Soap Carving, Auditory Testing, Sleepover!

Last Friday, Nico pulled out his pocket knife and started carving his soap figure for Cub Scouts. He decided on a horse.

For Saturday movie night, Nico chose Ferdinand as the movie to watch. We couldn't find it available to rent on Amazon Prime, but we did see that it was available at the RedBox at M&W Market. So Nico and I walked over there to rent it. As we were leaving I hear someone yell, "Joanna!" and it's Guy, he had stopped at M&W to get gas after he was done running errands, so we rode home with him.

Ferdinand is a VERY good movie. And the pizza, was VERY good.

Earlier on Saturday Nico and I completed his shelf by adding book ends, a pencil holder, and wrapping the edges with a bumper so that he wouldn't bonk his head at night. Here's how it looks!

On Sunday we celebrated Papa's birthday at Smokey Mountain Pizza. I can't believe I got NO pictures from it! But it was fun, Nico and Lexie played games in the arcade, and it was fun to get together, have some food, eat some cake, and celebrate PA!

Bright and early Monday morning was Nico's Auditory Processing testing. We drove out to Amity Elementary school to meet with the audiologist. She remembers Nico from Madison Elementary, where she had come to test all the kiddos' hearing. 

Nico went into a soundproof room, and the audiologist went into a different one that was connected by a window they could see each other through. I couldn't hear what they were saying to each other, but I did have a pair of headphones next to me that let me hear what Nico was hearing.  He had to go through a gamut of testing.

He had to pick out what someone was saying in one ear, with background noise coming in to the other. He had to identify "High" or "Low" for a series of tones, repeat words that were said in one ear, at the same time as a different word in the other ear. "Which word did you hear in your left ear?"

She said this kind of testing can be hard on kids and that they often take breaks, and indeed we did. Nico needed two breaks. The first one, she came out of her room first and said, "That last one was hard on him so we're going to take a break." He was discouraged that he couldn't get them all right and it was really getting him down. She told us while we were on the break that from what she was seeing that he's actually doing better than most kids his age. That seemed to cheer him up a bit.

The final report was what she had reported earlier - that for all the tests he did, overall he was testing better than kids his age. This means he has NO auditory issues! 

The only somewhat "off" thing is the reflexes in his left ear. Like you can test your knee reflexes by hitting them, they test ear reflexes by sending sound into the ear and measuring the reflex response. She said that the reflexes in his left ear are not quite what they should be. 

Alos, throughout the testing she saw that he favored his right ear and could generally understand things better when heard through his right ear. She said typically kids tend to favor their right ear. The language center is on the left side of the brain, and when someone hears something in their right ear it goes straight to the left side of the brain, so the response is quick. When something comes in through the left ear, it goes straight to the right side of the brain, so in order to get to the language center it has to cross the hemisphere over to the left, which takes a bit longer and is more pronounced in children.

I think they're mostly done with all the testing at school, and we'll talk about the results in a few weeks at another meeting.

On Tuesday, Guy took Nico to Cub Scouts only to find out they weren't meeting that night. Doh!

Wednesday morning I left on a trip and am still there - in Northern California at a conference. I will return home next Monday.

Nico stayed with Guy Wednesday, and today my Mom picked him up from school after Drama Club. Nico wanted to show her his classroom, so he took her in there, and his teacher was still there, so she was able to meet his teacher. Grandma said she was sweet and that she loves Nico.

Bruce and Rory are also staying the night tonight at Papa's and Grandma's. Mom sent me a picture of a snack bar she made for everyone tonight that was a hit! 

And here is Pa reading to Nico before bed. From here it looks like a Richard Scarry book!

Ok that's it for this week!

Pinewood Derby!

Last Friday was the Pinewood Derby. Out of 30+ cars, Nico came in 18th. He was very excited. Each car races 4 times and then the scores are tallied up to determine the winners. Since him and Guy had spent so much time working on the car, I think Nico was expecting a bit more winning. His very first of 4 races he came in last place against 3 other cars. The look on his face was sad (checkout video at end of blog), but then in the next race he got 3rd place out of 4 cars and he was SUPER excited! At the end, each person was given an award, Nico got the Lean Green Racing Machine Award. He was very happy about that.

