Spring!

Has sprung!  I hope everyone is enjoying it.  Spring in Florida is beautiful!  Homeschooling is going well with Elle, we did learning profiles on the website after reading the book Discover Your Child's Learning Style, and that has helped tremendously.  It turns out that I am a print/auditory/producing (think workbook) learner and she is not.  She's a visual/picture/tactile learner.  So the curriculum that I was picking out for math wasn't meeting her needs at all, it was black and white and boring!  The unit study or literature approach she likes (we started Five In A Row in November), and I lucked out on the phonics workbooks because they are mostly picture learning.  She's also a relater, which means that she needs to talk things out to understand them, which was driving me crazy because she would constantly ask questions about what she was learning.  Turns out, she needs to talk it out to understand.  We went on a field trip to a composting place to learn about worm composting, and it was partly lecture and partly hands-on.  When I questioned her about the lecture, almost nothing had been absorbed except for the hands-on part of the lecture.  She doesn't learn that way, she is completely visual.  Art is her favorite subject and she started taking a homeschool enrichment art class on Thursdays which she loves.  

Justin we found out is a performing/thinking/creating/tactile/kinesthetic learner.  He also needs rigid structure to his day, needs to be told what to do when, exactly how to do it, and hates to write or sit down to read.  He is frequently upside down when we are reading.  My teaching style and learning style are completely contrary to his, which was making life extremely difficult for both of us.  I'm tactile and kinesthetic to a point, I love building and tinkering, but his tactile is taking things apart to see how they work.  That frequently meant him destroying things in the house.  Now that I understand his motivation, I don't freak out when he is doing an experiment on the driveway to see how far the glass shards will go when he breaks a bottle.  I never thought I could say that, but when I peeked inside his head and imagined him watching the different shatter patterns depending on how high the bottle was when he dropped it, the experiment made sense to me.

In February I put him in preschool.  We had looked at preschools in October but I hadn't wanted to do VPK because it is 5 days a week from 9-12.  The director at his now preschool had emailed me to see if we wanted to enroll him in January, and because we were both climbing the walls, I put him in.  He misses our field trips and co-ops, but the break from each other and chance to finish the evaluations has been helpful.  Miles will go to that preschool in the fall.

Justin and Elle both got into the charter montessori school.  I don't know yet if I'm going to send Justin but I am definitely not going to send Elle as of now.  She is happy and thriving in homeschool and has so many friends we can't count them all!  The socialization problem is really mine, not hers.  Once I figured out that my model of homeschooling wasn't working (staying at home all the time, the three of us together all the time), I started exploring other models.  I talked to a mom who works and homeschools, met a mom at the preschool whose daughter goes to an umbrella school, talked to a neighbor whose daughter goes to a part time Christian homeschool, and found some homeschool enrichment classes.  

Elle plays with our neighbors after school, met a few friends at her art class, has friends at co-op that we have started getting together with, and has friends at ballet.  Mostly my problem was not letting people in and being too distant, I think.  Once I started to open up to the possibility that people wanted to connect, they started to.  One of our new friends even got us into Disney for Justin's birthday!  It is so unbelievably nice to have friends who care!

Miles is almost 2 1/2 and is such a total two year old.  He is stubborn, resists transitions unless it is HIS idea, and has mind-blowing tantrums.  Justin surpassed two with different issues, meltdowns he couldn't control at all, and a lot of sickness.  I forgot what real two year olds are like!  Elle was like this at two, but also had a new baby brother to deal with and distract her.  For Miles it's all him.  He's not usually playing with the older ones when he has to transition either which makes it harder.  When the direction comes from the older kids, he takes it much better.

He potty trained a week before he turned two.  I think it's just his personality, when he sets his mind on something, he's going to DO IT!  I had done some EC with him when we were in Iowa and it worked well, he would poop on the potty when I followed his cues.  At first we just went diaper free and he learned how to concentrate his pee instead of dribbling all the time (which EC proponents say diapers contribute to).  Once he got an idea of what a full bladder felt like, he was able to hold it.  For a very long time.  We'd go to co-op on the other side of town and he'd hold it the whole time, 5 hours or more.  I was really, really concerned about it and drove myself nuts bringing potty seats everywhere, even to Disney.  He hates public restrooms.

