A Peek in My Planner.

I'm getting things ready for recordkeeping next month and allowing YOU to look inside. Aren't you blessed? :p Embiggen for a long description of what's going on in the Happy Elf Homeschool.

Congrats, Henry the Tuatara!

On becoming the father of 11 new babies at the age of 111. Chris sent us a book with rhymes all about the tuatara from New Zealand, so Elf and Emperor were very excited to see his picture and read his story in the news.

S at Christmas!

I forgot to upload this picture of Rose at Christmas! It's a little blurry, but do you think she's changed much in looks since last month? Maybe gotten prettier? I can't decide. Please compare pics and tell me what you think.

Cookie Sweetie.

This is her first taste of homemade oatmeal raisin cookies. I think she likes them. She and Woodjie can say, "Mmmm." Things are generally pretty tasty when you have three cups of sugar and four sticks of butter in the mix. Mmmm. I wonder why Woodjie won't take his nap now?

Tea on Tuesday

For our Tea on Tuesday, we made pumpkin bread and served it with mandarin oranges from a can. We're reading about Winnie the Pooh and his adventures.

Birthday Cake.

Girls are always sweet and demure. They eat their food neatly and pleasantly without mwwam *snort* mmm sounds or food-throwing. Elf and Emperor were given a box of cake mix, a dozen eggs, vegetable oil and a measuring cup and told to make the cake themselves. All I did was put it in the oven. D gave them a grade of only a B plus because the cake did not have an interesting shape. Rectangles, apparently, are not interesting enough. I think to get an A, the cake had to be multi-tiered and decorated in italic frosting script. We'll just take the B. :]

Happy Australia Day!

... to all my Aussie readers, hope you're enjoying the long weekend. :]

Happy Birthday, Rose!

She is the sweetest little girlie, EVER! She's a snazzy dresser, has an interesting hairdo and do you know what else? She can walk three steps. Yes, she can. :] Her actual birthday is tomorrow, but I'm posting tonight anyway.

I WIN!!!

Yup, I walloped a small Elf at Battleship. But look at how *very close* I came to losing. Yes, one of the boats is missing, so we just each play without it. I was trying to show this to D and he was busy and told me just to blog about it so he can look at it later. Sigh...

School Uniforms!!!

Ok, not really. But I ordered these from Printfection, where you can download about any picture you could ever imagine and custom-order T-shirts, sweatshirts, mousepads and all kinds of stuff. Nope, not a sponsored post. We're just happy with the product. Guess what we call our homeschool?

Tea on Tuesday

Yesterday, we had some dried apple slices we strung up with some noodles in the kitchen. The noodles held the apples apart so that they wouldn't touch each other while drying. We also made lemon poppy-seed bread and lemon-flavoured butter! The children put some of the Lemonheads they had been saving since Christmas on this as well.

The Emperor.

We talked a little bit ago about the little kid by the name of Adolf Hitler. Did you know Emperor has a funny name, too? It really is an emperor's name, and probably not one most Christians would name their son, but I do stuff like that just to irk other people and make spelling difficult for the kid. Once, a lady accosted me RIGHT IN FRONT of Emperor for "saddling him with such an awful name." Yep, this happened at church, too. The Spirit of Christ was just movin' big-time in my response, too. Because I'm a hypocrite and am only Jesus-like when it's convenient and I'm unoffended. :]

Happy Housekeeping Tip.

Pancakes are very yummy with chocolate syrup swirls. However, the chocolate DOES stick to the pan and it's difficult to clean up. This is why I made chocolate pancakes when Patrick and G were slated for kitchen cleanup duty. Go me!

Let's Check the Schedule!

Woodjie has a schedule on the pole in our family room. It's attached with sticky velcro. Usually I will put only one or two things on the schedule and tell Woodjie "ball time" and stick the icon back on the pole before beginning. His speech therapist also has little schedule icons for things like playing bubbles and reading books. I use sticky velcro on the sides of the pole to hold all the icons we're not using.

Elf Goes To Church

He picked out the outfit and the pleasant attitude all by himself.

Ancient Egypt.

Elf was very nervous about EVERYONE seeing him talk. I told him he did a great job.

