The biggest news is not really new news, but is just as true as ever. We are so incredibly lucky and blessed to have Anna in our lives. Since Amy was away on her 8th grade class trip, Anna had three hours one-on-one with Sarah. This amount of time that wasn’t straddling two speeds and sets of interests allowed for an incredible activity to take place. I may still be trying to lift my jaw off the floor and find my socks from the next county over.
A goal Anna has been working towards with Sarah is to have Sarah be able to braid her own hair. Sarah loves hospital-related tales, and she loves tigers, no parking signs, Granddad, her bus driver, and musical notes. Anna used cardboard to create a tiger version of Sarah, complete with yarn and shoelace hair, and of course wearing a pair of glasses. The tiger has front paws that are hinged at the elbow! Then Anna called to Sarah, something along the lines of “doctor, the patient needs a scan but her hair is in the way! Quick, come braid it!” Anna used the names of things and people that Sarah loves to label clothespins, coaching Sarah to attach a clothespin to each of three sections of hair. With the tiger lying flat, each section of hair and corresponding clothespin was atop a white board with three circles. The circle in the center had a musical note drawn in it. This allowed Anna to verbally coach Sarah, “lift Granddad up and move him to the musical note, and move your bus driver to the right.” Once the “hair” was braided, they worked together to put a scrunchie in place. This whole scenario was incredibly creative, blending skills and finger strength with so many things that Sarah loves. To make it so almost everything could be described easily and clearly with verbal cues and making the whole thing fun just knocked my socks right off!
Amy loved her 8th grade class trip to the New River Gorge. They were away for two nights. Luckily for the main day when they went rafting it was not cold and rainy, as it has been seemingly all the time lately. She had a great time with her friends and even managed to nap on the bus for a bit. She only allows herself to nap if she is in a moving vehicle, so yesterday as we drove to Baltimore she had several more naps. Meanwhile, Sarah doesn’t nap at all in cars but can take three naps on a normal Saturday. As I write, Sarah is heading into her first nap of the day while Amy has yet to start the day.
We went to Baltimore for a memorial service for a family member that I wish I had known better. There were many beautiful memories that people shared, and it was good to see some family that I hadn’t seen for ten years.
Sarah particularly loved the grandfather clock at the funeral home. She spent many minutes happily standing by the clock and watching the pendulum. After the service we drove to Washington DC because Carl has a rowing race there today. The girls and I have some ideas for what we will do with our time but we also want to keep it flexible. Sarah definitely reached her internal processing limit a few times yesterday. There was a lot to take in. I want to keep today easy for both of us since we very often feed off of each other’s stress.
Earlier in the week we watched some Frog and Toad episodes. I really noticed how patient and unphased Frog is so much of the time, no matter what Toad is going through. I want to be more like Frog, but truly I am more like Toad and easily frustrated. Luckily Carl is more like Frog and can help us all recalibrate.
Wishing us all someone as creative as Anna and as calm and flexible as Carl or Frog to help us reach our goals. I need to be coached about moving my stress-overload clothespin out of the way so my relaxed-book-reading-clothespin can move to the center!
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