9/2/08 Update

Saturday Dad took Ben to Grandma's to go to the zoo so Tyler and I spent some one on one time together. I had him in and out of the car a lot more than normal since it was much much easier with just him and not Ben too and it gave me a good chance to work with Tyler out in public and in new settings. We also went ot the park and went swimming, Tyler and Mom both had a great time. Ben had a great time at Grandma's too. I am adding a video of him feeding the giraffes.

Tyler did some pretty cool things last night. As most of you know, Tyler isn't really that over fond of eating. He does it because he has too but in general, if he could get by in life w/o eating, I think he'd be happy about that. So mealtime is a "routine" we work on and it's always a work in progress. Sometimes he'll eat mostly on his own with utensils if you put the food no teh utinsil, sometimse you have to feed him almost every bite, sometimes he'll sit down happily in his chair sometimes it's a struggle just to get him to bend his legs, sometimes we have to use books as a support to get him to eat, sometimes he'll eat without any of the distractors, it just depends on teh day or even the meal. But what I've never known is whether or not he understands the phrase "time to eat". The only way you nkow what kids understand is if they respond to your request or sentence and since he doesn't care to eat, he typically doesn't respond. Last night I was at the table and Tyler was in the foyer, and i said "tyler it's time to eat" and he came running to his chair, yeah! I know most of you probably don't think this is a big deal but it's huge to me because as of a few months ago he didn't respond to any of my "verbal" requests, meaning, no gestures, no signs, no prompting, etc. and now he did for something he really doesn't like to do. That's huge!

Play group went very well today. The other little girl in the group was sick so it was just Tyler and me and then 4 other woman from U of M. Since it was just him, it really gave them a chance to get to know Tyler and his skills and how he communicatse and what his likes and dislikes are. We've been having a lot of trouble getting Tyler to go into Dad's car after playgroup but also in general, he doesn't like to get into the car seat in dad's car. We tried a new strategy today and it went well so we are going to use the new strategy for a while and try to break his bad behavior cycle. Usually Dad meets us in the parking structure which is about a 5 minute walk from the room Tyler and I are in. Today, I had dad meet us in the play room and gave dad a "new" toy to give Tyler once he sat in his seat as well as a fresh class of juice. I'd stay behind in the room until they were well on their way. He fussed a little at first when I wasn't walking out with them but dad worked through that. I called Dad on his way to take T yler to daycare and he said everythign went smoothly, yeah. With Tyler it's all about planning ahead a few steps and then changing routines if they aren't working.