Breakfast with Santa Claus

Reiss, Milla, and Daddy at one of the craft tables. They made little reindeer ornaments with popsicle sticks, pipe cleaners, and googley eyes.

Reiss getting ready to tell Santa Claus to bring him a Colts shirt, please - with buttons! We're still trying to figure that one out.

Reiss surprised us with his willingness to sit on Santa's lap. Milla wasn't having any of it!

Another surprise.....Reiss not only did not throw a fit about the horse, he was very willing to check him out and even give him a little pat. If I sound pessimistic, I don't mean to. I'm just going by most of our experiences with animals. Reiss and Milla are both terrified of most animals - even Grandma's chihuahua. In their defense though, Grandma's chihuahua is yippity-yappy and more hyper than Reiss doped up on candy bars.

Dancer and his merry red-painted hooves. This was the last photo I took before we all went on a very, very chilly carriage ride.

Yesterday was our breakfast with Santa Claus. The event was held at a church not far from our house and was sponsored by our county's autism support group. Although we had to take our own food in order to be able to stick to eating GFCF, it was nice to be around others who "get it."

No one around to point, stare, and whisper if our children began having an all-out meltdown over something as trivial as a drop of water getting on their shirt or having to have the food wiped from their faces (as was the case with us). Really, I'm not prejudiced against people who only have typical children but I do get tired of the looks we receive. If pointing and staring at children like mine is the example these parents are setting for their own children, it's no wonder why their kids grow up to be the ones who bully kids like mine once they are in school.

I will not go off on that tangent though. This is supposed to be a positive post!

Reiss and Milla got to eat breakfast at a table decorated with Christmas decor and marshmallows for snow, work on crafts, see Santa Claus, use bathrooms away from home (which is the whole reason we went there, right?), and take a carriage ride. It was incredibly cold yesterday but fun was had by all. Other than the mouth-wiping incident, I would say it was one of our best outings in quite some time.

Things Are Better Than I Make Them Sound

First things, first.

Celeste Jean, if you are reading, I have emailed you to request your mailing address for your Betty Crocker prize pack to be sent to you. If you're like me, you may get a lotta, lot of email and perhaps did not see my message, so I wanted to bring it to your attention on here.

We did not get to do the adorable marshmallow craft pictured below this morning because I am a slacker mommy. I was going to go to the craft store last night to get the styrofoam ring to make it and noticed that I didn't have any marshmallows either. I could have just sworn I had a bag of the large kind in the pantry but alas, none, and I didn't want to make two separate stops last night. So, going to the craft store and getting marshmallows at the grocery are both on the list of to-do errands this weekend. Maybe we can save this project for a craft-time activity for Monday.

This week has been a challenging week. Dealing with this autism thing day in and day out, one would think I would get used to some of the more annoying behaviors and just let them roll off - and really, sometimes I do.

However, this week and over the past two or three weeks now I have heard the question "What's gonna happen if I close the gate while I'm on the brown?" probably no less than 422,000 times. See, Reiss knows how to open the gate at the top of the stairs but we keep it there so that Milla doesn't fall down the stairs. Reiss is welcome to let himself through the gate and to the stairs going to the basement whenever he wants. Too often though, he will open the gate, stand on the top step (which is brown, hence, "the brown") and try to close the gate behind him, all while asking that question....the question that I am just certain if I hear it one more time, steam will come barreling out of my ears or nose or mouth or all three combined.

When I tried to express my frustration on facebook about this, I got the typical phrase all parents of children with autism just love to hear: "Oh, that's normal. All kids do that." Well, that wasn't exactly what was told to me but that was the jist of it and any parent in this position knows that this kind of behavior is not normal. If I had a dime for every time I've heard the "All kids do that....blah, blah, blah." Whatever....come walk in my shoes for a day and you will know what I'm talking about.

