Week 67

This week we said goodbye to Noah's Ark.  Tuesday was the last day and the kids were sad to leave. Both Ryan and Julia had a lot of fun there and we will always have great memories of the place.  The kids loved Ms. Jessie so much that Julia insisted that Dawn send her an invitation to her birthday party.  

On Wednesday, Grandma came to visit and brought presents.  She brought Ryan a "some Assembly required" firetruck by Melissa and Doug.  Ryan insisted that we put it together right after dinner. Ryan sat very patiently next to me the entire time as I assembled it.  He was very excited and kept handing me different pieces as I put it all together.



Waiting patiently
















Finished product
















Julia's jewelry box.




















Dawn and the kids went up to Nonna's and Papa's house for the last part of the week.  They had such a great time and to top it off Tommy, Beckie, Amelia and Alyssa came up as well.  As you can see from the pictures that the four kids all had a great time together.
  


All together in the pool




Taking a ride with Uncle T!




Hanging out in the swing


















All in the tent!






New box GF Sugar Cones...Ryan was so proud and enjoyed these so much!




Trying out the Quad with Uncle T!




Driving Papa's Vette!



Video of kids in the pool.

Video of Ryan driving papa's Corvette.



Hanging out with Amelia!

  



Convincing Auntie B to use her iPhone! Ryan has Ipad withdrawal!





Swimming in the deep end with no swimmies!  



I Love my Mommy!  



In our friend Larry's boat on the Hudson River; passing by a barge.

Ryan as co-captain!

Excited to see a train go by!



We were skeptical if he would like the noise and motion, but he really enjoyed himself!



PC

Week 66

The kids being silly...

 

After weeks of watching Julia jump in the pool Ryan finally did it on his own.  He wouldn't jump in unless I was in the pool and holding his hand while he jumped from the edge.  For a while he did this and got a big kick out of my parents on the sidelines clapping for him.  But then they said they weren't going to clap anymore unless he did it all by himself without holding on to my hand.  Well he was so excited to have people clap for him that he did it on his own!  Here is a video of one of his solo jumps... (and he clapped for himself!)

 

With all of this swim time he's had this summer, Ryan's skin is super hydrated.  It is sooooo soft!  It hasn't been this smooth and soft since he was a little baby.  

And nonna's and papa's house is not just about the pool.  Here are some other activities the kids enjoyed...

Who needs to walk to go pick up the mail when you can hitch a ride in the wagon on papa's lawn mower?

Couldn't resist... their faces are just priceless in this shot!

Julia looks as happy as can be but Ryan looks a little unsure of Julia driving all by herself!

A true backseat driver.

 
In this video, papa wants her to turn left and she goes the wrong way.  Ryan is not very forgiving of her mistake... but it is still so cute (and funny) to watch!

Ryan quickly got the hang of the slip and slide.

He even tried it face first which was a pleasant surprise since he doesn't like to get his face wet.

On the food front, I baked from scratch GFCF egg free cupcakes for Ryan because we ran out of our supply in the freezer.  I modified a recipe I sometimes use and they came out great.  You can't even tell they aren't regular chocolate cupcakes.  They were so moist, which is a difficult feat to master when baking GF dessert items, especially without using eggs.  The trick was using Vegan mayonnaise.

This weekend we visited our friends Angela and Michael in their new home in Brooklyn.  On the way down the kids were looking through the mail in the backseat. Ryan was reading through a grocery store flyer and he found the bakery section.  He proudly announced that they had a cake for $7 but it isn't "gluten free Ryan cake"!  We got a good chuckle with that one.  Ryan was very excited to play video games and watch Michael play Mario Brothers on the Wii.  Below are some pictures and a video. 

Attached at the hip, and sitting the same way!

Notice Ryan's left hand holding on to Michael!

In front of the "Welcome Ryan & Julia" sign on the door.

As you can see, Ryan became very attached to Michael as he always does when we get together with them.  And Julia clung to Angela.  Several times on the ride home the kids said they were going to miss Angela and Michael, and Ryan said, "I miss my friend."

I brought him up to bed a few minutes ago and Ryan says to me, "Tomorrow after camp I want to go to someone's house."  When I asked him whose house he replied, "Someone that has glasses and someone that doesn't have glasses, Michael and Angie."  What an observant sweetie!

DC

Week 65

It is already late Sunday night and after spending a good portion of the day with the kids in the pool, I'm exhausted.  So this week's blog is going to be short and sweet. 

Ryan had a great week with lots of different people.  He participated in cookie day, pizza day, and arts and crafts day at camp.  We went to our friend Donna's pool and Ryan did a nice job socializing with her and her family.  While upstate at my parents' house, Phil's friend Kim came for a visit and although Ryan didn't remember him, he was not shy at all.  He spent a lot of time with him in the pool.  Then the next day Ryan interacted with my great Aunt Teresa and Uncle Mario.  It's nice to see him not shy away from people as much as he used to. 

I'd also like to share a quick story.  Ryan and Julia were sitting at the table with company eating an ice cream treat.  Ryan finished his and asked for more.  It was close to bedtime and I really didn't want to give him more.  But I also didn't want him to have a meltdown in front of everyone, because as many of you know, Ryan has a difficult time dealing with situations where he doesn't get his way.  So I say to him, "You know Ryan, you really had a lot of ice cream already, do you think that was enough or do you really need more?"  And he calmly says to me, "Okay, I had enough."  Oh my goodness, boy was I SHOCKED!  I couldn't believe it; I was so proud of him.  For those of you who know Ryan, you can appreciate what a big deal this is and how far he has come.

Below are a few pictures from this week.  Enjoy!

