Square one, again.

Girlie went to social skills class today for the first time in a few months.  It’s been a real help, but the classes are expensive and social skills are not covered by any kind of benefit – strictly cash out of pocket.  The classes are nowhere near as expensive as some types of therapies and treatments, so I’m not complaining very loudly; I know of folks who’ve taken second mortgages to pay for autism-related therapies!  Anyway, Girlie is happy to be back because, not only does she enjoy the teacher and classes, she has a friend who goes there and we were able to arrange for the two girls to be in the same class. 

Boyo has begun rehearsals for two recital pieces; both ballet classes he is in will perform in February.  That means rehearsal time in addition to the regular classes. Seems like we were doing something like this only last month…

Today I began the official process of going back to work outside the home.  I’m fairly confident about this effort because I am known to the agency as I work a few hours a month in an associated organization (but that work is mostly done from home).  At an interview today we discussed working a few hours a week on a volunteer basis and already are hoping to expand the hours as soon as I feel ready.  Who knows, maybe by the time I feel comfortable with being away from home for more hours of the day, a paid position will open.  If nothing else, I’ll be bringing my résumé completely up to date in preparation for future employment prospects. 

So, in many respects, we are back to square one.  We’re all in for an adjustment period but I feel very strongly that I’m making the right choice for myself in consideration of my family. 

In November I went on a special trip with my friend Rhondi and bought some yarn I couldn’t resist.  With no practical thoughts whatsoever, I knitted something that no one I know could use.  First of all, I have suspected for a long time that I am sensitive to mohair if it’s around my face.  Secondly, I don’t wear cowls and I don’t know anyone who does except in the very rare case of severe winter weather.  Did I let that stop me?  No, in fact I allowed myself to be completely pulled in by the yarn, and knitted it anyway.  Photos don’t do it justice, it really was beautiful!

See the glints of sparkle? It's hand-dyed Sparkling Kid Mohair
from Fancy Image Yarn knitted with Cascade 220 Heathers.

I admired the finished cowl for a couple days before ‘frogging’ (unraveling) it and soaking the kinks out of the hank.  Back to square one!  

Notice 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid' - that was truly a coincidence.
Clearly I am not wimpy when it comes to unraveling hours
of knitting and hundreds of yards of yarn!  :-)

After winding the yarn into a hank, I put it
to soak for a while to relax the kinks out.

Granddaughter modeling her hat to humor Grandma

After a few days of drying, the yarn was knitted up into something it should have been in the first place: a sparkly, pretty, warm hat in the perfect color for a dark-haired, dark-eyed, (sleepy!) girl. (It looks pretty cute on her mommy, too!)  ♥

Love

Possibly the most often written about subject in history… and for some reason until a few years ago I really didn’t understand it.

The jewelry industry would have us believe that we fall in love and live happily ever after, as long as we continue to buy diamonds.  The candy companies imply that love can best be expressed with chocolate (OK, that is at least partially true, especially if it includes caramel!).  Hallmark seems to think that all mothers are perfect, and everyone knows that red roses symbolize love.  For parents, love is automatic.  Right?

No.  In fact, love is not a feeling and it is not an emotion.  Love is a choice and a commitment that has to be made and reaffirmed, often (as in the case of parenting children with challenges) many more times than one would ever have thought possible. 

Believing this has helped me understand that it’s all right to feel frustrated and angry occasionally.  It’s expected that I might be repulsed by behaviors.  It’s understandable that sometimes I feel like I’ve failed.  Those are the times I need to remember to love myself, and then re-commit to the choice I made to love another.

From time to time I have to re-commit to a knitting project.  Even when I’ve made a good match of yarn and pattern, I get tired of knitting at a particular gauge for a long time and need to switch to working on a project with bigger or smaller needles to prevent repetitive stress injury.  Other times I find I need or want to start a new project before finishing the one I’m knitting.  Either way, a project is languishing through no fault of its own.   I hardly ever have more than three or four ‘live’ projects at a time now, and occasionally I’ll use a new pattern or yarn as incentive to get something finished up.  When I finish this little throw blanket, I’m going to love it.  Unless, of course, it’s August…

KnitPicks Wool of the Andes Bulky on US 9 'Harmony' needles.

Accommodations

Accommodations:

1. The act of accommodating or the state of being accommodated; adjustment.

2. Something that meets a need; a convenience.

I’m going to address IEP accommodations purely from a parental point of view.  It’s a word one hears frequently in relation to IEPs and educating kids with special needs.  My familiarity with ‘the system’ stands me in pretty good stead, I think, and we have asked for – and gotten – some great accommodations for Girlie.  However, I think it’s really important to bear in mind that the world, in general, is NOT going to make accommodations for our daughter.