Then Eric discovered at Downtown Disney that he will pee standing up because Justin does!  Now we just go on trees when we're out b/c he won't go otherwise. I tried the mini potty in the car too, and that didn't work.  He was probably motivated by watching his older siblings and wanted to do what they were doing.  He's that way for most other things too, drawing, riding his tricycle, running, climbing the big ladders at the playground, and "reading" books.  I never thought in a million years I would have a two year old who can add small numbers or be potty trained!!  He amazes me.

He's also still a vegetarian.  He will eat the occasional bacon or ham but that's it.  No chicken, no beef, and no turkey.  I think it's the texture but it could be that he avoids foods he is sensitive to also.  He's allergic to gluten, dairy, chocolate, and soy, so it's not a stretch that he could be allergic to other meats.  Justin was sensitive to beef when he was tested a few years ago and now won't eat peanuts.  I'm afraid to get him tested again!  Miles will eat beans, hummus, pasta, rice, vegetables, and fruit.  He loves nut butters, especially peanut butter.  He's growing tall but he's still small boned.  It's hard feeding these kids with all of their different issues!!

As far as Florida, I think we've finally adjusted.  I spend 2 hours and 45 minutes in the car on Thursdays, but that's the only long day.  What is nice about the city is that everything we need is here, all the options we need for dining, and food, and homeschool activities.  There are so many classes and groups that we could be out every day doing something!  The traffic I could do without.  I have to chew gum or pick at something to handle my stress when I'm driving the toll roads.  

I took Justin to the pediatrician a week or so ago and was so pleased that someone would listen to my ideas about diet, and treating gut issues with nutrition, and Justin's sensory stuff that has been popping up again.  He won't wear underwear because he can't stand any little bit of moisture, and he is starting to hate tags and the seams in his socks.  Yet he is sensory seeking with water and wants to be soaked, and likes deep pressure.  Miles has the texture thing with food and hates anything that vibrates, like his toothbrush or the hair clippers.  The ped is going to help us figure out how to treat the sensory issues and speech issues that, at 5, should be resolved but are not.  Justin's main issue is that he doesn't know how to use his tongue properly to make the "L" or "th" sounds, both of which he would have learned at 2 if he could hear.  Speech therapy hasn't worked, probably because no one has taken the time to show him how to use his tongue properly.

I've been working on it with him but it would help for someone else to do it too.  The ped also said that he is going to open an integrative medicine clinic with other disciplines to treat autistic children and others with sensory issues, and ADHD.  He basically parroted back everything I have been saying and writing about for the past four years about vaccines, the vaccine companies, dietary therapy, sensory issues, and understands natural treatments like kefir and uses it himself.  He said that it takes 20 years to change clinical practice, but parents are pushing better and earlier therapies for their children, and are demanding that natural treatments accompany medical treatments, because the two together work far faster than either could do alone.

So it's nice to be heard.  And frustrating that Justin is having more food issues, that they are changing to new things, and that his sensory stuff is still there underneath.  It also frustrates me that Miles won't qualify for therapy because he doesn't have developmental delays.  I still should probably look into OT for his texture issues.  

We have a very sweet mother's helper who is 15 and homeschooled who comes once a week to help out.  It is so so helpful but we also need a babysitter for nights who can drive when we want to go downtown or go out to eat.  We had one but she's graduating from nursing school in May.  That is another thing I could do without, the constant search for babysitters.  Our neighbors are awesome about letting our kids play and alternating with us, so I do get a nice break on the weekends.

As for August, I have no idea what will happen at Eric's one year.  He can post for a new job at one year and has been pretty unhappy with the schedule.  I'm hoping he'll either get promoted or find a good job in the area, because the kids need stability and it's not fair to Justin to continually re-start therapy and evaluate him over and over again after we get the ball rolling.  We signed a two year lease on the house and I know that buying a house here would not be a good investment due to the sluggish market.  So we're kind of in a holding pattern until we figure out what the future holds.

I've also been trying to figure out my current behavior and frustrations toward my children.  It's not pretty digging things up and trying to change patterning, ever.  It's disconcerting to have to check and re-check everything you say to your kids before you say it, but that is the only way to change dysfunctional patterns.  Learning new ways of relating is hard, but necessary if the dysfunctional patterns are going to end.  I have been blogging about some of it if you are interested: http://letterstonola.blogspot.com/

I'll send out the monthly pics soon!  Hope everyone is well!