Update on the kids

Nate
We had a parent-teacher conference last week, where I had a chance to talk with Nate's main teacher as well as the special education co-teacher who works with him. He is reading at the level they want him to be at by the end of the school year. He is such a good little reader and can figure out just about anything. I'm so proud!

He's right where he needs to be in all areas except handwriting. It's still pretty atrocious, but he's improving. Previously we had made a plan to cut out the "social skills" class that was pulling him out of his regular classroom because his teachers contend he has no problems with social skills. Awesome! (This was one of our big worries as he entered Kindergarten.) We talked about ways to get him more one-on-one help with handwriting during the school day, but the problem is he is out of school every Thursday for outside physical and occupational therapies, and on Wednesdays and Fridays he goes to Speech Therapy during writing time. So that just leaves Mondays and Tuesdays for extra help. That's when I asked why in the world my chatterbox child has 2 days of speech! I mean, I know why he has speech--to work on answering questions appropriately, etc. But twice a week seems a little much. So we all agreed to drop one day of speech so he would have more time in class to work on writing. In fact, the speech therapist says she is sure he will no longer qualify for speech after this year! That's great news! (If it was OT or PT, that would be a different story.)

So then I asked the question: Are we still on the same page that Nate will repeat Kindergarten next year? They looked at each other. And the Special Education teacher said, "We really have no justification for holding him back." He's right on track for academics and social skills. Oh wow. I have such mixed feelings about this. I'm ecstatic that he has caught up so much after being out of Kindergarten for four months in the fall. What a smart boy! But I've just had it in my head and in my gut for months now that he would repeat Kindergarten. I guess I would rather have him repeat Kindergarten than have to repeat 3rd grade.

I mentioned my concerns. First is the handwriting. Well, we have a plan to work on that. (And to be honest, I saw some of those kids' handwriting on Valentines, and they aren't much better!) Second is that he's still in pull ups. But we are working on an appointment with a great doctor to work on at least bowel continence, and I think we can get there before school starts in the fall. And the third thing is his self help skills. He currently has a great aid that works on his independence at school. Like if he is washing his hands and tells her he needs soap, she tells him to get it himself. Lol! I love that!

Nate will have a very thorough evaluation this year for his IEP, so we will wait to see how that turns out and how the rest of the year goes. We can talk it over with the guidance counselor and his therapists too to get their input. We certainly haven't made up our mind yet. But 1st grade may be more of a possibility than we thought.

Tonight Nate came home with a special bag in his backpack. He is Star Student this week! That means he gets to be the teacher's special helper and the line leader (heaven help them get down the hallway with pokey leading them!), and he gets to share about himself. So there was a poster that he got to color and put pictures of himself and his family and his favorite foods. And he wrote his favorite color (blue) and favorite book (a train book) and what he wants to be when he grows up (engineer). He wrote his friends' names (Spencer, Eddie, Cade, and Georgia) and where he lived (in a house, haha). Then he was supposed to gather some items to do a little show and tell about himself. He chose a train (Gordon) plus a caboose to one of his model trains, his drum sticks and harmonica, a couple baby pictures, his stuffed turtle (we could not pack Seal the Sea Lion because we wouldn't get him back until Friday, and how would either of them sleep at night?), AND last but not least his Redefining Spina Bifida shirt. I quizzed him a little about Spina Bifida to see what he would say about the shirt. First he said, "That's where you work." Well, that's true. But then we discussed that meant he had a hole in his back when he was a baby, and it's also why he had surgery last fall. Let's hope he represents well.

Georgia
Poor Georgia has been sick twice in the past month. The first time she had an unexplained high fever for days and days. We took her to the doc once and got an antibiotic because she seemed to have an upper respiratory infection. Finally after 5 days of high fevers, I took her back to the doctor. He told me to take off her shirt so he could listen to her, and voila! She was spotted. She had roseola! Usually when the spots come out is when the fever goes away, and that happened with her too.

Two weeks later, she started feeling sick again. Very stuffy, bad cough. She was in the bed with us one night (more on this later), and out of the blue says, "My ear hurts." I am so happy that she can tell me what is wrong with her. You just don't appreciate that until you have a screaming baby and not a clue as to what is wrong. We got her ear treated, and got her cough checked out too--it's fine. She's still not 100%, but she's much better finally.

When she was sick, she got in the habit of sleeping in my and Blake's bed. Blake thinks it's a great idea to have the kids sleep with us when they are sick. And I always know it's a bad idea, but when they come in at 3 am, I sometimes don't even notice until morning. After several nights of this, it was time for Georgia to go back to her room. Oh, she really didn't like that. We had one terrible night of getting up every 15 minutes to put her back in bed. (I would have given any amount of money to have the crib back that night.) And every time she would scream her head off. Awful night. And since then, she has still had trouble staying in bed most nights, but I think it's finally getting better (knock on wood).

But her tantrums are really, really bad right now. She is SO good at being two. I bet my two year old can throw a better tantrum than your two year old. Blake took her to pick up Nate one day, and she threw a really good one in the floor in the middle of all the other parents. Then I made the mistake of attempting to take her to Nate's OT appointment one evening. The real victim was the poor woman who had to share a waiting room with us. Screaching, screaming, time outs, smacking (her smacking me, not the other way around), etc. So we're dealing with it, but it's not the most fun stage Georgia has had. I guess the terrible twos just showed up a little late. And I know what happens after 2 and that it doesn't get better for awhile!

And now I think we're pretty well caught up after my month off from blogging. :)