.)

Key Features

• This set includes 30 therapy cards with the target word and picture on the front, and the difficulty level and a carrier phrase on the back.
• The words are all CV or CVC in syllable shape.
• The words are simple and are easily understood by or easily taught to young children.
• Combines the target sound with all possible vowel sounds at least once.
• Words are sorted by difficulty level for an easy progression from easy to hard.

Permissions

I give permission to copy, print, or distribute this card set provided that:

1. Each copy makes clear that I am the document's author.
2. No copies are altered without my express consent.
3. No one makes a profit from these copies.
4. Electronic copies contain a live link back to my original and print copies not for merely personal use contain the URL of my original.

Looking for Feedback

I would love to hear back from anyone who uses this card set. Let me know if you find errors or there is anything you would change. Comment on this page, or send me an email at testyyettrying(at)gmail(dot)com.

Where can I find more?

More sets are on my Free Speech Therapy Articulation Cards page.

Card Sets

To download click on the image to open it full size. Then right click on the image, choose "save as" and save the page to your computer.

I recommend you print on cardstock and laminate for durability.

Apologies and Remorse Serve a Purpose

Before our road trip to LA for the holidays my husband decided to get the oil change the minivan needed. He didn't have time to do it himself, so he took it to the dealer the day before our trip. While he was there, they reminded him about a recall repair that needed to be done and said they could do that too if he was willing to wait an extra hour. He agreed.

Several hours later they were finally done. He maneuvered the van through their lot and came to the driveway of the lot where he needed to stop and wait for a break in traffic before pulling out onto the main road. Simple enough. All drivers stop before pulling into traffic several times each excursion. It should have been simple this time too, except that his brakes didn't work.

After a moment of panic, he managed to pump the breaks enough to stop and then turned right around and went back into the service area of the dealership. And instead of apologizing profusely about how they put his life and the lives of others in danger, they simply said they'd take a look at it as soon as possible.

To make a long story short, he was told that the repairman neglected to "bleed the brakes." I don't really know what that means, but my husband assures me that it is an inexcusable error that resulted in dramatically reduced brake performance.

He never did receive an apology. He just lost additional hours of precious time. Upon hearing the story I was appalled. Their error risked his life and the lives of any vehicle that might have been in his path. We were just lucky that he had to stop to wait for a break in traffic. If he had been able to just pull out, the first time he needed to brake might have been at a busy intersection.

I can't believe they didn't apologize. And then call out a manager and get him or her to apologize. And then ask what they could do to make it up to us. I know we live in a litigious society and to apologize is to insinuate guilt and put yourself and your organization at risk. I'm guessing that is why he didn't receive an apology. However, as a wife who recognizes that her husband's life was endangered, my heart craves an apology. I'm not looking to sue anyone, I just want to see some sincere remorse for such a huge mistake.

Clearly, we'll never return to that dealership. Somehow that doesn't feel like enough though. The incident still lingers in my mind a month later. It pops into my head every time we brake.

Anticipating a Child-Free Evening

My parents offered to take both children overnight Saturday night. My dad picked the children up early and took them swimming. My parents were going to keep the children all day Saturday, overnight, and most of the day Sunday. It was the first child-free time my husband and I had in over two, very stressful months.

Needless to say, my husband and I were very excited. 36 hours of freedom for parents of young children is no small thing. We went to lunch at a restaurant by ourselves. We did a little shopping by ourselves. Then we headed home for the main event. The plan was to get back in touch with our pre-parenthood selves by playing a game. My husband bought Skyrim (big fantasy adventure game) and we planned to stay up until the wee hours of the night playing. Then sleep in and play again the next day until the children came home. I get that many of you might choose another way to celebrate freedom, but we were pretty excited about our plan.

We were about two hours into playing (which is the tip of a very large iceberg) when the phone rang. My mom wanted to let me know that Ava woke up from her afternoon nap with a croupy cough. (Internal dialog: Oh no!!! Please don't let this ruin our night off!) I told her we would bring by a humidifier and some ibuprofen for the night. She told me to just leave them on the porch so that Ava wouldn't see us and ask to come home.

