November 2011: Birthday Parties, School Thanksgiving Grandparents' Lunch & Yo Gabba Gabba Live!

Oscar and Sasha

 I'm going to need to do a separate blog post with our pics from our Thanksgiving 2011 trip to Florida.

Near the end of trip, there was a salt water incident with our camera and David put all those photos on a thumb drive that I can't seem to find at the moment.

So, here's our November 2011 (sans Thanksgiving) in a nutshell.

The boys making their own pizzas.

Emily accompanied the boys and me to a pizza-making birthday party at the nearby family-owned pizzeria.

The boys were more interested in playing with the restaurant's train table than making or eating their own pizzas.

If  Otto had his way, he would fixate on the same two magnetic trains, but Emily breaks him out of his fixations, and has taught us to do the same.

Otto playing with Corbin. Mom, do you remember Corbin from when you used to drop Oscar off at school?

 After the pizza party, the boys took a quick nap and then off to another birthday party for our friend Emilio.

This party was at a local bounce house type place and was themed Yo Gabba Gabba.  :)

Otto loves to slide.

Otto mesmerized by the pattern on the carpet.

Otto also mesmerized by the life-size Toodee (from YGG) cut-out.

Emilio and his Yo Gabba Gabba cake.

The day after Emilio's YGG party, we took the boys to see Yo Gabba Gabba Live!

So excited for the show to start!

This is our second year taking the boys to YGG live and it's worth every penny! We all love it.  David and I seriously do enjoy the music. That's probably a tad bit pathetic, but oh well. :)

 

Happy Otto and happy daddy.

Happy Oscar and happy daddy.

Ended up accidentally sitting with some other Hallmark friends. We bought our tix on the same day and ended up in the same row. Here's my friend, Tracey, and her daughter, Gillian.

And we made some new friends, too. Oscar had so much fun playing with the boy in the row ahead of us.

And Otto had a tremendous time playing "peek-a-boo" with the grandma of one of the kids behind sitting behind us.

Another Hallmark friend in our row. Jennifer and her daughter, Lara.

Otto loves the music, so do I.

Oscar and I about to hug during YGG's "Hugs are fun" number.

Lara wants a better view of her YGG friends.

Otto getting restless, but still having fun.

And more Hallmarkers in our row. This is my friend, Olivia, and her daughter, Sidney. Sidney and Otto are now classmates at YMCA.

Oscar being silly with his new buddy.

Otto playing more peek-a-boo during the show's intermission.

Oscar is also at the party. He's in the striped shirt.

 In mid November, we went to our friend Abby's birthday at Dave's Gymnastics factory.

 Otto was ON that day. The highlight of the whole party for me was watching Otto participate in this "One, Two, Buckle My Shoe" routine.

 I was so excited to see Otto participating with the other kids, and tracking (at a slightly slower pace), I had to share the video below with Otto's Occupational Therapist, Nanette. She was also really proud and excited to see Otto's participation and improvement with coordination. Nannette even worked this routine into Otto's OT that week.

That's Noah in the blue shirt next to Otto.

Noah and Otto

 Above is the gymnastics video I was describing. Watching this video today (almost a year later), I'm still just as blown away by Otto's participation!

David helping Otto on the rope swing.

Otto loves being thrown in the foam pit.

He truly does love it!

Smiley guys eating ice cream cake.

Otto ate all his green beans and Emily's.

 Otto's former afternoon daycare, Willow Woods, has a yearly tradition of serving Thanksgiving lunch to the student's grandparents.

Since we don't have any grandparents in town, Emily and I went as Otto's guests:)

After lunch, the kids performed a musical number for us. Otto didn't sing or dance, but he did stand there and smile at us the whole time. It's participation, so I'll take it!

As we were getting ready to leave, so the kids could go down for their afternoon naps, I got to see Otto and friends go through the motions of taking their tootbrushes from Miss Pam (their teacher) and brushing their own teeth. 

Look at our Otto following directions so nicely. Now, if he would only do that for us at home. Hmmm...

Brushing teeth. The blonde boy in the blue shirt and khaki's is Otto's friend, Simon, who also left Willow Woods and is currently in class with Otto at the YMCA.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I call this video below "What happened?" My friend, Casey, calls it "I have no control."  The boys are supposed to be in bed. We haven't made the transition to our new bunk bed because we had a feeling stuff like this would happen. Even though I'm trying to be stern, I'm so pleased the boys are playing TOGETHER. Plus, it cracks me up that as soon as I bust them, Otto asks "What happened?"

Below is part 2 of the video shown above. Love how Otto asks to watch TV and how Oscar sweet talks me into reading him another bedtime story.

I constantly tease Emily & Nannette, Otto's ABA therapist and OT, about how I can hear their voices and expressions in Otto's always-developing speech and sentence construction.

In this video I call "Otto eats Peas," the way Otto compliments himself by saying "good job, Otto," is classic Emily and Nannette.  When he says "Oh no!" to the napkin, he sounds identical to Emily. (She is embarrassed when I point this out, but totally agrees).

One of Otto's favorite books from about a year ago is his "Happy Sad" picture book.  The words are minimal, because the pictures really do the talking.  This book was critical for us teaching Otto the difference between the two emotions. It's pretty common for kids on the autism spectrum to need extra help distinguishing and understanding emotions.

A year later I confidently say that Otto has no trouble distinguishing and communicating the range of emotion he experiences. Even when he's mid tantrum and crying uncontrollably he'll choke out to us "I'm sad." It's adorable.

In addition to Otto's therapists working wonders with his speech and development, I have to give huge credit to Oscar, who is a chatterbox, a mover and a shaker and tough act to follow. He loves to communicate every single thought that runs through his head and has unintentionally taught his little brother so much.
I'm so proud of our boys!