Yes, all typical kids will ask questions over and over. For example, "Can I have ________, please? Pleeeeeaaaase? I promise, promise, promise I'll be good." And that's what the parent may hear several times in one day. If you're one of these people, seriously, tell me, when was the last time your typical child asked you the same question three-hundred, four-hundred, or even more times in one day? And yes, I am being literal. Those numbers are no exaggeration.

If I sound like I'm complaining, well, maybe I am and this is my blog so I'll do what I want. Call it what you will but I have the right just like anyone else to vent now and then. And don't even get me started on the petty little complaints on some of my facebook friends' pages to the likes of "Oh, poor me. I'm so tired. I need a nap." from people who don't even have kids, much less a kid with autism. I really just want to tell them to suck it up and that they don't know the first thing about exhaustion. Ask any parent about exhaustion and I bet close to 100% will say they never knew the true meaning of exhaustion until they had kids. And that's saying a lot coming from me, someone who was in the military, someone who knows what it's like to get up at 4am, go to PT and then train all day long for an eighteen to twenty hour day.

Blah, blah, blah.....blah.....blah, blah, blah!!!

Yes, I am very frustrated this week.

Guess what Milla's thing is right now? She likes to take her pull-up off and get a new one every few minutes. By 11 am this morning, she had changed her pull-up no less than fifteen times. Keep in mind, that is only about two hours that she had time to do it too, because she woke up a little before 8am and her speech therapist was here for an hour. She did not pull off her pull-up any while the ST was here so that only leaves about two hours - or an average of a new pull-up about every eight minutes. Good times.......

On a more positive note, we are going to have breakfast with Santa this weekend. We have to take our own food, because although it is sponsored by an autism support group, many of the parents do not use any special diets for treating their child's autism and the food there will be traditional fare, almost certain to contain all kinds of gluten and casein. I am happy to have friends who also eat gluten-free and casein-free who will be in attendance. There's nothing I hate more than being the freaks wherever we go because we don't eat things others do. I'm starting to think this must be how people feel who eat a raw diet or vegan or both.

It will also be interesting to see the kids' reactions to Santa and if they will go near him. Hopefully, I will not forget the camera. Let's hope I have something pleasant to photograph.

And another positive....Reiss pooped on the potty last night!!! Something that has not happened much as of late. Just when we think we have his "currency" figured out to bribe him to poop on the potty, he switches things up on us and his currency turns to something else that we can't figure out and the old currency is worthless. Right now, chocolate candy bars are out. "Bugs" are in. Bugs are gummy fruit snacks, such as the Betty Crocker Create-a-Bug snacks I recently reviewed. We also buy the Annie's bunnies, but wow, are they expensive!

Well, I'm sure no one came here to read me complain about everything under the sun and since I'm not having the greatest week or looking at things with the best perspective....Toodles!

Until next time...

Mmmmm.....What IS That Smell?

Yesterday began the official first day of our bathroom remodel. It was supposed to happen a few weeks ago (and would probably be done by now!) but lo and behold, our contractor's mother passed away and he was put behind schedule. Although I can be a very compassionate person, words fail me when I try to convey such a trait. So if I sound callous, I'm not. I just don't know how to word things to say what I mean. Our contractor's mother died. He got behind schedule. Those are the facts and I feel for his pain.....I just don't know how to word it to give that perception.

So anyway, yesterday, he and his workers began demolition of our bathroom. They came back today and did more of the "dirty" demolition work, as in, ripping out the shower and the toilet. The reason we are doing the bathroom remodel in the first place is because the shower was leaking into the finished part of our basement. Typically, that's not a reason to replace an entire bathroom but you haven't seen my bathroom.

We have known for awhile that we want to remodel the bathroom but we are not exactly instant gratification kind of people. More often, we do things as we have extra funds to do them and make the best of things while waiting. Our bathroom was one of those things that we had on the radar for maybe next year or the year after. Our bathroom had other plans. So rather than have workers come in and only fix the existing problem, we would prefer to have them do everything all at one time - you know, so we have our bathroom out of commission only one time instead of two times (once now and once again on down the road when we were really ready to do all of it).