When we first got there, it was imperative to have a little play time first. The other kids were crawling through the chairs and Nico joined right in.

The MC was joking at first about how we'd be there until midnight because Pinewood Derby races take a long time, especially with a whole bunch of kids. But, she explained the rules and the kids generally followed through. We were done in about an hour and a half. When it's time to pay attention, you put two fingers up in the air.

 3rd place in one of the races

 Afterward. Digging the baby interaction in the background.

On Saturday we tackled the huge task of cleaning out under Nico's bed and organizing his toys.

Organization central. We got rid of a trash bag full of stuff.

Afterward.

For pizza that night, Guy chose The Fuller Brush Man to watch, prompted in his desire by a nostalgic text from Grandma Russell about the movie. "Wanna buy a brush?" It's a black and white comedy/murder mystery, and Nico and I both really enjoyed it! I am delighted the way that Nico has been interested in a variety of movies. We were able to watch the movie downstairs, as Jeff and Allicia and the kiddos were out of town for the weekend.

Nico loves the vest that GG got him for Christmas. He wears it almost every day and he says it's his "Lucky Vest" because GG got it for him. He wore it to church on Sunday.

On Sunday afternoon, Nico went over to "the boys' house", and soon came back over with 2 of the boys. Since Jeff and Allicia were out of town, Guy and I retreated to the basement so they could play in the Clubhouse as loud as they wanted. 

On Monday, Nico didn't have school, so he came with me to my parents' house where my mom and I were going to do some work together. After lunch Papa took Nico to the park. They batted for a little bit and then Nico played on the playground. It was windy! Papa said they both stopped for a minute to listen to the wind in the trees.

Nico's been on a kick with taking things apart. He has been searching for things to take apart and then put back together. He took apart his remote control car and the remote, some of his game and some of his cars. When Rylan came over on Wednesday, he helped Nico with one of them. Then they went outside with Guy to try to fix the turn signal on the car, as part of the "taking things apart" campaign.

Wednesday morning we had Nico's yearly IEP meeting for speech (Individualized Education Program). In a few weeks we are having his 3 year review. They re-evaluate his need for speech services every 3 years, so he is going to be going through some testing in the next few weeks to determine needs. I love talking about Nico with other adults that know him. We had to list strengths, Guy and I came up with a list, but then hearing a list of strengths from his teacher was very nice. Nico's strengths:

He is very outgoing, makes friends easily, is not scared to be the center of attention when speaking in front of the class, is funny, gentle, interested in a lot of things, loves organizing things and loves science and understanding how things works. 

Nico is reading the next Tom Gates book, and is enjoying Press Start books, he checked out three of those from the library today.

That's is for this week, enjoy the video!

Preschool Program, Cabin

On Friday was Nico's preschool program. Grandma Salisbury and I were there. You can see a video of clips from it at the bottom of this entry!

Then over the weekend we were able to go to the cabin TWICE. Nico and I went up on Saturday to hang out and eat lunch. We saw Grandma on her walk once we got to their subdivision, so we picked her up. The first thing Nico said to her: "Do you have a lego for me at the cabin?" hehe.. turns out, she did! We had a great time there. Nico and Papa spent some time chopping wood, of course! Then I think he helped Papa build a fire. Here's some of the prizes Nico came home with. A glow-stick flag mask, and a hat with a big red spider printed on it. He wanted me to take a picture of him like this.

Then on Sunday we went to the cabin again! Papa picked up Nico after church to take him out there, and then once Guy woke up, him and I headed out there too for a family BBQ. Lots and lots of fun.

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, don't remember much of those days. Nico had school I guess! Not much more of that left.

Oh, right, on Monday Guy took him to his Summer Literacy Academy testing, to see where he's at with his letters and sounds before the Academy starts in June. Nico was apparently quite uncooperative and didn't respond to any questions after reciting the ABCs.

We've been having what I like to call "limp Nico syndrome" where he takes a big sigh and then just goes limp. That's kind of what happened on Monday.

Now I'm remembering more! On Wednesday I had his parent-teacher conference with Teacher Chris from Beautiful Savior Preschool. She told me that he was right on course for everything, except a little behind emotionally.

The fort Nico built today.

Videos... First one is him playing with a huge puddle outside with a big stick while waiting for the bus. The second one is clips from his preschool program.