Sadly, I get the impression that Dearest and I are in the minority sometimes when it comes to our involvement in Girlie’s education program.  We do not expect the school district to implement something that would be ideal for Girlie if it would interfere with the education of twenty-five other kids.  We do not expect the teacher to keep her in the classroom if she is a disruption and a distraction (which, thankfully, is rarely the case any more).

It’s important to note that just because IDEA gives us the right to ask for accommodations for our children with challenges, it does not give us the right to demand special treatment that would create a detrimental learning environment for other students.  My responsibility as a parent is to do my best to raise children who are as competent as possible, and prepared to live in a society that, for the most part, expects them to get along as best they can.

Notice the second part of the definition of accommodation: ‘a convenience’.  Yes, there have been times when we could have made some very convenient changes for Girlie’s school day.  What would have been the advantage, in the end?  The most important thing is for her to learn how to make accommodations for the way real life interferes with her needs and expectations, not the other way around.  If Girlie grows up knowing how to be flexible in exercising her rights and practical in asking for accommodations, we will feel very successful!

Merino sheep - Wikipedia

One of the happiest discoveries I’ve made as a knitter is the wonderful accommodating properties of wool.  I don’t know how wool got such a bad rap in the first place; I’m not the only person who automatically thought of itchy wool sweaters, right?  Because there are many varieties of sheep, there are many varieties of wool, and each has its place.  It’s quite true there are some types of wool that are not ideal for sweaters or next-to-the-skin garments; those can be very suitable for outerwear and felted wool items.  There are other varieties, merino probably being best known, that are very soft and fine.  All wool has amazing insulating and moisture wicking abilities, making it my first-choice fiber.  Pointy sticks and wool: doesn't take much to make me happy!

Resources

Since we recently updated Girlie’s IEP it seems like a good time to talk about resources.  We’re very fortunate to have had plenty of opportunities for educating ourselves, online and in person, to become better advocates for our kids.  If you have a child with an IEP or Section 504 plan, and have not already done so, I strongly recommend reading about what those programs are and are not intended to do.  I can’t emphasize the importance of this enough, as one’s ability to advocate effectively for a child is directly affected by one’s knowledge of the programs and how they can be used to design a tailor-made plan.  Because you, presumably, are the expert on your child, your input in cooperation with the educational experts is the best way to come up with an optimal plan.  Please do not underestimate the importance of your involvement!

A great website for information and articles related to Asperger’s syndrome, autism, and Pervasive Development Disorder / Not Otherwise Specified (PDD/NOS) and challenges common to both children and adults, OASIS has provided a calm in the midst of my storm on more than one occasion.

CHADD is an excellent source of information for children and adults with ADD/ADHD.

SparkTop has been around for quite a while, and is a great website for ‘kids who learn differently’.  There are games specially designed to meet the needs of different challenges, as well as creative online activities.  The site was originally created by Schwab Learning, a program of the Charles (of the financial world) and Helen Schwab foundation.

Knitting two socks at once, toe up, on two circular needles. Just an example
of the information you can find easily from online tutorials and videos!

Anyone who is looking for knitting help can find assistance from the basics to advanced techniques, with excellent video support, at Knittinghelp.com.  This is the site where my oldest daughter and I spent the most time when we started knitting in 2008.  Of course, my favorite knitting-related time sink now is Ravelry, which is a huge source of free and for-purchase patterns for knitting and crocheting, as well as support for spinners and weavers, and a comprehensive and up-to-date database of yarn.  Not to mention, a fun place to drop into a forum and chat!

If you're feeling overwhelmed by the amount of information available, and unsure of the reliability of information you find online, don't hesitate to ask someone who's been there.  Pretty soon, you'll find the information that works the best for your family's needs... and pass it on!

The party's over...

…and I can’t say I’m sorry!  The kids are off to school, back into the routine (with a helpful new aspect in the case of Girlie’s schedule), to the comfortable, dependable rut.  This week will bring the return to piano and ballet for Boyo and social skills classes for Girlie, which she has been out of since the beginning of fall since our schedule gets crazy around The Nutcracker season.

Girlie got a bead weaving loom for Christmas and seems to be enjoying learning a new craft.  This is encouraging, because she doesn’t tend to be interested in doing much, other than reading, coloring, or playing video games.  I’m hoping this might develop into an expandable creative outlet, and we enjoyed looking at beads online and ordering a couple more assortments.  Boyo received more drawing pens and a Zentangle book, which has been holding his attention for several minutes at a time.

Dearest and I are thinking about his upcoming vacation bid and considering what worked and what didn’t, as far as the time off that was scheduled in 2011.  We’re also thinking about arranging for a long-overdue night away from the kids sometime later this winter or in the spring, and I have embraced the notion of going back to work on a part-time basis – most likely in a volunteer capacity, considering the current shortage of available jobs. 

