I can't like that

The intro to Floam was interesting...He was so excited when I showed it to him through the packaging. "What's that?" "It's floam, its like playdoh." "Like playdoh? Lemme see it." His excitement turned into instance disgust. But very pleasant disgust I might add. He just flicked it off his hand with a half-smile (I'm being an optimist here) on his face and simply said, "I can't like that."

So they went outside to play with the playdoh. Oh yeah, and I figured out that he really isn't playing with it. He uses the scissors (from the letter/number kit I just bought) to cut the playdoh into "cookies" and then the last cookie he just mutilates with the scissors. Today I passed by when he was having playdoh time with Cris, and saw him stacking the Playdoh containers into a tower (no playdoh was out except what Cris was playing with). Short lived love affair huh?

So do I dare reintroduce Floam in the same DAY? Why not? He had a decent response. So during my "shift," as I call it when Cris is off duty, I pulled it out and spread it over my hand like a glove, and he stressed out about that. "Gotta take it off, mommy." Then I tried to flatten it to see if I could use the letter stamps, but that didn't work. It crackles a little bit as you mash it and I think that might have been hurting his ears by the way he was shying away from it. Finally I put it all back into the tub, no lid. I started playing with the younger who LOVES playdoh, and he's learning a few letters here and there. All of a sudden I hear, "Look mommy...holes." He was poking his finger into the Floam and there were about 10-12 finger indentions in the tub! So I made a bigger hole and called it a swimming pool, and then I made "stalagmites" and called them trees (which really impressed him by the way). He tried to make trees by picking a little bit and stretching it up (if you've ever played with Floam, that just doesn't quite work). So a little bit was picked off inadvertently and I asked him to roll it into a ball. "It's too small" So I gave him a bigger chunk, and he made a "ball" with it! He still had some stress lines going on on his forehead but he was really trying. Next thing you know I took the whole slab out of the tub and held it to him to let him squeeze it. I finally got this shot of him going "solo" with the stuff.
WOW, what a day!

Another part of today's WOW day was it was his first Cherub Choir rehearsal ever. I took him to his class and they were all sitting in a circle and he comes in and plops in the middle. Ms. N shows him where he needs to sit and he listened (he was still in the middle of the circle but not so obvious-we haven't told anyone at church about his diagnosis yet). I didn't see him again until they were dismissed 30 minutes later, and he came running out saying "mommy!" and ran to give me a hug. I was shocked and elated at the same time. Glad no one knew about his AS because no one would have believed me! On the way home, I tried to get him to tell me about his experience. "I can't say it." Then I went into the detailed questions, "Was Henry there?" "Yeah" "Did you sing a song? "Yeah" etc. He did try to tell me something but I'm not really sure what that might have been. But when we were almost home he said, "I like going to school." Wow wowee!! A clear, complete sentence AND describing an emotion!!!

I'm a happy mommy today!

[Newsflash: The younger just successfully used the potty for the first time! Could this day get any better?]