Autism Clothing (and other merchandise)

Found an amazing online shop today www.cafepress.com.au   .  I ordered some "palaeontologist in training" clothes for Jamie for his upcoming 9th birthday, but then today I looked at all their autism products!  OMG!  Amazing amazing statemtents and info on all their clothing etc.  I think I will definitely get the "I love someone with autism" shirt for me and the "I love my autistic brother" shirt for baby Henry, but am still deciding if it is appropriate for Jamie to wear something....or maybe I will get him a bag or something else.  I especially liked the slogan Always Unique Totally Interesting Sometimes Mysterious (AUTISM) - (something like that anyway)..  And the Autistic Today, Genius Tomorrow and the I have Autism, What's Your Problem or the Eye Contact is Over-rated or the list of famous people with autism..and I could go on and on!!!
Enjoy.
Amanda

Recent catch up

Just a belated thank you to all the lovelies that came along to our last catch-up. It was a couple of weeks ago on Wednesday 31st March, seven of us made it on a windy Busselton day!.....Plus my Mother-in-law, who was brilliant at keeping Griffin occupied so I could have a decent chin-wag (well done Janice!)

Great to meet Jacky for the first time, welcome hun! And a big thanks to Carol from DSC for popping by for a chat, as always, you're such a great support and we love having you....always such a wealth of knowledge!!

Will email you all very soon with an update on how our fundraiser went, have to say we are all very clever and did a brilliant job all round - thanks for all your hard work, hope you didnt all consume as much chocolate as I did!

Hope to set a date for our next get together soon, probably for the second or third week of term, lets all settle back into routine first eh! Would also like earmark a weekend gathering sometime this term....to get the kids together and start helping them along with some extra social networking! I was contacted recently by a new family who are keen to expose thier child to safe, friendly social opportunities, which reminded me we should really involve our school-age kids a bit more. Should be fun, might take a little more thought & planning of course!

Take care people, looking forward to catching up with you all again soon.

Cheers
Deb

Holidays

Hi All,

Thought I'll let you know of our exciting news. We are heading over east to Adelaide for our once a year holiday.  This is the first holiday where we will be traveling around without a real destination.  Kyle has always struggled with holidays and so we've stuck to the one place for the one holiday. But so far with careful planning, Kyle is excited and coping well. Thanks Felicity. He has been helping getting ready and been very interested in the whole affair. Something that's been good for our hearts. We'll see if I survive with 4 kids in the car for countless kms. Oh well all part of the fun.

So till we meet again, take care and may you all enjoy your holidays.

Elaine

Back to the Blog!

Hello all,

Its been pretty quiet in here lately, we've all been so busy with the new school year and settling back in to life after the chaos of the long school holiday break. So welcome back!

Our fundraiser is in full swing and has been blitzing! A few clever ladies have been selling them like hotcakes and comming back for more, thanks so much to everyone for putting in so much effort, it looks like we will raise several hundred dollars towards our library. Will let you all know the final figure in a couple of weeks when we have sold through.

How have all the kids settled back into school? We have our case conference/IEP next week and will have plenty to talk about. Grace's anxiety has been in full-swing and her teacher reports several challenges every week. I had been optimistic she would go really well this year as she surprised me with how well she coped with pre-primary last year, so my heart is sad for my little lady lately. Some of this is sensory, so will work with the OT on that, but we might give Felicity a call and look at getting her clever thoughts on all this.

Would love to hear how everyone else is going. Tish, hope Jarvis has coped ok with the move, a new house is always an adjustment for anyone, so hopefully he is alright and enjoying the 'sea-change'

Our last get-together was brilliant, we had about 12 ladies and several kids come down to Simmos in February, and great to meet some new faces. We also had a small, impromptu get together at Bec's house last week when I did a chokie drop down in Margaret River. Erin, lovely to meet you and your gorgeous boys, look forward to seeing you again soon. Things are looking pretty busy for the next couple of weeks, but how about we make the next catch up on Wednesday 31st March? Time & place to be confirmed, will put my thinking cap on....probably up in Busselton this time.

Hopefully everyone has been getting my emails with updates on up & comming seminars, workshops and other bits n bobs. I will start posting updates in here too, as I know how easy it is for emails to get lost in the chaos!

Blog away ladies, always lovely to chat!

life changes

Well every year that goes by more things change.
On Saturday night my mother in law died. It was expected and a blessing but of course has hit the children hard and me to although I know she wanted to go I am sad to not be seeing her again. She was a very accepting adn loving mother in law even after our divorce. Kirsty has not been to school for a week but I guess we will get her back there.