Later this month I’ll be going on a special ‘Seattle to Portland Yarn Train’ trip with my oldest daughter, a few friends, and well over a hundred other like-minded individuals.  It’s a real stretch of my comfort zone but it sounds so inclusive and fun: knitting and visiting with friends on the train, shopping a few great yarn stores in Portland, and a visit to Powell’s Books!

Dearest finally got a heater for his garage and has been going out most evenings to work on restoring a Honda Trail 90; something he has wanted to do for over a year.  The fact that he and I both feel comfortable with the thought of him going out to the garage in the evening is an indication of how stable things are in the house.

All is well, all is well.  We’re feeling pretty grateful right about now.

Plugged in...

I tried in vain to resist immersing the two younger kids in unnecessary electronics and technology.  I just kept thinking about traveling with the two older kids and how they would play word games, or look out the window, or actually have conversations with us or each other.  I think I finally gave up and got our first portable DVD player when Boyo was about five, and we were on the verge of refusing to go anywhere more than about 10 miles from home – about as much car trip as he could handle without pushing Girlie to meltdown point, and Dearest and I to the limits of our tolerance.  Occasionally he’d work himself up to being carsick.  Sometimes he even gets too agitated out of a sense of competition when we play ‘I Spy’ for random things we might see along the way!

Of course we don’t know exactly what’s going on in his head, but traveling makes him anxious anyway, and I think seeing all the visual input outside our van is overwhelming.  It’s nice when we can point out something – he loves spotting unusual birds or deer, for instance – but then he can go right back to watching the movie or playing his game and not think about the trip.  Girlie doesn’t have any real difficulties with travel, for the most part, and she’s just as happy to read a book if we’re traveling in daylight.  In fact, it’s only been recently they’ve stopped asking me to read aloud; I read “Kildee House” (Rutherford G. Montgomery, 1949) on the way home from Sacramento in 2009 – about 11 hours of reading with a couple short breaks – and didn’t want to speak for several days afterward.  But what great memories we all have of that trip!

From what I understand, it's common for kids with similar challenges to use games, movies, or mp3 players to help stay calm.  I admit it was a hard thing to come to terms with, maybe especially because I’m an older parent and we didn’t need any of these newfangled things back in my day!  :-) I think when we use the tools carefully, they have their place and serve a great purpose.  During our trips we ‘check in’ with the kids; ask them to pause, have a bit of conversation, point out a landmark or two, answer their questions about where we are and how much longer the trip will last, and then let them get back to being plugged in.  As for me, if I’m not knitting, I’ll just read a book… lemme just make sure it’s fully charged...

My nook color - which I love - in a knitted and felted cover I made, using the framework of a hardback book with about half the pages removed.  

Beginnings.

Recently, Girlie had her three-year academic re-evaluation and her Individualized Education Program (IEP) was updated at the same time.  There are only two people on her team who’ve been with her since the beginning (10 years, including preschool!): myself and her occupational therapist (who, incidentally, happens to have become a great friend and knitting buddy).  Sometimes during these meetings the OT and I talk about how much progress Girlie has made, and tell stories about past behaviors and challenges.  These anecdotes can be quite surprising to teachers and staff who may have only known Girlie for a few months, or maybe a year.  I think it’s good for them to have some perspective, and maybe help them see Girlie with a more realistic sense of her accomplishments.  I honestly believe there have been teachers who’ve gained respect for her after hearing some of the old tales.

The result of the meeting was quite satisfactory and Girlie will start the new year with what we think will be a less stressful schedule for her, and include a little more help in organizing her school work.  Now if we can just get Boyo to buy in to some of the methods we know will work… it can be so difficult for him to let go of the ODD behavior (even if it sounds like a good idea, it’s coming from parents and must. be. opposed), and his anxiety works against him here because he can be very fearful of change.

So - beginnings, fresh starts, new things, organization: must be talking about the New Year!  I don’t make resolutions because I recognize that, for me, it is likely I will get carried away with a new item/activity/method and then let it slide as soon as the novelty wears off.  True story.  However, I did start walking a couple years ago, and because I have chronic injuries and an autoimmune inflammatory disorder, walking is a great and very ‘do-able’ exercise for me. Family and friends know that knitting is about the only way I can tolerate the treadmill tedium, and due to an injury to both ankles a couple years ago I’m better off walking on the treadmill than on the uneven rural roads where we live.  So, I knit easy things and listen to an audio book while I walk.  Things like dishcloths, washcloths, handwarmers, hats, and the like are perfect projects and I think there are still a few family members who can use an item or two on that list!

Simple handwarmers, perfect for knitting while
on the treadmill, and wearing when I walk outside!

I wish for you that 2012 will be a year of finding wellness in whatever aspect of your life it's needed most!