Target Verbs

Eat        Sleep        Shake     Touch     Sit

Read     Smile        Play        Draw      Crawl

Drink     Jump        Kick        Pet         Walk

Clap      Bounce     Brush      Hug        Tickle

Lick       Paint         Pull         Wiggle    Roll

Whisper Chew        Go          Run        Open

Peel      Fly           Write      Turn       Wave

Smell     Close        Cry         Lift         Bang

Spell

Target Nouns

Body

Nose     Eyes         Ears        Cheeks   Chin

Mouth    Teeth        Tongue   Feet       Hands

Fingers                 

Giraffe   Fingers      Tub        Crayon    Monkey       Clown

Bicycle   Penguin     Girl         Candy     Pizza   Table

Tractor  Dress        Toes       Merry Go Round Puzzle        Hippo

Vacuum Button      Boy        Ice cream Tree   

Motorcycle            Egg        Watermelon      Sweater     Woman

            Potty        Pajamas  Umbrella Carrots        Mouse

Tummy  Turtle       Sand       Glasses   Man    Tiger

Alligator Juice         Frog       Rollerskates       Hair  

Lion       Bird          Feet        Bib         Balloon        Apple

Truck    Blocks       Bowl       Boat       Elephant      Key

Doll       Horse       Stroller    Hand      Clock  Blanket

Drum     Bear         Swing     Hat         Hammer     

Train         Pig            Dog           Nose         Mouth           Shoes

Plane         Cow          Cat            Ear            Eyes             Bus

Ball           Bottle        Book         Cup           Car              Flower

Baby         Banana      Spoon        Fire truck   Teddy bear

Rabbit        Broom       Bulldozer    Comb        Slide             Shirt

Fish           Cookie       Bubbles      Duck         Brush           Phone

Wagon       Water        Tricycle      Pants         Squirrel         Legs

chair         Boots         Helicopter  Arm          Orange                      

These are the words that I have chosen to help Tyoma say.

Pinkeye!!!

What better way to spend a Sunday, than with a toddler who has pinkeye? Oh wait! Make sure you get pinkeye, too!

Yep, the wee one woke up with a bloodshot, crusty left eye. It looked mild enough, that I debated about making a big fuss with the doctor, but worry (naturally!) prevailed. Back in New Mexico, you could call an answering service and some nurse would phone in a prescription for you. Out here, folks is par-tic-ular, you gots to be SEEN!

So Tyoma skipped his nap and we spent the afternoon waiting with the other unfortunates at Nashua Pediatrics. I managed to keep him on my lap with much effort, I didn't want him to single handedly infect greater Nashua by smearing his fingers on every inviting surface. The Doctor saw him and prescribed two bottles of eye drops. She asked be if I'd every given a toddler eye drops before. Soberly, I replied, "No." She laughed, gave me a wise sidelong glance and commenced to give me a few strategies to get the drops in. Heh.

Well, I dropped off the prescription and did tomorrow's shopping (can't bring the infectious one out for 24 hours) and braced myself for the eye dropping ceremony. Tennisfiend held Tyoma as he screamed bloody murder and I tried to get the drops in his eyes. It was like trying to tattoo a cat. Good Lord!!! Such straining, struggling and shrieking--and that was just Tennisfiend yelling at me to "Put the drops in, already!" After four frustrating minutes, we traded places. I held Tyoma down and cursed at Tennisfiend while he tried to get the drops in. Success! My curses were obviously much more effective than his.

After all the excitement, my eyes itched. And so did Tennisfiend's. Thank you Doctor for giving us two bottles of eyedrops!

ETA: Pardon me for adding some pictures of the boys doing yard work together! I took these in the morning before I completely convinced myself that he had pinkeye.

In the bottom picture, Tyoma is so serious about clearing the yard of debris that he's pulling up handfulls of grass to add to the trash!

Speech Therapy

Well, another day has passed and again the speech therapist seems to think Tyoma’s autistic.  She sweetened it with a “But he would be clearly a very high functioning autistic”. 

Sad!

Poor Tyoma looks sadder and sadder as a video palys on Youtube! He's watching this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MdS3yQfRxI Whe he sees Grandma cry over her missing geese, his face droops. He'll even say "Sah" mournfully as it plays.

Autistic Traits

This is a list of Tyoma's behaviors for future reference.  Some are "autistic" others seem normal.

Hideous Green

So, a few weeks ago I picked up a sample of the green paint that would transform our kitchen into a tranquil oasis for cooking and dining. Foolishly, I primed the sample area with a paintbrush, not realizing that I put the primer on a bit thick. Result: the wall looked like a vertical karesansui garden.

I sanded it before painting with the green, but the underlying texture came through, nevertheless. Not that it mattered, the green totally did not work. Despite my careful color selection, it still looks hospital green. Would you like some appendix with your gazpacho?