BO Duke.

OK, so his bangs are crooked. I'm counting the haircut as successful because he has both ears and eyes still. He's running to the camera to get his photo taken. Cameras are a source of joy and excitement. Unlike baths. BO to baths, Woodjie says. And BO to nigh-nigh time. And BO to being told "all done Bob Tomato." BO. I guess he'll learn to say "Luke" and "Uncle Jesse" later.

??

This is the kind of thing I see all the time. Emperor is the only person who can jump and do math at the same time. WHILE he is doing a running commentary and giving away all the answers to Elf. He really doesn't realize he's doing it. The humming. The flipping of his legs in the air during English. (Why do you keep doing that?? I don't know. Well, wouldya QUIIIT? I'm trying!) Unfortunately, the boundless energy doesn't always translate into a clean room or a great job on repetitive tasks like stirring cake batter. But he is awfully cute. I think we'll keep him.

Girlie.

Rose likes to take whatever you're using. Then she will give it back. You're supposed to then hand it back to her. Such a strange kid! WHO taught her to share? I don't think it was her brothers.

How to Do Workboxes.

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Woodjie's play therapist helped us get started with workboxes. You might enjoy doing them as well with your autistic child or preschooler.

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First, get a couple of old ice cream containers with lids. You'll also get some sticky-back velcro and cut little signs for "work," break time, and "finished." You can make your own sign or download one from the internet. Mine are laminated, but yours don't have to be as fancy. Oak tag and velcro will do.

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I've loaded each of my boxes with an activity. Puzzles or potato-heads are good examples of what to put inside. You want to find an activity that has a definite beginning and ending. A toy Noah's ark or baby and bottle set, for example, wouldn't quite fit the bill. You want something that the child will understand that he has completed. Sometimes I'll even get the large puzzles with knobs and pictures underneath, and just put the pieces in the bucket.

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We started slowly with making these activities part of Woodjie's routine. The idea is to acclimate Woodjie to a schedule of some kind, and give him a sense of order and "what comes next." We started with one bucket once a day. We're now up to two buckets twice a day. Some day, we are hoping that he will understand a picture schedule and understand things like, TV time comes after lunch. Then we will play and read a book. Next comes dinner. Etc.

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I come into his play area with my strip and the buckets and sing a song to the tune of the "Muffin Man:"

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Ohhhhhh

Do you know what time it is?

What time it is?

What time it is?

Do you know what time it is?

It's time to

WORK.

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He's very excited about this and usually does a little dance and a good hand flap before pulling the "work" icon off and handing it to me. What's next on the schedule? He knows he's to pull the blue dot and "match" it with the blue bucket. We help him affix the velcro ends together and walk him to a plastic picnic table to do his activity.

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One of his activities is to read a book. He used to be very resistant to reading books and would bang his head and throw fits whenever they were presented. Now we can get through several pages, although he will try to squirm and get away after that. What we're trying to do is get him to the very limit without quite going over... and then hope that that limit gets longer and longer as time goes on. So far, with a few regressions here and there, it has really been helpful. Now occasionally he will point to a picture. (This is rare, however.)

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Between boxes is "break time." He's guided to "check the schedule" after completing his first box. He hands me the "break time" icon and I set the timer for three minutes. When the timer goes off, he excitedly turns it off when it's presented to him.

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THIS SOUNDS LIKE HARD WORK, and it is to get started and make a part of your schedule. Then again, here's a child who has never said Mama or Dada, and he is able to do these things with some assistance. It would be wonderful if he were to speak more, but if that isn't possible, I'd at least like a child who understands there is some order in the world and is able to use picture icons. So, we're working on this diligently.

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Usually the second bucket is harder for him to do than the first. I put the easier of the two activities (his puzzle) second on the list because I anticipate this. Just as it's harder for the average worker to continue to put in his best on the job right before quitting time, Woodie has a bit of a hard time toward the end there. Sometimes I'll get a picture of Bob and Larry as a reward and he can trade this for Cheerios. The main thing is to get him to understand that the schedule is his friend, that it makes some sense, and that he can accomplish tasks and receive praise.

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Feel free to ask questions in the comments! I'm excited to share this system with you.