An hour and a half later we stopped playing and gathered the requested items. I called my mom to let her know we were on our way. In a concerned tone, she told me we'd better come in and listen to her ourselves. I knew this was a bad sign. When we walked in to my parents living room I could hear the stridor in Ava's breathing. It was clearly audible with every inhalation even though all she was doing was calmly watching television. You could see her upper chest suck inwards with effort (retraction) at every breath.

It was clear that we would probably need to go to the ER. Again. I wanted to call our pediatrician's office though and see if there was any possible way to avoid the trip. Perhaps we could try an oral steroid first? We gave Ava an ibuprofen and left her at my parents. The stridor always gets worse when she gets upset and making her leave would have upset her. It took me an hour and a half to finally get someone on the phone and talk them into calling in a prescription.

We picked up Ava from my parents house and drove her to the 24 hour pharmacy with us leaving the windows cracked (cool air helps soothe stridor). I got the medicine in her at 8pm and we drove around for two more hours before going home. She was calm in the car and we wanted to give the medicine a chance to kick in before trying to put her to bed. She was in bed at 10:30 and back up at 11:30 panicking during a coughing fit. I calmed her as quickly as possible to minimize the stridor fallout and didn't manage to leave her room until after midnight. She was back up again at 1am and 2:30am. Then, finally, she stayed down until morning.

The next day she still had audible stridor about 50% of the time, but there was no retraction and her mood and energy level were mostly appropriate so we were mostly out of the woods. We avoided the ER trip by the narrowest margin.

Not anywhere close to the 36 hours of child-free time we had been anticipating, but one health crisis narrowly averted so still a win. Is it terrible that I'm wondering if I can convince my parents to give us a make-up weekend?

Update: The Fantastic Flying Books of Morris Lessmore - Free

A few days ago I wrote about an animated short/iPad app called The Fantastic Flying Books of Morris Lessmore. On January 24, 2012 it was nominated for an Oscar. They deserve the nomination and I hope they win.

In honor of the nomination, the animated short is free on iTunes until February 26th (the night of the Oscars). You can watch it for free here. You can also download it in regular or high definition for free to keep on iTunes. Watching this is definitely worth 15 minutes of your time.

I enjoyed reading this article on Morris Lessmore and the nomination. I also enjoyed watching this short video of the team that produced Lessmore waiting to see if they had received the nomination and their subsequent reaction.

How do you know?

We were at the play place at the mall last night. The children were having an amazing time. Michael loved it when a 15 month old baby followed him around trying to give him hugs. Ava was inside a tent like structure with three other girls about her age and appeared to be having a great time. It was idyllic.

Then Ava exited the tent and was running towards us. I think she just wanted to tell us something. First she tripped over one structure. I saw it. She got right back up and continued towards us looking back over her shoulder at the offending structure. So, of course, she stumbled right across the next thing in her path.

She fell with her right arm twisted beneath her. I knew right away that I needed to go to her. This wasn't a wait and see if she shakes it off kind of situation. I was concerned about the arm and shoulder. She was crying and I scooped her up and cradled her in my lap. Often, if the injury is minor, she'll be off again after a short cuddle, but not this time.

She was crying that her hand hurt. In that moment it looked like the area on the top of her hand around the middle two knuckles was swelling up and red. Her fingers weren't moving and quivered a little. I can admit it. I panicked a little. I scooped her up and rushed her over to my husband. Meeting his eyes and giving him a significant look, I told him I thought her hand was -hurt-.

Now when we looked together, I could no longer detect anything that looked like redness or swelling. She was able to tolerate having her fingers wiggled and bent a little. When we asked her to get her shoes, she held one in each hand. I was starting to feel better and a little silly about overreacting.

But then, she didn't go back to playing. And she was favoring the hand. She wouldn't use it to play "high five." She was visibly scared when I tried to hold that hand instead of the other when leaving the mall. She was extremely careful when I unbuckled her from her carseat to take that arm out from the straps of the 5-point harness without bumping the hand at all.

I just wasn't sure what to think. Even with all that it didn't seem like an ER on a Friday night kind of situation. Give some ibuprofen, wait, and observe seemed to be the most prudent choice. I hate the uncertainty though. How do you know how serious something is?

