Quite the Absence...

I hate not blogging. I feel guilty when I stop blogging and generally, it isn't intentional. Life happens and the longer that I am away from it, the harder it is to come back to it. But back I am. And hopefully, I won't have another unplanned hiatus for quite some time.

I thought I had some super exciting news to share with you guys, but I guess I don't really. You see, we recently found a new place to live. Our current place is MUCH  too big for our needs and we have a lot of wasted space (as in rooms that we don't even use) and way too much stuff. I hate stuff.

This new house that we found would be a wonderful thing for numerous reasons. For one thing, it is much smaller than our current place (like by half!). Two, it would force us to seriously declutter. Three, the monthly payments on it (plus ALL the utilities!) would be a couple of HUNDRED dollars less than our rent alone in our current place. That equates to more money to do more things and less stress about money in the first place! Four, we would own instead of renting. That part is the major deal for us!

So, we went in to two different banks today. My father-in-law had already said that they would help us out with this (and I tried not to get my hopes up...long history of getting excited about something only to be let down by it later) but he wanted us to go in and apply for the loan on our own. So, we did. We knew that we would be denied (though we haven't yet talked to the lady - but I'm just being realistic here). You see, the cost of the new place is so low that it doesn't qualify for a mortgage, but a large personal loan. Our credit is not favorable. I know that and so does my father-in-law. But whatever, he wanted us to go apply on our own and so that's what we did.

The one loan officer tried to call us back today, but apparently my mom took Hubby's phone home with her (and my phone - well, let's just say that it got dropped and the back and battery both were lost/trampled by a crowd in a small dark room on a Friday night by heavily intoxicated people a few weeks back...but that's another story for another day - or not) So Loan Officer tried to call Hubby but we missed the call b/c my mom had the phone so she called Father-in-Law because we had listed him as closest relative. I figured it made sense to list him because his original plan had been to co-sign with us on the loan or to just take out the loan himself and we just pay it off.

So, Father-in-Law shows up at our door at like 8:00 this evening and tells Hubby that the Loan Officer called him because she couldn't get ahold of us and that when he tried calling us, he got my mom instead. Oh and by the way, he isn't sure about the loan at the moment. (Mind you, he has been CERTAIN about it for the last week and a half since we first mentioned it all to him, even up to the point of being certain about it at 10:00 this morning.) So frustrating. And he goes out of town tomorrow and I work 12 hour shifts tomorrow, Thursday and Friday. He'll be back on Friday night though, so maybe we have a chance at the whole loan thing either Saturday or next Monday. We'll see. Right now though, I feel so defeated about it and disappointed in myself for allowing myself to be excited. :/

But anyhow, do you want to see the pictures of the house? Hear a little bit about it? If for nothing else, I will at least have it on here as a memory of what could have been and a reminder about getting excited about things...

It has two connected living areas, but one (the bottom right) would be used more like an office area. That is the area that you step into when you first walk in the door. The bottom left shows the room you see when you walk in (though that pic was taken from the corner of the kitchen) There is a sliding glass door on the wall behind the couch (it's actually between the back of the couch and the kitchen bar). And then there is the kitchen. It's beautiful. All the appliances stay. It has a newer (WORKING!) dishwasher and a large refrigerator and the stove is a glass flat top too. I have never had one of those. Hubby was super excited about it too because as he said, "It's flat. That means no more tilted pots or pans and unevenly cooked food!" I love that man! He so gets me!

The dining room is just off the kitchen and that front area that you first walk into. It's smaller and I think we might have to get a smaller table for that area or maybe just different chairs. We aren't exactly sure until we try it out. Initially though, we'd make what we have work in the space. And it even has cute little built-in cabinets in the corners. Love the little details in this space!

It has a large bathroom (only 1 compared to the 3 we currently have - most willing to give up 2 bathrooms though!) and the washer/dryer actually go in there - directly opposite of the tub. So when the kids get into the bath at night, their clothes from the day could go directly in and then be washed once all of the kids were bathed too. Talk about convenient (and no more excuses for laundry piled up!) It has a newer furnace and hot water heater too! They even offered to throw in the washer and dryer but since we already own a set ourselves, we passed on that. They will probably pass that on to her middle son instead, which works for us!

