Day 35 - Back to Frog School

We started the morning with a decision. We had 4 more days left on our medication trial. I had reduced Frog's dosage back to 5mgs last week to see if having more time to adjust to the way his perceptions changed would make a difference. He continued to cycle between clam/lethargic to sensory overload melt down with prickly feet, large red itchy splotches, lots of tears and the need to go to his room and sleep it off. He also has gone quite manic every day around 4 or 5 pm, running and yelling non-stop. His therapists were very happy with his session yesterday, but still reported red itchy splotches and discomfort. Frog and I have really not had any quality home school time since we started the medication trial. This morning I decided we have had enough. So today was school without meds.

We started the day with Frog choosing pancakes for breakfast. He ate a little bit before we had to leave to take Diva to school. He ate a granola bar in the car. With a little prompting, Frog gave Diva something between a high five and a wave goodbye. At home we finished breakfast then headed downstairs for some Floortime. Frog wanted to climb up the mats against the wall. We turned it into a climbing and sliding game with an anticipatory 1, 2, 3, go! Later he moved to his swing. He let me move my body into the swing and add additional pressure for proprioception. We used the setting for requesting and working on the ee sound - with the choices "eat sweet feet?, squeeze knees?, or kiss please?" There was lots of Frog laughter, twinkling eyes, requests (offering me the body part he wanted pressure on) and ee sounds. We moved on to music and took turns strumming the guitar and singing/vocalizing into the karaoke machine.

Frog decided he would like to take a bath. This fit well into our school day, as stories work best for Frog when he has water to play with. Since today is a very rainy day and there are at least 4 more days of rain forecast, I thought rain would be a good subject. We re-read It's Fall and talked about the changes we've seen outside this week. Then I read Coyote's Rain Song, a Native American story from our ENKI folk and fairy tales. I had the pleasure of taking Diva to see According to Coyote at the Seattle Children's theater.



Gene Tagaban , the gifted story teller, brought Coyote to life for me. At the time, I really wished that Frog had been able to see the show with us - but I knew it was still too much for him. I must admit, I heard Gene's voice and saw Gene's mannerisms in my head while I told the story today. Frog and I both enjoyed it. (side note: If you ever get the opportunity to see According to Coyote performed or to see Gene Tagaban perform or speak - do not miss it!)

After I finally talked Frog out of the tub, we opened up the windows and doors so we could hear the rain. We also listened to the rain pounding on the skylights while I got our art supplies ready. Then went outside in the rain (and got almost as wet as Coyote) to do our art project - rain painting. I put a few drops of food coloring onto white paper plates and we took them outside into the rain. The rain bounced off the food coloring and splashed colors around the plates. Frog did not want to stick around for the "art" but rather ran around and experienced the rain bouncing off of him. He did come back and checkout the finished product.



After the plates dried in a warm oven, we used them for our lunch. Frog actually ate half his lunch today - including some yogurt WITH A SPOON (but only a little - he didn't want more if he couldn't use his fingers).



Frog also has a new box from Grandpa C.



Today, instead of using our composition book, we got out the markers and made lines and scribbles on the box.



We also discovered that when you push the box against the window, the box has a smaller window to look through - another perspective on the yard.



We finished off our school day with some more Floortime, including throwing and catching a ball - to musical rather than verbal cues. It is now 2:30 and Diva will be home soon. Frog is not having a melt-down and does not appear to be heading for a nap any time soon. Since we have had a week of sleep problems, I'm hoping this is another sign that stopping the medication is the right thing to do.

Day Five - GOT TO MOVE

Mondays are Speech Therapy days with our private SLP. Frog was up, active and ready to go today. He was a very happy camper at speech, but really reved up. He and his Therapist worked on body imitation, trying to form their bodies into the poses depicted on simple stick figure drawings. Frog had trouble staying on task and exhibited some delayed processing (forming the previous pose instead of the one they were trying for). Therapist decided to copy Frog instead of having Frog copy her. This held Frog's interest for a longer period of time. I'm going to add follow the leader to our games at home. At the therapy table, Frog did some vocal imitation with physical prompts. He choose to work on writing letters, but had a hard time staying on task and needed to flail his arms about, seek deep pressure from the Therapist and play with her hair. They moved onto a book about ducks. Frog did not stay actively engaged with the story, but he did not resist the story either.

