Photo Shoot

Ian loves taking pictures with my camera, so the kids and I had a photo shoot one afternoon.He especially likes when the flash is turned on :)

6 months

Chloe is 6 months old today. Chloe is our little social butterfly. She is such a little talker and loves people. She can army crawl now, and there is no stopping her. She can't sit up by herself yet, but she will have it in no time. I remember Ian crawled before he sat up on his own as well. She got her first tooth on the bottom, front about a week ago. It also looks like the one next to it could come through anytime now too. She loves eating her solids. She will eat anything, but the meat baby food. I don't blame her, it smells terrible. The other night while we were saying a blessing over dinner Chloe said "mama". Matthew and I both opened our eyes and smiled at each other. It was so sweet. Chloe loves her brother so much. Last week Ian was watching Wheel of Fortune like we do every night, and Chloe was right there next to him. She was pulling on his pant leg the whole time. :)

6 month stats

Height: 26.5 inches: 75%

Weight: 16 lbs: 50%

Head: 17.25: 75%

The sweetest thing

Ian's therapy and progress

Therapy:
Ian has been going to speech therapy twice a week, therapy at home twice a week, and occupational therapy every two weeks. He is really liking therapy, and interacts with his therapist so much more, and is having lots more eye contact then ever before.
Ian is a kid who needs lots of movement, so this can make it difficult to get him to sit in a chair and focus on an activity. The occupational therapist suggested putting movement in his therapy. Chelsea who comes to the house twice a week does this. It has been working greatly I think.
We decided that it would work better for Chelsea to do it with more room at our house. Keri at speech therapy is sticking to the same routine.
Keri and I did decided to do a little reward system with Ian. We think that this will motivate him to use his words or sign language. Chelsea is also using an reward system as well.
Matthew and I have changed up his bedtime routine some. Ian has a difficult time going to sleep once we get done with bed time routine. Our routine goes like this:
1: Lots of running, jumping and rough play= just whatever we can think of to wear him out
2: Bath: not every night but most
3: PJ's
4: Ian usually runs for a little longer while I get Chloe down to bed
5: Matthew and I both go into Ian's room with him, all the lights are out, night light is on
6: We read scriptures, maybe sing some songs, say prayer
7: Turn night light off, and tuck him in
Even with this routine Ian usually needs a little more movement. He will either kick the door for a little while, or run around in his room. It just depends how much we wore him out earlier. He hardly ever sleeps in his bed. I do feel like the routine is helping some, so I am glad we have stuck with it. He is going to sleep a little quicker then before.
We are still waiting to hear from the Danny's wish foundation to see if Ian will be given a ipad. Keri uses an ipad during therapy. This is will be a great tool for us at home to work towards Ian's progress in his speech.
Progress:
1: Ian is showing more eye contact to others
2: He is showing a little more interest in his sister. He doesn't want to touch her or her touch him, but he watches her
3: He has said a few more words but not consistently, but we know he knows them
4: Asks for our help when he needs it: He does so by bringing the object he wants to us or showing some sort of eye contact when we ask if he needs help
5: He is still so so happy
6: He is understanding our pictures schedule at home more, and uses it to ask for things


The other day when we were shopping at Wal-mart a guy comment on how Ian was acting while we were in the check out line. Ian loves Wal-mart for some reason, and gets super excited and yells/screams, flaps his arms, and just laughs the whole time. The guy in the check out line said "wow he sure is loud, and likes to flap those arms." I answered by saying "yep super excited to be here." I wanted to say ya know I am not a bad mom because my kid is overly loud in Wal-mart, my kid just has Autism, and I think he is perfect, but I never do. I try to be super kind about it.  I read a quote the other day that I loved that goes along with Autism.