Then there are the bedrooms. The bedrooms are tiny, especially compared to the rooms that we all have now. Punky and Boo would still share, Natty and JoNo would go back to sharing. And Hubby and I, well, of course we share! Eventually, though, we'd really love to get a bunkbed for the boys that also has a pull-out trundle bed for Boo to sleep on. It would be the most space-saving option and the boys will have the biggest room anyhow (since there are three of them) and then Miss Punky would have the smallest room (since it would be just her) while Hubby and I would take the middle room (which has a ceiling fan and a custom closet system already in place....droool!) The kids' bedrooms have smallish walk-in closets that would be the perfect size for their clothing and they also have shelving in there too which would work out wonderfully for toy storage as well.

The front porch has a nice swing and the back deck, well, it's kinda plain, but it's bigger than the deck that we currently have and that is a bonus. Also, we could fence in the yard. There is a grove of trees behind the house which I love, but also scares me a little bit because of Boo's wandering. Because of his issues, he wanders a lot. We can pretty well redirect him into something else, but it can be a challenge. Also, because of his issues, there is a program here that would help out with certain things for him. One of which could be respite care for him. It's not a huge issue because we have a pretty decent support base of people already in place if we need that time. And besides, if we had respite for him, that doesn't cover the other three, so really, it would feel like we were singling him out and sending him away (when really he is probably the easiest child of the four to take care of) and it just doesn't feel right. Anyhow, our family coordinator suggested that as an option for him. But when we were talking today, I said, "Ooooh, a fenced-in yard!" because the form was talking about home modifications. I was joking, but she said that I should put it down because it would be a valid request for Boo.

Of course now, we don't even know if we are going to get the place and if I request a fenced-in yard and they grant it and we don't get it, I'm not sure what happens after that. It's kind of confusing. But anyhow, as much as I hate to remain hopeful, there is still a part of me that is. I will be devastated if we aren't able to get this place. We really need it so badly. We cannot afford to stay in the place we are living right now past our lease (which is up July 31st). The new place is just SO affordable. Even with the much smaller space, the fact that we would move to the other side of town, that the kids would have to change schools, that they would be moving away from some great friends that they had (FINALLY!) made in our neighborhood. All of those things are worth it to our WHOLE family (even the kids are supportive of it - though they will miss their friends but the power of the internet will allow them to remain in touch even after we move)

So, that's where that stands right now. Oh, and there's another house that I want to tell you about too. But that will have to wait til tomorrow my friends. Until then, think good thoughts for our family and our ability to get this place, please?

(EDITED to add: You can read Part Two and Part Three by clicking on their links.)

Boo

I have been debating with myself about posting about Boo. You see, there is just so much that we are still learning and discovering about our sweet boy and his educational diagnosis of PDD-NOS.

PDD-NOS is the acronym for Pervasive Developmental Delay - Not Otherwise Specified. PDD-NOS is sometimes included on the Autism Spectrum but not always. And even though he does have PDD-NOS, we have not been told that he has Autism. It's kind of a weird, confusing thing to me actually.

But to explain what he does have and how we have gotten to where we are right now, I'll go through the basis of his history. When he was born (at 39 weeks via scheduled c-section) he was not breathing. The umblical cord was tied in a knot. Much like the knot you make when you are tying something. Just a simple knot. But a knot that was cutting off vital oxygen and blood to him. We were told that had we scheduled the c-section for later than we had, he could have died. As it was, he wasn't breathing and had to be resuscitated and given blow-by oxygen. I didn't get to see him for three hours. It was horrible. They got him to breathing well on his own and by the sixth hour (I believe it was around that time) he was able to stay in my room with me. Prior to that, he had been able to come in but had to go back for further monitoring. His apgars were something like 2,9,9. The only thing he had going for him during that first set of apgar scoring was his heartbeat. That's it.