On a lighter note on Saturday I got the insurance for my horse riding business so now I can go out there and say "This is me this is what I do"

So I am hoping that soon I will be busy enough with teaching special kids how to ride that I wont have time to be worrying about life lol.

So I had better be off and go and do some tigns out at the horse paddock. Nice way to spend time and enjoy life :)

Have a blessed week everyone. Give those you love a hug and enjoy the little things in life. THey are the things that bring joy.

Donna

ASD Library....

Hello all!

Looking forward to catching up with you this week, hope you can make it on Thursday! Please call or email me if you haven't received the info - I sms'd and emailed everyone last week.

I am in the process of cataloging books to put together a library for us all! I had 9 ASD related books and Donna has kindly donated a few and got a lovely email from a lady in Perth who had heard about us and wants to donated 7 books (a complete stranger how brilliant is that!)....so I should have about 20 or so books on hand for you all to borrow as needed within a few weeks.

If anyone else has any books they don't need anymore and would like to add them to the pile, please let me know or bring them along on Thursday, they will be taken care of and of course returned to you if you ever need them back!

Hope you are all keeping well, see you soon.

Cheers
Deb

Well it's 11.59 Sunday night and it looks like my girl will not be going to school tomorrow.
15 year old girls with ASD are not fun when they decide that they are no longer interested in going to school.
She spat the dummy.

A week ago she was excited about going to school. Now she hates it.

She was throwing things in her room so hard that she terrified the dogs who were sleeping in my room.
Now of course I am wound up tight as a drum adn cant sleep and I know she wont be getting any sleep for a while.
*sigh*

I said to her that if she really didn't want to go to school she had to get a job and that was it I was teh nasty mother from hell and life got noisy. Tell you whatr i am glad I dont live next door. Dont think I would want to listen to a meltdown at nearly midnight.

Still it's not all bad news.
I found a place to give horse riding lessons from so just a few more small hurdles adn I can get my business up off the ground. Might have a helper after all lol.

Hope everyone elses school year starts just a little smoother then mine has lol.

Donna

Happy B'day Grace

Hi Deb,

Hope Grace's 'party'  went well on Friday, and you had an enjoyable day. We are facing the birthday week this week. Kyle hates surprises so he just pleads all week for us to tell him his presents.  Don't know what we're doing for a party. Kyle wants one cause thats the thing to do but the last few years he hasn't handled them very well.  Might just go to a park that way he can play how he likes with no social pressures. 

See you at the beach, I'll make sure Ella is around. Grace is so cute with her.

Elaine

The Gorgeous Edward!

We made it back to riding today after a few weeks break, and thought it time to share pics of the very special pony Grace & Jarvis are enjoying spending time with! The lovely lady in the picture is Donna's Daughter Kirsty who helps out with the kids lessons, and is quite an acomplished rider herself!

I mentioned ealier that Donna is experienced teaching kids with special needs, her logo is below - 'Giddyup Kidz'. We ride most weeks, so if you are interested in finding out more about Donna's lessons, or would like to just have a look, please contact either myself or Donna anytime. Edward is located in Busselton.

Thanks for today Donna.....sorry Grace was having 'one of those days' lol!!! Have we had enough of the school holidays yet Arghhhhhhh!!!!

A few happy snappies....

Gracie loved that mask & snorkle Santa gave her!......Yep.....she wore it to the playground in anticipation of a swim at the beach later!

The other shot was taken on Christmas night, probably the only shot of the four of us ever taken!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Hi everyone....

Hope we all had a lovely Silly Season, no doubt it was all ebbs n flows like ours!! Lots of highs & the inevitable lows, but generally a good time was had by all.

We've just come out of 3 weeks of house guests, plus staying with people in perth ourselves so its great to have our house back and can try to settle into the new year now. The kids are exhausted and Grace is hypering-out (more than usual)....so some routine is desparately needed.

Amanda - how did Jamie go in his play so far? Sorry we didnt make it to the Sat 2nd show, we had Jarrod's sister & her boys with us and just couldnt make it work.

An update on my previous post about Grace's Gift meltdowns.....yes there were a few, but our speechie managed to throw together a social story at the 11th hour and it did help prepare her a little. The gift voucher she recieved a few weeks ago was 'spent' today, she selected a Barbie sleeping bag, loves it & is excited about using it for our camping trip in a few weeks! Hopefully this will help her understand the concept next time ie: she chooses something to satisfy her Barbie obsession lol!!

