Emmett was eating some jumbo shrimp for lunch this afternoon when he decided that he couldn't deal with the tails.  Now, up to that point, he was eating around the them as is commonly done by most people when they eat shrimp. Today however, he wasn't willing to do that. He first wanted to cut the tail off with a pair of scissors, but we said no.  We explained to him that he just needs to hold it by the tail and use his teeth like scissors and bite off and chew up the part of the shrimp that he's supposed to eat, just like he normally would. Apparently, today the tail was disgusting and he wouldn't even touch it.  However, he didn't let that stop him.  In true Lost…

I love my boys, I truly, truly do.  Okay, with that out of the way.....  Elliott and Emmett are driving me crazy.  They are literally fighting over and bouncing off of everything. I know that it's been a long break but jeez oh man. I'm actually really nervous about Christmas break in a few weeks because Gavin will be added to the mix for a full 2 weeks.  That's going to be akin to lighting a match while swimming in a pool of gasoline.  That may sound dramatic but it honestly won't go well.  We experienced a small sample of this earlier in the week. Currently Lizze is sick and sleeping, fitfully, on the couch.  I would move her upstairs but she been battling insomnia for a few days now…

It's been over a month since Gavin has moved out of our house and into his grandparents house. He seems to be doing really well there a day we're really happy about that.  Unfortunately, Gavin's health is not improving at all, even on the new cardiac meds. Gavin's resting heart rate sits at about 130 bpm +/-. While he was home the other day, he was up in the high 140's and that's not a good thing.  We are currently waiting for his autonomic specialist at the Cleveland Clinic to get back to us about a secondary medication to help slow his heart rate down. This means that at this point, Gavin cannot be considered medically stable.  This makes residential placement all but impossible. We have been advised to set…

As many of you know, Emmett, currently 4 years old, is a rather extreme perfectionist.  In my experience, this is a fairly common #Autistic trait and from what I understand, it's somewhat sensory related. Coloring for Emmett has been both a blessing and a curse. The reason for that is that until recently - and by recently I mean the past few day- Emmett wouldn't actually color by himself because he was too afraid of going outside of the lines.  Despite lots of time, energy and sanity spent trying to help him understand that things don't have to be perfect, it always ended up in a meltdown. Having said that, over the past few days, Emmett has been coloring with Elliott.  He's actually coloring on his own. This has been…

Elliott and I just arrived home from his classmates Birthday party.  He had so much fun and everyone was really nice and down to earth.  We will have to have a friends Birthday party for Elliott come March. I'm so happy that Elliott had this experience and that it went so well.  They were very understanding of his wanting me to stay and his new food allergies.  Lizze baked Elliott cupcakes for him to take so that he could have something while everyone else did.  Turns out, everyone else had cupcakes as well, so he didn't feel out of place.  Elliott's first Birthday party........check! Elliott was kind enough to pose for a picture, while he was at the party.  :-)

I'm sitting here at the party and Elliott is having a really good time.  The little girl having the party ran up and gave Elliott a big hug when he arrived. I'm so happy for him. 

Yesterday it was in the 60's and sunny. Lizze was comfortable with the weather and that's always a good thing. However, late yesterday afternoon the temperature began to plummet. As I'm writing this, it's currently in the 20's and we actually have snow sticking to the ground.  It's not a ton of accumulation but it's our first snow fall of the year.  Needless to say, Lizze is miserable and the boys are excited.  If you don't like the weather in Ohio, wait 5 minutes.