In the photo above, Tennisfiend is sanding away the bumpy primer (you can't see his scowl from this angle) so we can begin again. Heh. Anyway, we ordered four new paint samples online, using some suggestions from Papa Sasha plus our own eyeballs. We picked out a lovely pale greenish-yellow which works very well. I didn't dare paint the wall again, so I painted scrap wood and we chose the one that looked best. The new color had better work! I'm going to perish if we have to stick with the yellow!

Happy Halloween!!!

How's this for a jack' o lantern? I wondered what odd little child put this pumpkin picture together when I saw it posted across the hall at the preschool.

Spooky, ain't it?

In response to his jumbled creation, Tennisfiend commented that Tyoma would clearly have no idea how to put a pumpkin face together since he'd never seen one before. I reminded him that Tyoma has been playing with the plastic jack' o lantern on the kitchen table for most of this month. The truth is, our lil' prodigy has a plan. He was clearly inspired by Klee:

You might think that his pumpkin is an homage to Picasso, due to the distorted facial features, but Tyoma is a student of  Expressionism and he favors Klee's color tonalities. 

Coming soon: I justify Tyoma's restricted speech at daycare as "performance art!"

Honk!

We were sorting through Tyoma's "odd box" of strange things that Mom compiled for Tyoma when we came across this winding/drinking horn. My Dad picked it up for me when he was in Russia in the 90's and I'd almost forgotten about it. Since I know that you are giant nerds, just like me, some trivia: an animal horn that's used as a drinking cup is a rhyton. And when used as a bugle it's a shofar (Jewish) or dungchen (Tibetian). :-)

Tyoma’s Progress

The past two weeks have been difficult for Tyoma, primarily because he has been ill. He has missed daycare and been more sensitive and prone to meltdowns. Intense speech therapy was sometimes put on the back burner while I coped with my tearful son. Nonetheless, here’s our progress:

·   Tyoma seems to have great difficulty communicating internal states to us. He does not consistently indicate when he is hungry, thirsty, hot, cold or in pain.  He also uses no words or signs for his emotional states. Recently, he has said “brrrrr!” when cold and will clack his teeth to indicate tooth pain. We are working with him intensely to use gestures (sign) to show hunger/thirst rather than bringing me his cup or booster seat. Since he has been feeling unwell, this has been a major priority and we could really use some good advice.

·        I have been focusing not on the addition of new words (which he accomplishes easily), but the pronunciation of existing words. He has not regained the improved pronunciation that he had when my mom was here. Tyoma typically utters the first syllable of a word and does not bother with the rest. He can, however count to 12 with clarity.

·        Tyoma now completely “gets” the word mine, which is has become a source for meltdowns of late. Auuugh! He also says “where,” but it is unclear if he “gets” the meaning of the word or is just repeating it as part of a game.

·        He uses two word combinations regularly, but is reticent when pressed. He has begun to string together three words; such as “want…bath…open” (open the door to the bathroom). His “I want that!” from a few weeks ago has vanished.

·        Tyoma’s  pronunciation has slipped a bit—he has gone back to good days/bad days. I’d say he has about 20-30 words that he speaks clearly and consistently now. More, star, car, want, pop, no, zoo, white, the numbers 1-12, 23 letters of the alphabet, and a few more I can’t think of as I write this. A definite pattern exists, most of the words are nouns and most of the words relate to things he is profoundly interested in. The rest of his speech is about 25-30%  recognizable to a stranger.

Verbal reports from daycare staff indicate that he continues to do well there, the director commented on “how far he has come” and “how quickly he has adjusted.” I have begun to leave Tyoma for the full four hours so that he can have the experience of sitting and eating lunch with his peers. He is finicky about the food, but otherwise he is adjusting nicely. At home, we have playing social games like chase and hide and seek. Tyoma has been imitating Papa as he rakes leaves and quickly followed Papa’s example in learning how to fall in a pile of leaves. We have also been playing “airplane” with him (where we pretend to be airplanes flying) and he mimics us with gusto. Physical games engage him and bring out cooperative behavior and a few words.

Youtube!

Sure, Tennisfiend and I are midly addicted to youtube! Where else could he possibly watch obscure Russian music videos? How could I keep up with the freakishness that is Julie Masking or catch snippets that I missed from Dancing With the Stars? Seriously!

So, today we took a big leap--we introduced Tyoma to youtube! It's the best thing ever! You can find most of the cool animations from old school Sesame Street! I really don't care for the current politically correct, Elmo imbued program. Give the Cookie Monster his cookies! Let Oscar be a bastard! Etc, ect... Anyway, I'm going to embed two really psychedelic videos, just for nostalgia's sake! I dare Nickelodeon to match this!