Is anyone interested in catching up before school goes back? Maybe we can arrange a get together for sometime next week....if its not too hot. How about an ice-cream at Simmos one afternoon?? We start Vacswim next week and are commited to be at the beach by 11:20am everyday for those 2 weeks, so I'm thinking around 3:30ish??

Looking forward to seeing everyone again soon, take care ladies :)

Backyard Blitz

Just had to share a funny story from tonight.  I don't know if anyone saw the Backyard Blitz done for the mum of 2 Autistic boys about 2 weeks ago, well we watched it as a family and Troy talked to Kyle about how this mum had 2 boys that were like him.  Kyle didn't move from the TV that night.  Tonight Kyle came up to me and said "what is it that I have, I know it starts with an A." I replied telling him it was Autism. "That's right" he said "I better go on backyard blitz" I told him they would then come for me. His reply " Oh okay then for both of us."

If only!!

Season Greetings

Just wishing you all a blessed Christmas and a Happy New Year. May it be a good and safe holiday season for us all. Also all the best as we all tackle the holidays with our children, it can be the hardest time of the year for us too.  See you in the New Year.

Elaine

When will you know if you took the right action?

One of the hardest things for me as a parent was the length of time it sometimes takes to know if you are doing the right thing or not,. After all sometimes it takes thousands of repetitions for our kids to learn something simple. ( I estimate 4000 + to teach my son to brush his teeth without needing me standing beside him like the toothbrushing police)

When other kids seem to learn how to do things without even being shown it can seem like you are getting nowhere in a hurry and you are a failure as a parent.

Well I just wanted to share this little story with you.

When my son was in year 2 primary he started loosing his baby teeth and replaced his beautifullly straight teeth with a mouthful of crooked and crossed over teeth. He went from beautiful speach to lisping all the time because of the crossed over teeth.

At that stage I didn't know what we were dealing with ( I now think he would have been diagnosed autistic if there was the same knowledge then as now) I just knew that there was no way he could handle sitting in a chair and having a tooth pulled out.

Over the years as his teeth were replaced with adult teeth the crowding got worse but I still had nothing done. I couldnt afford ot have his teeth extracted under a general anaesthetic and there was no way he would have sat still long enough. It was a trial enough to get a filling done.

Then when he was in highschool the school dentist said to me to take him to the orthodontist. No point in going there until he wanted to get his teeth straightened. I thought. As it was at that time he was not good at looking after his teeth.

So today after his 17th birthday last month he finally got a headful of metal. 2 ops to remove teeth to get ready for it over the last year and he is committed to keeping his teeth cleaned so he has a nice straight smile. It's not the smile that was worrying me but the fact the teeth are so crooked they are very hard to clean.

So today 7 years + down the track I recieved the positive feedback that yes I did make the right choice.

Sometimes the positive feedback comes quickly, sometimes it takes years and sometimes we will never know if we have done the right thing so it is vitally important that as a parent we remember to celebrate to ourselves when we get things right.

Sometimes it is celebrating that we got the support we need to get the outcome we want. Sometimes it is simply that we held onto our temper when our child was meltingdown around us.

And sometimes it is simply knowing that we are hanging in there on those really tuff days when we feel like we are doing everything wrong. (And oh yeah I remember those days when I did EVERYTHING wrong)

Give yourself a pat on the back, your still here after all and remember that in the future you will see the rewards that you cant see right now.

It's very nice to be sitting here right now knowing that I have a son moving into his adult years who was capable of sitting in a dentist chair for 1 1/2 hours while he had his braces fitted BECAUSE I made the choices I did when he was too young to make them for himself.

Celebrate your actions. You make them after careful consideration and with all the information you have at your disposal. You will make mistakes, we all do, that is why saying well done to yourself is more important than anything else I can think of.

Gift meltdowns....and general Christmas tips??

Ok, so we had a situation today.....here goes....

My Dad visited for the weekend and I knew he was bringing Griffin's birthday pressie early. Id pre-warned and talked through the whole "Griffin will get a gift, but its his birthday & so there wont be one for you" etc etc and she seemed ok with that (sort of lol!)

So Dad mentions he has a little surprise for Grace too - and gives her an envelope.....with a gift voucher inside (K-mart)......IMPLOSION!!! Grace completely lost it for almost an hour. Luckily Dad understod she wasnt being ungrateful, and I will be on the phone first thing tomorrow to our speechie for tips.

