7/7/08

Hope everyone enjoyed their holiday weekend. The boys had an excellent weekend as the weather was perfect and we were able to spend a lot of time outdoors. Here is a video of me working with Tyler. It's just a short clip but there are a lot of positive things to say about it. Working with Tyler outdoors is tricky because there is so much going on outside, he's easily distracted and has a hard time paying attention to anything. Also, since this clip involves water play, it's also very tricky to get him to engage because he loves water so much, it's almost always more fun than mom. But in this instance, he actually kept coming to get me to come play with him. I was testing him and would play for a few mintues and then go sit down and he'd walk over and get me and bring me back to the ball. In the clip you'll see him touch the ball, he wants me to tell him the color that he's touching. He loves "labelling" so the first color I tell him. Then he hits a different color and I wait to label it until he looks at me (joint attention; eye gaze) and then I gave him the label. We were really excited because it's the first time he's sought me out to play with him during water play, usually I"m trying to insert myself into it and get him to want to play with me. Plus this comes at a time that we are really struggling with Tyler. The past 2 weeks have been tough as he's just not himself. He's more stimmy than usually, having trouble sitting still, shaking his head back and forth, etc. he hasn't had very many vocals. he's also still more aggressive/resistant than normal. Pulling his brothers hair, not wanting to take his dish to the table, not wanting to sit in his chair. Usually on our walks, there is one area he struggles with (wants to go a different direction) this weekend, we had quite a few areas that he did not want to want to go the direction we were going. Yesterday he was very resistant to go into his car seat which is really really rare. He was arching his back and pushing himself down to teh point I was struggling to ensure he didn't hang himself on the part I had already latched as he was almost completely out of the seat. You'd be amazed at how strong he can be when he's trying to resist. Anyway, that's what makes this video so special because he was really engaged and wanting to play.