The stars are shining

Not in the sky, silly, on the walls of Brain Balance.  When the children do something really good, they get a star with their name on it and a brief description of what they did to earn the star.  The child gets to stick it to the wall wherever they want.  Why am I telling you this?  Because of the tumultuous last few sessions, I was incredibly shocked when Spencer emerged Wednesday with not one, but TWO stars.  He got one from the Sensory Motor room and one from  the Cognitive room.  Both were for following directions, listening and doing all of his work without complaints.  So, he earned the chance to go swimming that afternoon.  Too bad Mother Nature was not as impressed as I was with the two stars, because it STORMED.
Unfortunately, we couldn't go swimming on Thursday either because we had to wait for the furniture rental company to come pick up the furniture.  Since I will be here until next May, I found it would be a lot cheaper to buy some inexpensive furniture than to rent monthly.  I only wish that they could have come while Spencer was at ESY.  He got extremely excited while they were here, and he was very confused.  I think he thought that we were moving.  He followed me around like a puppy, afraid to have me out of his sight for even a second.  Then, during the night, he crawled into bed with me,  He hasn't done that in a while, so I figured maybe he thought I would leave him in the middle of the night.  Of course, all I can do is guess, because he can't let me know what is going on in his head.  Very frustrating for us both.
Friday, I bought a golf cart.  Now, we are ready.  I picked up the cart while Spencer was in Brain Balance, taking him completely by surprise!  Before I get to that, I need to rehash Friday.  My parents came into town.  They chose to leave Thursday, so they would be here all day Friday and Saturday before departing on Sunday afternoon.  Spencer was confused by the fact that they were over in the morning (I suspect he thought it was Saturday). Then, his Brain Balance session was changed from 1:30 to 12:00 noon. He does not handle multiple changes well.  So, when he got to Brain Balance, he was fit to be tied.  He was behaving horribly.  He did mange to do all of his work, so that was an improvement over Monday.  I forgot to mention we went to Target Friday morning to purchase some inexpensive furniture for the apartment.  Spencer found the aisle with the Goldfish crackers.  Uh oh.  He brought me a box and I had to calmly explain that he couldn't have them.  He didn't understand and threw a fit, rolling all over the floor at Target and getting very upset.  When I left the area, he followed.  He was still upset and started throwing his "Cars" sheets on the floor over and over.  I let him because he needed to get it out.  There was a lady shooting me horrid looks when I told Spence he couldn't have the crackers.  I was tempted to tell her something, but her ignorance is not my problem.  My focus was on my child.  I've gotten better with ignoring people.  If I can, I do calmly explain the situation.  For some, that may be their first hands-on experience with an autistic child.  But, when I am in the middle of trying to diffuse a volatile situation, the educational needs of others come second.  I must say that even his tantrum wasn't as bad as I have seen.  There was no self-injurious behavior.  He did not try to attack me (or my parents).  He did find a sofa and threw himself on it a couple of times.  I think he was waiting for me to tell him to stop, but I was not going to give him attention.  Sure enough, it stopped.  Anyway, my poor dad spent the whole day putting together the two dressers (it would have gone a lot faster if I could have helped him), going to Home Depot, and picking up lunch (Chinese- yummy!!).
Spencer got two golf cart rides.  The first was when I picked him up from Brain Balance.  At first, I saw him looking for my car.  He grabbed my hand and looked at me with the most confused expression on his face.  When I got into the cart, he snagged his spot.  It took us a long time to get back to the apartment, I had to take the VERY LONG way.  There was a large dog chained outside of a house on our original route.  When it saw us, it started barking and running to the end of the chain.  Spencer didn't know or realize that the dog couldn't get us.  He was terrified.  He jumped in my lap screaming, "dawdie, dawdie, dawdie"  (I am trying to spell it phoenetically- but it is pronounced like doggie but with a d sound instead of a g.)  HE WAS COMMUNICATING!!  Awesome.  So, we turned around and took the longer route home.
We saw a baby deer and a bunny rabbit on this first trip, so cool!  Then, later, to get him out of my dad's hair, we took another trip.  We found a playground and he played for a little while.  It was getting to the time that the bugs were coming out, so we hopped back in the cart.  This time, I got a picture of a deer in someone's back yard.  Spence was quiet and was actually looking at it.  Good Stuff!

This is our golf cart.  You can't really tell, but it is purple.  I call it the "purple people eater" or "grape ape".  Yes, I know I am weird.

The deer we saw the second time we took the cart out.  You can see the hammock off to the left hand side.  I think this is neat.

We took the cart to Kroger this morning and got to park in the "golf cart only" parking.  That still cracks me up that they have special spots all over town for golf carts.  He was so good, I bought him a Cars activity book with stickers, etc.  He loves going riding in the cart and he is so well behaved.  Here is my little shopper:

Going to go enjoy more of my weekend!!