He recovered well from his birth and was a nursing pro. When he was just shy of three months old, he began having bowel and reflux issues. We thought maybe it was just reflux. We took him to a doctor who deals specifically with nursing babies and allergies/intolerances. She diagnosed him with MSPI (milk, soy protein intolerance), so those things were eliminated from my diet. But he still was not getting better, so we eliminated more and more things. Eventually, I went on TED, the Total Elimination Diet. I was able to only eat turkey or lamb, baked or boiled potatoes, sweet potatoes, rice or millet, squash, pears, and pear juice. That's not a lot of options. It was hard, but I did it. After two weeks' time, I was able to add items back in one at a time (much like you do when you are introducing solids to your baby for the first time) and then had to watch him to see if he began reacting to it. What we were able to determine was that he had intolerances to not only milk and soy but also to beef, eggs, nuts, hmm, there were more things but now I cannot remember them... Eventually (around 7-9 months of age), he was able to tolerate most of those foods in my diet in small quantities. He stopped nursing around 9 months old and we had him on a soy-based formula, then switched to regular formula. He began babbling and even saying a few words by a year old. Around 13 months though, he started reacting to something again, and at that point, we eliminated all of the foods we knew he had issues with prior to that. We even had him on goat's milk for awhile because he seemed to tolerate that but eventually, he began reacting to that as well, so we switched to rice milk for him instead. It was around this time that his world went silent. He didn't talk or babble anymore, but he was also learning to crawl and so we thought maybe his energies were tied up in mastering this feat. More and more though, he withdrew and after awhile, he wouldn't make eye contact either. He didn't play with the other kids, didn't really even acknowledge them. We made an appointment with his pediatrician.

His pediatrician ran a battery of tests to try to determine a physiological reason for his delays and regression. But there wasn't a physiological one. He referred us to our city's public school program.

At 19 months old, he had his first evaluation with the school system, at which point, he was diagnosed with PDD-NOS. Basically, PDD means across-the-board developmental delay. He was behind in EVERYTHING. From social and play skills to cognitive abilities to gross and fine motor skills. He had learned to walk just one week prior to the evaluation. The NOS part of the diagnosis means that there isn't a physiological explanation for it.

So, we started services. We had a wonderful home teacher, Jane, who came out about once a week to work with us and Boo and he gained quite a bit of ground while we worked with her. We worked with Jane from May 2009 until October 2010, when Boo enrolled in a traditional classroom setting.

We had two options for his classroom. One was more of an ECSE (Early Childhood Special Education) format, where most of the children have IEPs (Individual Education Plans) with a few peer models thrown in for balance. The other was basically an inversion of the first. Mostly peer models with a few kids who have IEPs. We chose the second one, feeling that it would be of the most benefit to the boy.

He has done wonderfully! He is still behind quite a bit socially but is catching up. His motor skills are just minimally behind, his play skills are also still fairly behind but we have seen some recent improvements in that as well.

For instance, we went to a classmate's birthday party a couple of months ago and the main activity was bowling. The event was slated to start at 11:00 sharp. We got there a few minutes prior but waited in the car until a few minutes before 11:00. We went inside and I let him run loose around the alley with the other kiddos (it was a confined area at a fun center and we were the only party in there). We didn't actually get started until around 11:15. That is a LONG time to wait for something fun to happen in Boo's world and I was fully prepared for the meltdown that I was pretty sure that would happen, but it didn't.

We started out on lane four, as you can see. The guy is the birthday boy's father. He was helping the kids bowl down the lanes (and we had bumpers for the kiddos too.) Boo was in a lane with two little girls that we didn't know. I think they were family or family friends, not classmates.



He had a hard time waiting for his turn to bowl, though no meltdowns there either. At one point, our lane broke. I don't know what the deal was, but of course, it was Boo's turn. I had just spent the last two kids' turns telling him that it was almost his turn and when we finally got up there, he got his ball and I had to stop him. "Not yet, Boo. The lane isn't ready. They are going to fix it though." So, he stood there patiently and my heart grew with pride about how well my little Boo Buddy was waiting. He stood there and held that 8 pound bowling ball for a full five minutes (it felt like an hour to me!) until they decided that the lane was unfixable and then worked us into another lane that already had three kids bowling in it.