After Speech Therapy we headed for the grocery store. I asked Frog to push the cart, but he indicated that he would prefer to ride. He did a great job during the 30 minutes we were shopping. He got a cookie at the bakery and choose some trail mix for the car. He tried to open the Frenches French Fried Onions, and complained when I said "no" and took them away, but there was no melt-down. We had to wait in line at the checkout stand. This is always the hardest part for Frog. He did great! No fussing, no complaining, no loud outbursts.

We left the store and took a drive to a local beach, listening to some classical music on the way. We spent an hour on the beach where Frog was free to run, climb, and explore.





It is always nice for both of us when we are in an environment where Frog can have some freedom to explore without mom hovering. And we had a nice lesson in natural consequences - walk in the water, wear wet shoes!

We went home to clean-up, put away the groceries, and get some lunch. After lunch we tried a little art. Frog was actually curious about what I was doing with all those bowls out on the patio. He came and explored the paint and water with me for a few minutes.




Our face project today was putting chocolate chip eyes on pumpkin cookies. I took this opportunity to work on Frog's pointing finger. I placed an eye and helped him make a pointer finger to push it into the cookie dough. I had him do 4 cookies (8 eyes). He did the last eye by himself.



We spent the rest of the afternoon in the pool - taking advantage of the sunny weather. He is playing the duck, duck, goose game with three people now. He is very tired this evening.

Day Four - FOLLOW ME

Still no waving goodbye to Diva. We came home and straighted up the kitchen. We did some of our HANDLE exercises. Frog spent a little time outside in his fenced in front yard, then came in for some swinging with mom. We did a little potty training.

Our school day started with a trip to the garden to harvest the long awaited squash.



Frog's Dad and Diva did the planting this year. Because of Frog's new found love of uprooting every plant he sees, he's only been allowed to look at the garden from outside of the fence - until today. He was not as excited as I'd hoped, but he did look under the leaves at the vegetables with me.



And he stayed in the garden - stopping and coming back when I called him, while I harvested our tiny crop. Frog liked washing the lettuce and eating it better than picking it.




We explored the front and side yards for awhile and talked about why we don't run into the road as we watched large dump trucks come racing down the hill. I offered to help him ride his bike, but he was not interested. So we headed back inside for some Mr. Potato Head fun.

Today's game was "Let's make a potato head like Frog and one like Mom." Since I knew he wasn't going to build a potato head himself, I asked him questions about his face and when he responded (usually with a clap) I followed his answer and put that piece on his potato head. I also had to keep chasing him around with the activity as he insisted on moving from room to room. The strangest answer I got from him was that he hears with his nose. He told me this once before during a rapid prompting session. I'm still trying to find out if he is really not answering/getting the answer wrong, playing a joke on me, or he has some synesthete tendencies. When we finished his potato head, it asked him, in a very funny voice, if it could have a hat. That was Frog's favorite part of the activity. He chose a hat from two I offered and gave it to me to put on his potato head.



Later in the day he came back to the potato heads and slowly took them apart, piece by piece. I got the box out and we had a lesson in cleaning up.

We got two stories in. First we read Silly Little Goose. Frog did a good job listening to the story - we only had to move once (he wanted to sit in my chair). After the story I asked Frog to look at Goose and see if Goose had a face. He was not happy about this and fussed and fumed all the way through. Later, while he was playing in the bathtub, we went back to the Duchess Autumn poem. He listened to the whole poem this time and clapped at the end.

We finished our day with some music. I got all of the instruments out and played a few tunes on the piano, recorder, xylophone, percussion instruments and my violin. Frog listened from his swing in the other room, vocalizing along. When he came to join me I followed him around and used my violin to mimic his movements. He likes this a lot. He stopped me now and then to strum and pluck the strings on my violin. I ended up composing a rift that he especially liked. Maybe this will evolve into a whole new Frog inspired composition.

We are now eagerly awaiting Diva's return so we can go swimming before our NAET treatments.

Day Three - UP, UP, UP!

We started our day taking Diva to school. I sang the "Frog is getting in Mommy's Car" song and Frog took himself to the garage and climbed up into his seat without assistance. Diva is working on getting Frog to wave goodbye to her. She is very animated as she waves to him. I asked Frog if he was going to wave goodbye to Diva. He clapped yes, then put one hand up and played with his hair - its a start.

