FINALLY....an Explosion in Speech!

For anyone who has followed me, or my journey with Jacob, you know that speech has been one of our biggest struggles.

Getting ready to go to speech therapy! 

Not only is he getting 30 minutes of speech at school each day, but he has another 30 minutes per week at a private agency.

Jacob's progress has been excruciatingly slow.  But there's been progress, nonetheless.  When he started at Youthful Horizons, he was essentially mute.  He didn't even grunt much.  We had him using Geminii system, but he got bored quickly.  And I think that's because the Geminii system is geared more towards people with Autism.  There was very little emotion in the programs, and it relied heavily on repetition.  All good things, don't get me wrong.  But he was bored. So we topped out on his progress pretty quickly, then backslid for a while. And, at $99/month for the program, we couldn't afford to keep using something that wasn't working.

About that time, we found Debbie at Youthful Horizons She and Jake have been an awesome fit.  She's mellow, nice, and she has all the best toys--at least Jacob seems to think so!

I've learned to appreciate the process of learning to talk.  First there is learning to push out air forcefully enough to make noise. Then you must learn to control your muscles enough to manipulate your lips enough to create specific sounds. And don't forget about placement of the tongue, jaw, and awareness of the cheeks, face, and other muscles.  All of these things had to be addressed in proper progression, while concurrently teaching him other means of communication via the PECS system and more sign language to enable communication RIGHT NOW.

Jacob is nearly 6 1/2 now.  Sign language is still his primary language, but now he's added a few words to his vocabulary.  He can say things like purple, bye, dad, mom (pronounced ba), Elisha (pronounced uheesa), he calls Courtney (seesa), bus, please (pronounced psss), blue (boo), there it is, that, dog, Craig (his PT), and occasionally, when he's in a good mood, I'll here his say Debbie.  13 words and 1 phrase. 

I'll TOTALLY take it!

And on those days when I'm frustrated that he still prefers to yell rather than use his words, I remind myself that we couldn't understand his older brother (who is normally functioning and actually quite smart) until he was 12! 

Patience, grasshopper.  Patience.

Kindergarten? Already?? Where Has Time Gone?

How can it possibly be a year since my last post?  I know life has been crazy busy around here, but seriously?  I sit here scratching my head wondering where time has flitted off to and I'm ashamed.  So many wonderful stories I could of shared, but I haven't.  So, let me glaze over some of the highlights of the past 12 months. 

Speech:  Jacob is making progress.  Not as quickly as I'd like, of course, but there is progress.  He's beginning to say words like bunny, ball, bubbles, peaches, there is it, this, dad, juice, etc.  He is attempting to say prayers at night, and speech has progressed from learning sounds, to emphasizing words.  Do Jake and I have conversations? No.  But I can see marked improvements since last year, and I'm happy with them.

Physical Therapy:  Jacob has spent months in the pool with Craig, our physical therapist.  Not necessarily because Jake needs to learn how to swim (although he does), but because he is so incredibly strong, that the water is the only place that Jake doesn't feel comfortable. Craig needed Jake to learn to trust him and follow instructions before he could teach him anything. After several months in the pool, Jake has finally graduated to "dry land" and is now learning how to follow instructions rather than flopping on the ground and trying to overpower us.   Jake has calmed considerably in the last several months.  And, although he isn't perfect, I don't have to worry about him running into traffic any more either.  This summer was the first summer I didn't have to follow around behind him in the backyard for fear he'd try to climb the fence and run for the streets.  Thank goodness!  He is finally beginning to calm down and be a boy who follows instructions...about 30% of the time now. 

Our family has been on many adventures to places like the park, Yellowstone, go-carting, and other stuff.  

 We were sure Yellowstone would involve lots of running after Jake, or making him wear some sort of harness or leash, but he was perfectly happy holding someone's hands, or on our shoulders discovering with the rest of us.  It was in-cred-i-ble!!!

Is he perfect? Nope.  There are still days when he flops.  Okay, he flops just about every day.  But it's not all day, every day.  Now it's once or twice a day.

His personality is beginning to blossom too.  He loves to laugh, and play, and discover.  His  brain is always absorbing and learning; processing.  One of the most enlightening things I experienced as a mom was when I let him run free with the hose.  I never knew something so simple as a hose with running water would be so remarkable to Jake, but he played with it for hours.  Not just filling the kiddie tub, but spraying the dirt, and seeing the cause & effect of the water stream, and how changing the flow of water changed what happened to the dirt, or  how hard the water was when it left the hose.  He discovered how to make mud, made puddles in the grass and jumped, and how pouring water into the air conditioning fan made all the water fling back up into the air like rain droplets.

Bubbles were a big thing this year too.  He's mastered the wand, how to adjust this blows to make big bubbles and small bubbles. Catching them on the wand, etc. Bubbles are one of his favorite things to do. Oh, how I love to watch him learn and grow. And to be a little boy.

He LOVES his big brother, and spends as much time as he can with him.  They play a hunting video game and Jake helps him find the Moose, or Nate adds a hunting dog to the game that runs around on screen while they're walking and Jake loves to watch the dog and point at him.

I love watching Nathan signing to Jake during church, or wrestling with him on the living room floor, or even when he falls asleep next to him at bedtime.

These boys make my heart swell!  I am one lucky mama.

Jacob has changed so much over the last year.  Much too much to describe in one blog.  But I can tell you this much:  Kindergarten will be the year of CHANGE.

My daughter, the artist

My daughter is an amazing artist.  It's quite disgusting actually.  She also plays Division I sports, was offered scholarships for singing, is a commissioned artist, was ASB president in high school, and has succeeded in nearly everything she's ever put her mind to.

I told you. Disgusting.  In an absolutely fabulous sort of way, of course.  Who am I to complain? Besides,   I'm writing a series of Young Adult novels about her.


She has her very own website called AllredArtistry.com where she displays some of her past art. And, as a favor to me, she agreed to product test some canvases for me.

I received a variety of canvases - 24 to be exact - ranging in size from 3X5" to 8X10".

These canvases are low-profile, which means they lay flat on the table.

I wasn't sure what to think of the canvases when I received them, but she was extremely excited. She wound up making a wall clock for her new apartment, as well as making a wedding gift for a friend out of the remaining pieces.  How does this girl come up with her ideas?

I don't know either.  But that girl is sure talented!




* I received these canvases for free in exchange for an honest and unbiased review.