And the kicker? He went from it being his turn to having to wait for FOUR children to bowl before it was his turn again. So in all, he had to wait for TWO children, then for a broken lane repair attempt, readjust to the new lane and then had to wait for FOUR more children to bowl. That was kind of difficult to explain to him. It was supposed to be HIS turn after all. But he took it in stride.

I think this is what helped. His little friend from school, Miss H. Isn't she a doll? So, I got to talking with Miss H's mom and she was telling me that H talks about Boo at home and I just stood there. Because while Boo talks, he doesn't exactly tell stories about things that he has done, people that he knows. All of his communication is in the moment or the immediate past (i.e. "Punky hit my back!" as he tattles on his sister, and even that has been a recent development).

I love this picture of Boo. I think it is probably one of his best. This is one that is going to go into our portfolio this year for his school. We have to make a portfolio of some of the family activities and things that we have done with him.

And then lastly, a shot of Boo with two of his classmates.

One really recent development with Boo has been in his communication. Although he doesn't really talk much about things that he has done, seen or experienced, I try to prompt him for information. After school one day recently, I asked him if he had played with Master C (the birthday boy in the above photos) and our conversation went like this:

Boo: "No. I play wif [Master M],"
Me : "You played with [Master M]?"
Boo: "Yes. I play wif [Master M]."
Me: "What did you play with [Master M]?"
Boo: "We play cars. Vroooooooom!"
Me: "You played cars with [Master M]! That sounds like fun. Was it fun?"
Boo: "Yes. Fun play cars wif [Master M]!"

That was the longest "conversation" we had ever had. It still might be.

I just love the way he talks! He has some really unique ways of saying things and he is very obsessed with letters and numbers. Some examples of Boo's language:

"Open hand!" This is said when someone is holding his hand or arm to keep him from running off. Instead of saying "let go", his command is "open hand". It would get the same result if obeyed, but is just a different way of saying it.

"Mommy, you home. I home." This is what he says to express that he missed me while I was at work. It doesn't matter if we are in our house or if I am picking him up from Grandma's or whatever. If he missed me, this is what he says. He also says this to express love. It's a situational phrase.

"Mommy, I find your blue!" He says this as he runs to me, holding either my (blue) phone or my (blue) camera. I tell him, "thank you Boo, for finding my blue phone!" He will look at me and say, "Blue phone!" and I will hold it up for him to look at and then repeat the phrase.

"Can I cars, please?" He just said this a moment ago. He wanted to go play with his cars, but he doesn't always use verbs in his sentences, so we give him permission as we rephrase his question, "Yes Boo, you may go play with cars."

He knows all of his alphabet letters on sight and can put the alphabet in order when using manipulatives. He also knows his numbers by sight up to 19 and can count up to 49 now. He also rote spells his name, his sister's name, JoNo's name (well, an abbreviation of JoNo's name but says it as the full name), as well as Mom and Dad. He does get stuck when spelling Dad or just refuses to spells it.

His Magna Doodle Jr. is his best play toy. I keep that in his backpack at all times if possible. No matter where we are or what we are doing, I can almost always get him back on task (or at least out of a meltdown) by using this toy to practice letters or numbers. He also knows the sound that each letter makes. He will spend quite a while "reading" letters off of signs or walls or whatever he can find. He loves it! A while back, I was dropping him off at church and he sat down and started "reading" the wall. "J-E-S-U-S-L-O-V-E-S-Y-O-U" It's all just one big long word to him, although he does recognize the words as separate items when I am reading to him.

And that is Mr Boo in a (VERY large) nutshell. He is such a joy to have around and to experience life with. The world is such a different place from his prospective. I love seeing things from his point of view. ♥ ♥ ♥

I am also going to link this up to Company Girl Coffee and