Ryan having fun in nonna and papa's pool.

Ryan and Julia attacking Kim!

 

Ryan with Ms. Jessie at camp.



Enjoying his GFCF pizza on Pizza Day at camp.

 

Our little monkey!

DC

Week 64

 Castle

This week we decided to stop off at the Olana house in Hudson, NY.  This is right by the Rip Van Winkle Bridge on the eastern side of the Hudson River.  We have passed it several times and the kids always wanted to see the castle on the hill.  So we decided on Monday, July 4th to stop off and see it on the way home.  When we got there the kids insisted that we go into the castle.  The bad part is the the tours go every half hour and we had to wait 20 minutes for the next one to begin.  When we got in, Ryan immediately wanted to know where the toys were.  We have no idea where he got it in his head that the castle had toys but he looked in every room wanting to know if this was the room with the toys.  The tour lasted 45 minutes and they did great for the first 40 minutes.  However, they were getting really antsy the last five minutes.  Luckily we only chose the 45 minute tour and not the 70 minute one.















We drove by the castle again yesterday and Ryan looked up and said that he did not want to go to that castle, he wanted to go to the toy castle, not the art castle.  There was only art in there and no toys!  I guess we will have to wait before we take him to any more Art Museums.

View of the Rip Van Winkle Bridge from Olana

We went upstate to Dawn's parents this weekend for a family friend's 70th Birthday Party.  Staying at their house with us was Dawn's cousin Guy and his wife Elaine.  They were just recently married and this was the first time that we had seen them since their wedding.  Both Ryan and Julia were so excited to see them and they are both so good with our kids.  Guy wanted to make his special potato home fries but knew that Ryan could not eat all of the ingredients.  So he cooked Ryan his own huge bowl of potatoes thinking that he would take some home.  Ryan ate the whole bowl!  Guy was so happy that Ryan liked his potatoes that they posed for a picture together.  

 Ryan loves the water but still does not like to get his face wet or go under the water.  Even though he is able to touch the bottom he still insists on wearing swimmies or a ring so that he does not go under.  He had such a great time in the three different pools that he went into this week. Yes, I wrote three different pools.  He started off the week in Papa and Nonna's pool, went into our neighbors pool on Tuesday, visited friends who had a pool in their condo complex on Thursday, and ended the week back in Papa and Nonna's pool.  

While upstate this weekend, we visited a family friend, Sherry, who owns two horses.  These were very gentile horses that were very excited to see different people.  Julia had no fear about going up to them, feeding them, and even sitting on the back of one of them.  Ryan was very nervous around the horses.  He fed one of them a carrot but I had to hold the carrot with him and he let go almost immediately.  After Julia went on one of them, we tried to get Ryan on the back of the same one.  I was able to lift him up but once I tired to put him on the horse's back he started to yell that he was too afraid and wanted me to put him down.  I did not want to scare the horse so I let him down and he backed away.  He was very concerned when he was going to get back into the car about where the two dogs were that Sherry owned.  He still does not like dogs and is extremely afraid of them. 

Both Julia and Ryan are still so competitive with each other.  They have to win getting to the bathroom to wash their hands, playing a game, getting their shoes both on and off, and who is going to open the door first when company arrives.  We hope that this is something that they grow out of quickly because right now Ryan is stronger and faster.  But in a few years, Julia is going to catch up and Ryan hates to lose.  He has a fit when he does not win and he sulks in the corner for 20 minutes.  However, Julia is starting to realize this and will taunt him when she gets somewhere first.  This is something that we will have to watch and hopefully they will grow out of this quickly before it becomes a bigger problem than it already is.  



Ryan is still making huge, elaborate train sets on the floor almost every week. It is great to see that he is really getting into the pretend play with the different train characters.  He is even using different trains from different sets to pretend that they are a particular character when he does not have that particular one in the Thomas set.  He truly enjoys his Thomas and Friends sets and has a lot of fun putting them together.

PC

Week 63

Ryan had a great Fourth of July weekend!  Let's start with the brownies.  There are lots of GF, and even many GFCF brownie recipes and box mixes out there, but it is not always easy to find an egg free mix.  Cherrybrook Kitchen makes a GFCF egg free brownie mix.  It's an okay tasting brownie, but the best part is that it is easy to make.  It doesn't call for a lot of ingredients and it is convenient in a pinch.  Making a recipe from scratch may give better tasting results, but Ryan really seems to enjoy these!



For his PARC graduation Ryan received a Melissa and Doug wooden train to paint from grandma.  He's asked several times and it was never a good time to take out the paints and work on this project with Ryan.  But this week we finally had an opportunity to work on it.  He sat with me for about an hour gluing the wheels on the axel, painting the train, and putting on the decals.  Ryan did most of it by himself.  He was patient and he tried really hard to do a good job.  He looked at the picture on the box and wanted his train to look exactly the same. 



So proud of the finished product!



Video:  Ryan's train

Ryan and Julia checking out the tent at papa's house

roasting marshmallows





Ryan having fun in the pool with his family





This week Ryan also went to camp at Noah's Ark for four days.  Besides swimming both morning and afternoon Ryan participated in lots of other activities.  Here are some pictures that were posted by the staff at Noah's Ark.

Ryan making pretzels with Ms. Jessie

Yes, he's petting a snake!



The class made smores one day.  Ryan couldn't eat the chocolate and graham crackers but he still looks so happy with his friends and content just eating the marshmallow.

I'll end with a quote that I just read on the Autism Speaks Facebook page:

"To succeed in life, you need three things: a wishbone, a backbone and a funnybone." -Reba McEntire


DC