Our guys arrived just as I was leaving to go get Reiss from preschool. I spoke briefly with them and then headed out with Milla to go get Reiss. We picked him up in pouring rain. That's the trade-off I get for not allowing Reiss to ride the bus: sometimes I have to get soaked in the rain or snowed on or whatever. Inclement weather is not my friend but for now, I'll take it over Reiss riding the bus. Call me over-protective but he is my first and he's only four years old and I've seen the way some of the bus drivers drive around here. After getting Reiss, we then took James lunch and hung out for awhile. James is his own boss so his boss doesn't mind too much when the office becomes a zoo/daycare on Friday afternoons.

When we arrived home again, the men were carrying bucket after bucket full of demolished bathroom walls, shower tiles, and flooring. The smell of raw sewage smacked me in the face like a dump truck. Now occasionally I have been in that bathroom and smelled a horrible smell and when I told our contractor about this on a previous occasion (when he was here doing another project), he explained the "trap" system in bathroom drains and all that and how gases (is that spelled correctly?) get built up and blah, blah, blah. Don't expect me to explain because I just went with what he was saying. Anyway, I knew there had to be more to it than that and when we began seeing the water stains on the ceiling downstairs, that was proof there really was a problem and that the smell wasn't just gas build up in the pipes.

I walked back to the bathroom and while doing so, the smell got stronger and stronger until I was on the verge of vomiting. And for good reason. One look at the demolished bathroom was all it took for me to find that it was not just raw sewage gas I was smelling all along. There was mold buildup from here to Utah in that darn shower! We knew it had been leaking but nothing could prepare me for this mess......there was mold all over the place. Horrible! Horrible! Horrible!

Even now, as I sit here with most of the demolition mess cleaned up, the crew gone, and that back bedroom closed up, our house still smells like the refreshing smell of poop raw sewage. The ceiling fans are on. Candles are lit. Thank goodness, it's getting to be Fall and cool outside, right? Oh, it's just disgusting but with the candles lit, pretty soon it will smell like blueberry muffins and raw sewage. So I guess I'm okay.

Now, the real decision....do I dare have all the moms and their kids over next Thursday for the coffee chat and playgroup I've been planning for weeks now? Or cancel? I had planned on coffee and donuts. Maybe I could still have it and just avoid buying any chocolate eclairs......

Donuts at Daycare!!!

Seriously...what is this world coming to???

I have a very good friend who works outside the home and her son stays at a very reputable and widely known private, non-franchised childcare facility in our area. Like me, my friend is quite the planner and researcher when it comes to delving into any new adventure. For example, being the responsible person she is, she began interviewing childcare providers well before her due date when she was pregnant, even while knowing that she would be home with her son for twelve weeks before returning to work and putting him in the care of others.

As my friend did her research for a suitable provider, she would tell me stories about the different facilities she had visited and questions she had asked of the providers themselves. From what she told me, I honestly think she made the very best choice from all that were available. All of this was done around a year and a half ago, as her son is the same age as my daughter - sixteen months.

My friend, I'm going to call her "S," is a registered dietician with a Master's degree (in Dietary Science or whatever it's called). She is one of those people who is conscious of what she puts in her body but not overly picky like some people where you would never see them eating anything considered unhealthy. No, S is one of those fun people who practices healthy habits but also knows that an occasional indulgence never really hurt anyone.

Just like my family has been doing, S has been trying to be even more conscious regarding her family's nutrition and their consumption of organic foods. Although the childcare facility where her son goes provides snacks for the children, S has been sending healthier snacks with her son and specific instructions to feed him the aforementioned snacks. However, recently her son's daily reports (I'm sure there's probably a specific name for these reports but I don't know what it is) have indicated that he is being given the same snacks as the other children: vanilla wafers, Crunch Berries, and a few others that I don't remember right now. Um...let's see here, that equals sugar, sugar, artificial food dyes, preservatives and who knows what else. I don't know because I do not buy those things and haven't looked at any of the boxes for quite awhile now.