The Weekly Review: Week 45

Ava this Week

Ava had a hidden talent that has recently become quite prominent. She is a born manipulator. She is impressively good. She has started having trouble falling asleep at night. She'll leave her room over and over and over. Sometimes this will go on for 90 minutes and the number of excursions will reach 8-10.

Now, I have a plan. The plan is to not interact with her at all. The plan is to simply pick her up, return her to her bed, tuck her in, and leave the room without even making eye contact.

Well, that sounds great in theory, but Ava knows how to derail that plan. For example, this is how the other night went...

Round 1: First she needed help going to the bathroom. And she actually produces when she's there. It doesn't seem right to just tell her to pee in her pullup.

Round 2: Then she wanted some treasured item she needs to sleep that has been forgotten somewhere in the house. She has about 8 things she cuddles in her bed so inevitably something has been forgotten. She knows how to play it too. Her eyes are wide, her voice trembles, she asks so nicely. I feel like such a grinch not responding to her when all it takes to be responsive it to walk three feet into the next room, pick up the requested item, and hand it to her.

Round 3: Then she'll hear a scary noise. And this time there are some tears and an actual quiver in the voice.

Round 4: Her tag reader pen (which she carries everywhere listening to stories) runs out of batteries.

Round 5 Her tummy hurts. She acts pitiful when delivering this line. Somehow, "I don't care, go to sleep sweetheart" doesn't seem like the appropriate parental response.

and so on...

I am so hoping that this is a brief stage in her development.

The Weekly Michael

The issues with Michael are already becoming more complex. How am I supposed to respond to the following:

"What does stupid mean mama?" (Where did he even hear that word? I certainly don't use it. Must be school.)

"Boys don't like pretty things mama." (I was speechless. I stammered something about Daddy and Grandpa certainly liking pretty things.)

I'm sure this is just a tip of the "big kid issues" iceberg and I don't much like it.

Weekly Home Therapy Focus

We are still working on /s/, /sh/, /f/, /l/, and /k/. /k/ continues to be remarkably stubborn. In fact, it has been worse this week than it was a few weeks ago. /sh/ and /s/ are moderate. /f/ and /l/ are coming along nicely. We're doing those sounds in sets of three (light, light, light) and in pairs where I put out two cards and the same time and she'll say each word with an and in between (light and lamb). We also are practicing those sounds in short 2-3 syllable phrases.

Weekly Song

Sung to the tune of Oh Where, Oh Where Has My Little Dog Gone.

Oh where, oh where did the pm nap go?
Oh where, oh where could it be?
I took care of it and I loved it so,
How could it abandon me?

(It isn't completely gone, but it is going. I'm wondering if Ava's night-time sleep issues might actually be because she doesn't need her nap any more.)

Our Last IFSP Meeting

Our last IFSP meeting was held yesterday morning. To be honest, it was mostly a formality. It was due by January 29th and therefore we had to have a meeting even though Ava will age out of the program in five weeks.

I filled out a few forms about the progress Ava's made and the concerns I still have ahead of time. Our case manager emailed them to me so that we could have a head start at the meeting. We went over the forms and she took our new insurance information (some insurance will reimburse Missouri First Steps for part of their expenses). We agreed to leave Ava's services the same for the next 5 weeks.

I worried and worried and planned and planned before the first IFSP meeting to ultimately feel relieved that it seemed so easy. Then I repeated that experience before the second IFSP meeting. This one just felt a little token.

My focus is moving forward to the transition from early intervention services to school age services. We've qualified and our first IEP has been written. Now we just wait for Ava's birthday to switch. We'll appreciate the last few sessions of OT in our home and our last few sessions of speech with our wonderful early intervention therapists. Then we'll start all over again.

Free Speech Therapy Articulation Cards: Game and Activity Ideas

Speech Therapy Card Activities and Games

Here are some suggestions for fun activities to do and games to play using the free speech therapy articulation card sets (or any other card sets you might be using with young children). They're great for speech therapy, but could also be used for flash cards while studying for a grade school test.