Back at home Frog quickly discovered that the fountain continued to foam all night. There was a mountain of soap bubbles with large pieces breaking off and floating around like low lying bubbly clouds. We had to go check that out. An hour later we were still playing with bubbles, the fountain and the sandbox. It was clear that I was not going to get Frog back into the house and I wanted to distract him from trying to climb up on top of the fountain, so I suggested we get in the pool. He didn't give me any response. I went in to get my swimming suit and some swim pants for Frog. When I looked out the window, I saw him up at the top of the stairs to the pool with his body plastered against the gate. I guess he was listening.



So our school morning was spent in the pool. At first he wanted nothing to do with me. He swam, he dove and swam under the water, he bobbed up and down - eventually he came up with the dive sticks I was throwing to get his attention. Slowly he warmed up to working with me. I came up with an auditory processing game I thought he would be able to participate in and enjoy - our version of Duck, Duck, Goose - we hold hands, he puts his feel on my knees and we slowly bounce around in a circle. I say duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, GOOSE - then take a big breath and we go under the water. After a few rounds he swam away. Later, when I asked him to play again, he took my hands, I began the circle, I said duck, and he said "gez" - down we went. We also practiced some of the hand movements from the Smart Moves video and practiced throwing the dive sticks overhand (hand over hand at this point).

We got out of the pool, dressed and ate some lunch then left to run errands and to keep Frog from climbing up on the counters. We put the Smart Moves video on in the car. At the bank, Frog got a lollipop. We had a long wait at the pharmacy drive-thru, but between the music and the lollipop, Frog stayed content. We ended our outing by stopping at the Estuary downtown on the waterfront.



We read the placard explaining that "An estuary is a semi-enclosed coastal body of water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. ..." In other words, its a big old transition. And that is exactly what our visit turned into. Frog was not happy about putting on shoes; he was not happy about looking for letters or words (or at least pointing them out); he was not happy about being asked to stand on his feet and move forward. Eventually he settled in and let me know that he did not want to go back to the car, he wanted to go to the observation tower. So we went, Frog in his socks, up, up, up the stairs of the observation tower. Such a happy Frog 15 feet off the ground, bouncing like a pinball off the tower fence. We spent some time pulling up the grass and watching the birds and boats then headed home to meet Diva.





Frog spent the rest of the afternoon showing off on the trampoline, playing in the sandbox and the water table. He even requested that I join him on the trampoline. We took turns and tried holding hands and jumping together (harder than it sounds). We finished our day by frosting and decorating the cookies we made yesterday. Frog watched as I said each feature I added to the cookie. He waited patiently until it was finished and I gave the "OK" before he grabbed a cookie and took off.

Day Two - BUBBLES!

Today turned into a day of bubbles. It wasn't planned that way, but we go with the flow around here.

I wanted to get the kitchen cleaned-up before we started working. Yesterday Frog made several side trips to the kitchen where he got into and played in the cold, greasy, dirty water left in the pots I was soaking in the sink. It got all over him, the counter, and the floor - I spent too much time cleaning up. So today I wanted to nip that in the bud and take advantage of Frog's desire to play in the sink. We did the dishes and Frog was able to play in the warm, clean, soapy water to his heart's delight. Next I wiped down counters and the kitchen table - Frog wasn't so keen on that chore. Last we washed the hand prints off the sliding glass doors. Frog was fascinated with the spray cleaner I used. Since it was a non-toxic variety, I let him make a writing / art project out of it.



He then headed to the pantry to look for a quick snack. I unlocked the door for him and asked him what he wanted. He SAID "fish," clear as a bell, then grabbed the carton of goldfish crackers and took off with it! Yesterday when we got to the park he said "duck" then paused and said "ducka, ducka, ducka, ducka" which is a common babble for him so I didn't get too excited. But two clear words in two days - I think I'm going to have to start a Frog's Word of the Day in my sidebar!!!!!!!!!!

I had planned on doing some bubble art: adding food coloring to bubble solution then blowing the bubbles at the paper and letting them pop leaving colored bubble marks. Frog had absolutely no interest in this activity. I tried both a bubble wand and a bubble pipe (letting the bubbles fall down on the paper) the pipe worked much better. When I finished one painting without Frog, I decided to join him in his activity (playing in the fountain). I took the colored bubble solution and poured it from way up high into his hands above the fountain. We looked at the colored soap on his hands and watched it swirl into the water. In no time, we had suddsed the fountain which Frog thought was just great!