S has spoken to the childcare providers about her son not receiving the snacks she sends with him. However, understandably so, she is in fear of being "that parent." You know the one...the parent who makes a fuss about everything - or at least, "everything" in the eyes of the person on the receiving end. I am "that parent" - I know, because I see the looks when I go to a restaurant and ask, "Does that have gluten in it?" or when we go to the doctor or dentist and I say, "I don't really want my son to even be on a prescription but if it's absolutely necessary, it needs to be gluten-free, casein-free, soy-free, dye-free and have no artificial sweeteners." I've seen the looks...people start getting this glazed over look and right then you know that whatever you are telling them is being totally lost somewhere in the deep recesses of their heads.

Speaking of "glazed over," you can imagine S's shock when she walked into the childcare facility one day to pick up her son - or maybe it was a visit, I'm not sure of the specific details of why she was there at snacktime - and the providers were slicing up yeast donuts to give to the children for their snack. Yes, you read that right: DONUTS!!! For. their. SNACK.

Let me clarify something here: I am not one of those parents who never lets my child have any sort of treats. Nor am I a parent who waited until my children were "X" (you fill in the blank with the desired number) years old before they were given something containing sugar or anything so incredibly stringent as those sorts of dietary rules. Yes, I know a few moms who have said their four-year-old has never had a cupcake......yet they will sit there and give them fruit leathers because they're "nutritious" or raisins by the handful. I'm not going to debate that either of those things don't have plenty of vitamins in them, but where I see the problem is that they contain just as much, if not more, sugars in them as a cupcake. The only difference being that the cupcake most likely has refined sugars in it - unless, of course, I am the one who made it using a reformulated recipe to include honey or agave nectar as the sweetener - whereas the sugars in the fruit leather and raisins are naturally occuring. But I'm getting off-track here.....what's new, right? Anyway, the point of this is that I am not an uptight grinch when it comes to my children having sweets and treats. I do allow them - they just have to meet a few requirements.

So back to S and her predicament....

These childcare workers were cutting up donuts to give to the children. Please, please, pleeeeaaaase tell me that S and I are not the only ones who see a major problem with this! First, we are talking about 16-month-old children being given donuts...for...their...snack! That is their snack? Hellooooo??? By the time snacktime rolls around, these children are probably pretty good and hungry. Is a yeast donut really the best thing to be giving a child with an empty stomach? All that sugar is going to go straight into the bloodstream and forget about the lack of health benefits here, it's the next stage of events that would worry me if I was one of the childcare providers. Seriously, who wants to be in a room full of toddlers all hopped up with a sugar rush from donuts? With that many toddlers bouncing off the walls, you may as well go to one of those indoor bounce house places at 7PM on a Friday evening when the kids are all fed and happy and just getting started on the bouncers.

S and I only spoke very briefly about this so I don't have many details but I have to wonder about a few things. For instance, do the parents of the children receive bad (or at least, not as good) daily reports on the days when the children have been given donuts? And if so, have any of the employees made this connection? It seems obvious to me, but then, I'm on the outside looking in. What sort of person would even think giving a toddler a donut for a snack is nutritious? I know that S can't possibly be the only one concerned about this, so are the other parents unaware of what their children are eating or just afraid to speak up? If this kind of thing is acceptable at one of the best facilities around, then what in the world is going on inside the not-so-great ones? Again, I do give my kids treats but let's save the donuts for a time when it is either considered a treat, or perhaps, as part of a weekend breakfast meal and there is also protein and some sort of fresh produce that must be eaten in order to earn the donut.

This situation just reminds me of how fortunate I am to be a stay-at-home mom. No worries about my kids eating things I don't want them to have. No awkward confrontations with people who think I'm being picky about how they are caring for my child. No worrying about whether my instructions for my child are being carried out. Aaaahhh...it's good to just be a mom even if it does mean wanting to pull my hair out some days.

Wow...All of this writing has got me hungry for a late night snack. Now where in the freezer did I hide that last GFCF donut?!?