1. Play a matching game. This requires two copies of a set.
2. Play go fish card game. This requires two copies of a set.
3. Play a fishing game. Put a paper clip or a couple of heavy duty staples in each card. Make a fishing pole with a magnet on the end of the line. Turn the cards upside down and have the child "fish" for the cards. Alternately, you could leave the cards face up and ask them to fish out the card you prompt them to find (see levels of prompting).
4. Play bowling. Put cards in clothespins you can stand on end. Line up 3-5 clothespins in a row and have the child say the words pictured on the cards before attempting to "bowl" them down with a small ball.
5. Build a train. Make a train engine and caboose and laminate for durability. Line the cards up in between to build a train. Put a small prize on the caboose like a sticker or cheerio. The child receives the prize when they finish saying all the words pictured on the train.
6. Put cards in a mailbox. Cut a slit in the top of a box or other container to make a "mailbox". Let the children "mail" the cards after completing each card.
7. Play top-bottom puzzles. Cut each card in a card set in half and have the children match the top of each picture to the bottom saying the words as they complete the mini puzzles.
8. Play speech uno. This requires four copies of a set. Take foil stars in four colors (red, green, blue, gold) and put a star of each color on the four cards for each word. (You could also use smiley stickers in four colors, or simply color dots with crayons or markers.) Then play a card game uno-style matching either color or word. The child says the word each time a card is played.
9. Play flashlight hunt. Tape the cards on the wall and turn off the lights. The adult or child shines a flashlight on each card in turn saying the word when the card is illuminated.
10. Play stepping stones. This is recommended only if your cards have been laminated and you have a large space to work in. Place the cards on the floor making a trail. Space the cards so the child has to take a large step to move from one to the next. The child can only move to the next "stone" once they've said the word on their current card.

Note: Keep in mind, you're making a trade off. The more game-like the activity is, the fewer repetitions the child will produce. Particularly with a child who has motor-planning problems, you want to get in as many repetitions as possible in each session. Strike a balance between fun and productivity and try to keep things moving quickly with the focus on many productions no matter which activity you are using. One way to increase the number of productions during an activity is to require multiple repetitions instead of a single production if the child is capable of doing so accurately. So ask for chains of two, three, four, or even five if you can get them. (ex. "pay, pay, pay)

Does anyone have any other games or activities they play while using articulation cards? I'd love to add more ideas to this list. Please leave suggestions in the comments.

Beautiful Distraction

I spent a disturbing amount of time yesterday browsing the Vladstudio website. The website has hundreds of beautiful wallpapers/background (725) and I'm pretty sure I looked at all of them. You can turn the pictures into jigsaw puzzles to play right there on the website. They also have an iphone app which provides 12 puzzles for free and all available puzzles, forever for $1.99.

Here are a few of my favorites:

Magic School Bus and the Earth

We visited my husband's parents in Oklahoma last week. They had a wonderful dry erase easel and the children were having a blast playing with it. The adults were sitting in the living room talking and when we looked up Michael had drawn a picture on the easel that looked just like the following photo except that his was done in carefully chosen colors.

He explained that this was a picture of the earth and showed us the crust, mantle, outer core and inner core and explained that it got hotter as you went further in. I was so proud of my four year old.

I knew exactly where he learned it. He's recently become obsessed with the Magic School Bus books. This is a series of books about a class of children and their teacher who has a magic school bus. The teacher takes the class for field trips in the magic school bus that cover a wide variety of non-fiction topics. His diagram of the earth came from the "Magic School Bus Inside the Volcano" book we had recently gotten from Scholastic Book Clubs. We've read it about 10 times since we got it.

The Magic School Bus books come in three varieties. The original picture books are aimed at ages 4-8ish and include some humor I find inappropriate for my younger children. There are also magic school bus chapter books aimed at older children. The version of the series we like are simpler picture books adapted for younger children by Scholastic. These feature the same set of eight children in each book so the kids get to know the characters. The humor is appropriate for younger children and school and classrooms are treated as fun places to be. You can find several of them on Amazon by searching for "Magic School Bus Scholastic Level 2."

I highly recommend these books. Michael (4) and Ava (almost 3) both really enjoy reading them over and over again and they're learning great facts at the same time.