Frog spent some time playing with the hose while I prepared the next project. My plan was to make Gack in his water table. Frog liked the dry cornstarch, but when I added the water he was out of there. Before giving up on the idea, I tried adding more water then I added a few drops of the food coloring I was using for the bubbles. Frog was willing to come over and give this a quick try:



After which he headed back to his bubbly fountain. I'm going to have to think of more ideas to incorporate that fountain! The color swirl in the water table turned out better than I had hoped. I'm going to post more about it next week for my "Try It Tuesday" post at 4-Frogs.

When Frog was finally ready to come back inside, Dad was home and he helped Frog help me to get the ingredients for the pizza dough into the bread machine. Frog poured in the buttermilk and the sugar (after he had a quick taste of course). Frog loves the bread machine.



I tried to squeeze our story time in here, but should have waited for bath time. Frog wanted to go outside. I told him to wait for Diva to come home from school. When I tried to read the story he went into major melt down, then grabbed a blanket and headed for bed. I don't think he ever got to sleep, but the self-imposed time out seemed to help him regroup.

We are running a little behind schedule here. Plans for the rest of our day include harvesting those squash for our dinner, swimming (more bubbles), decorating some sugar cookies for dessert (our faces project), and getting our story in before bed.

Day One - THE BEGINING

We are starting off gently. Frog spent some time at home with Grandma while I took Diva to her first day of 4th grade.

When I got home, Frog spent some time in his Airwalker while I helped push to make it swing. Every so often, I stopped the swing and opened the material and made a face - different faces for different emotions. We will be working on body parts and facial expressions all fall. Frog initiated a spinning motion. I helped him wind-up in the swing then "whirl" and "twirl" - which came back later in the day with the Dutches Autumn poem from our ENKI nature stories - the leaves whirl and twirl and eddy upwards.

Frog had some free time while I re-viewed the movement videos we will be using: Smart Moves and Auterobics. When he drifted in, I left him alone to preview the videos too. I'm hoping to acclimate him to the music and words on the videos before we try the movements. Later in the day we took a drive and I put the Smart Moves video in and played the first series over and over.

We played a game of Silly Faces. The goal today was primarily to get Frog to stay with me through one round. I did have to help him stay. But, he vocalized his disapproval rather than pinching me so I felt this was a success. He did spin the spinner until we got all the pieces we needed for our face. He didn't pick the pieces, but he patted the sheet with the pieces when I asked "what do we need" or "where are the eyes", etc., and he patted the face we were making when I asked where does the nose, or mouth, or ears go.



Our story was Dutches Autumn. It was not his favorite, but this was the first time we read it. I'm hoping that as it becomes more familiar and it ties in with other things we are doing, he will settle into it.

Frog indicated he wanted to "go" by taking me to the garage. We took a drive to a neighboring city and went to a park where we could feed the ducks. Frog was a bit overwhelmed when the ducks spotted us and our bag of bread. 18+ ducks came waddling out of the pond and surrounded us. I asked Frog if the ducks talk too much and he clapped (yes).



We left the ducks and headed for the playground. There were 2 to 8 other boys there at any given time. Frog stayed on the playground. He spent most of his time running around or playing with the wood chips, but he also watched the other boys playing. When the playground got quiet, Frog ventured onto the play structure. When the other boys returned Frog stayed up there with them. He tried several times to go down the twisty slide, but lost his nerve. He was able to back out of it and get passed the other kids without pinching, biting, or screaming.



Back at home, we went out to pick apples. I put Frog on my shoulders and took him and a bucket to our trees. I showed him an apple, said "pick the apple" then picked one and put it in the bucket. The next apple he touched but wouldn't grasp. I picked the apple and he took it from me and put it in the bucket. The next time he choose the apple, I picked it and he put it in the bucket. The last apple he choose, picked and put in the bucket. He watched me wash, peel and chop one of the apples. I put them on the stove to make apple sauce. He came back to the pan when he saw the steam. He tried several times to get his hand in the pan, but was told "No, HOT!" and removed his hand.

After apple picking, Frog took himself to the trampoline and climbed in without assistance. I went out and zipped him in and watched and commented for awhile. I told him I was going inside for a few minutes. He continued to jump until he'd had enough. He unzipped the enclosure and got himself out without assistance.

We will continue similar activities tomorrow including harvesting our three small squash that we grew in our tiny garden.