“Walk a mile in my shoes, see what I see, hear what I hear, feel what I feel, THEN maybe you will understand why I do what I do. Until then, don’t judge me”

 Autism is tricky because every person who has Autism or is anywhere on the spectrum is different. Therapy is all experience with Ian. We use trial and error to figure out what works for Ian and what doesn't. I feel like the older he gets the more we will understand how he functions and things wont be as crazy. Lately I have been feeling like I have been pushing him through all these therapy sessions like crazy, and not seeing the tons and tons of progress. But really he has progressed. I need to remember that I am doing everything I can to help him, and no matter what the outcome is from it all, I will always know I did the best for him. I am so thankful for Ian's therapist who work so hard with him, and truly do love working with him. I am also so thankful as parents that we have prayer and our Heavenly Father on our side to help us through this with Ian. We would be a wreck with out it. I have been worrying about us leaving for a month in October for vacation. I worry that Ian will regress so much while we are gone. But I will be able to work with him while we are gone as well. Keri and Chelsea have reassured me that it could be the best thing for Ian and the whole family to take this break. We are super excited to go to Wyoming, and to have our family be involved with Ian as well. We need a break from our Pullman life and routine here for awhile. Matthew and I are so blessed to have Ian as our son. He is the sweetest boy, and teaches us so much of our Saviors ever ending love for us. Life is not always easy being a parents with a boy who has Autism, but it is so worth it. It truly is the best thing in the world to be parents.  It brings me to tears to think how blessed I really am to be Ian's mom.

Update on Us

Matthew is still doing his 4th year rotations. He has really enjoyed being almost completely done with the small animal rotations at the vet hospital. He has one this spring but other then that he is done. In just a short three weeks he has a vacation for three weeks. Matthew can hardly wait, and either can I do go to Wyoming to see family. Matthew is going to be using his vacation wisely however. He is going to be visiting with different vets around in the area close to where we are from to see if there are any job opportunities. Also this will be great experience for him. Matthew finished his senior paper just a few weeks ago. He also had to present it in front of a group of peers and professors. He did very well, and is happy to have it done with. He is also working hard on studying for the boards now.

I am running nonstop seems like most days. Between taking Ian to speech twice a week, grocery shopping, playing at the park, and other errands I run, most days it seems like the kids and I are on the go all the time. Tuesdays is our one day we don't have any planned appointments to go to, so we enjoy that day off. I also got put back in the primary as the secretary, so I am enjoying being in primary. I am looking forward to going to Wyoming to see our family as well. My sister Brandy is going to come up sometime. I have not met her baby or her mine. Also I think I will get to see my sister Sam as well. She hasn't met Chloe yet either. I am super anxious to know where we will be in 8 months. I am super excited to not live the student life anymore. Besides that I would like to go back to school eventually someday.

Ian is doing great. He is loving going to therapy almost every day of the week. He has speech therapy on Mondays and Thursdays, and a therapist from early learning services come to the house on Wednesdays and Fridays. He also has occupational therapy once every two weeks. He has shown great improvement with eye contact and sticking to an activity longer. He has not said a lot of new words, but shows more comprehension of what is asked of him. He is still such a happy boy, and always going going going. I wish I had just half the energy he has. We took him to the county fair the other night, and he really like the seeing the sheep the best. He also loved watching the carnival rides go up and down. He was so funny while we were at the fair. He held his hand over his nose most the time. It must of stunk pretty bad to him.

Chloe is growing up too fast. She rolls all over the place. I will lay her in the living room to go do something and I come back and she will be all the way in the kitchen. She is also jabbering a lot. Yesterday at church one of my friends little boy's who is a year old was saying hi to her. Chloe would just laugh at him. She thought he was so funny. I love to hear her sweet laugh and voice. She is loving eating rice cereal and anything else we give her. She like to drink from a sippy cup, and will hold it herself. She is such a happy girly.

A couple of weekends ago we picked up lunch and played at the park.

Chloe swinging at the park for the first time

Bedtime stories

I made eggplant parmesan last week for the first time. Even Ian liked it. 

I didn't quite have enough zucchini for my zucchini bread, so I added some carrots as well. It was pretty tasty

Chloe and I rockin polka dots

One of Ian's new favorite after nap snacks is apples. It has to be a whole apple though. He wont touch apples with they are cut into pieces for him. 

Chloe girl sucking away on her sippy cup

We went to Costco the other night and pulled over to snap a pic of these lovely combines. We thought it was pretty cool that there were seven of then all lined up in a row

Ian boy at the Palouse Empire Fair

Ian not taking a nap. But I loved getting cuddles from him. 

Our little mover

Ian doesn't mess around when it comes to eating fruit salad. He gets it done right. 

Family Pictures 2013