Perhaps once she has been able to buy something SHE chooses, it will help her understand next time. Im just wandering if any of you have had problems with gift vouchers before? Birthdays and Christmas have always been a challenge, the build up, anticipation and expectations get the better of her. How do I get her to understand that

.......sometimes you dont know whats inside
.......sometimes someone else might get something she wanted
.......sometimes someone else might get 6 gifts, and she may only get 5
......it hurts people feelings when she gets angry or crys when opening a gift
......gratitued, even if she doesnt really like her gift

etc etc etc

School orientation

Kyle had a school orientation last Wednesday. Being a small school they did preschool orientation and then included the whole school by moving everyone to the class and room they were going to go next year. It was mainly for Kyle. He did really well and it's given him confidence for next year. We are so thankful the school is behind us in helping Kyle. We did have a quiet laugh when the desks became his focus point, everything about them was wrong including the colour. We just have to wait now to see how he goes next year, first we have to tackle the holidays!!!

Babes In The Wood

Hi everyone. I just wanted to let you know about the annual pantomime by the Repertory Club in Busselton. This year it is Babes In The Wood, starting on Jan 1st and running for a 12 show season. Why am I telling you this??? Well, Jamie, my ASD child, is in the show. He has been performing in pantomime every year since he was born, and even while I was pregnant with him!! This year he has a part in the juniors section (a 5 minute segment during the main show) plus has been given a small part in the main cast as well.

Acting and drama classes are often suggested for ASD children as it gives them an environment to practise social skills, emotions and reading non verbal language. Plus they can have no fear of performing on stage as they don't realise it is a fearful situation. Jamie loves being in the pantomime and manages to crack us up every year with his tone of voice and body language etc.

So, if you want to come and check out a great show head down to Callows newsagent in Busselton to purchase tickets (you can only purchase in person, NO PHONE SALES), but it you want to watch Jamie in a great show you need tickets for one of these 6 dates;

Sat 2nd Jan 4pm

Mon 4th Jan 7:30pm

Fri 8th Jan 7:30pm

Mon 11th Jan 7:30pm

Thu 14th Jan 7:30pm

Sat 16th Jan 4pm

The juniors are split into 2 groups and do half the shows each - regulations do not allow kids under 12 to perform for the whole season. Also, Sat 16th is the final show, which always has presentations and speeches afterwards. If you dont think your child can sit through this DONT go to that show.

Enjoy. Amanda

I couldnt help sharing this image my dear friend just emailed me! It was taken at the Busselton Show last month. Such a tender moment, and so true to Gracie's form, she is oblivious to anything around her, completely enamoured by the dove...my heart is full :)

Hanen More Than Words Workshop Feb in Busselton

I just emailed everyone this info....but here is is again :) Deb

A Hanen More Than Words workshop series is being planned to run over 10 Wednesdays from 09.30am to 12.30 at the Busselton Community Health Centre, Mill Rd Busselton commencing on Wednesday February 10th 2010.

The program will be presented by Sabrina de Beer, senior speech pathologist with the Health Department’s Regional Therapy Team.

There will be no cost for participants, but parents are asked to commit to attend the full program. The sessions are run with the parents as a group. Children not attending school will need to be left with a babysitter.

A brief overview of the program is attached below, and further information can be found at:
https://www.hanen.org

It would be ideal if registrations for participation could be made by December 22nd so that pre-programme interviews and videos can be planned and completed prior to the end of January.

To register or to obtain further information please contact Sabrina at: sabrina.debeer@health.wa.gov.au
or phone: 9724 0512

Gluten and Dairy foods...

We've not headed down this path till now, and after a brief conversation with Donna's delightful daughter, I purchased A2 milk yesterday (assuming Grace would be able to tell it wasnt her 'usual' beverage!) and its delicious! I loved it.....and guess who didn't notice!!! It seems a bit expensive, but if it means keeping dairy in her diet - bring it on! Donna, is there anywhere local that seems to sell it cheaper than Coles??

I also wandered down the health food isle to hunt for the cereal K said was nice (I think she said Crunchola??) but didnt see one that was Gluten free, other than the rice flakes, puffs & muesli...has anyone tried any of these??

This is the website for Freedom foods, they make the A2 milk and seem to produce several other GF options. Click on the A2 icon and it takes you to some interesting media reports on this milk.....specifically mentioning Autism. Im going to pop the pancake mix, cookies and wraps on my next shopping list. Tried the potato chips....which Griffin & I loved, but Grace didnt, will keep offering it and see!

www.freedomfoods.com.au

Ladies - Share your favorite GF product with us! Or if there are any recipies your kids love, or GF cookbooks you use......let us know. Also, anyone know of yoghurt that may be along the lines of the A2 milk??