what I did on Thursday.....

(This is Spence, rockin' his skinny jeans, and running away from his Auntie Annie who is chasing him down the slide!!)

I joined Spencer's class for their weekly outing.

They make a list of grocery items and then search through the nearby shopping plaza for the items and write down the prices. It takes about two hours to mosey through CVS...Trader Joes.....and the Von's stores. (BTW, while I'm writing this, I have to write to his teacher and modify the format of his paper...it is waaaaay too advanced for him, easily changed).

Along the way we get to see some of the pretty fountains and read some books in Barnes and Noble. (GUESS which book Spence has to read every time? First one to get it....wins a prize!)

For two hours I got to hold his hand, hug him, sneak in some tickles and walk. I got to block him from grabbing all those tempting snow globes in the drug store....hang on for dear life while he lunged for the fountains.....I got to read him his favorite book over and over and over again. But the sweetest part was catching him making glances at me. He purposefully looked at me with his cute face a total blank.....but he was looking.

I was magic.

He pointed to everything that he wanted in his usual forceful way and say..."ove-theah"... but was INFINITELY easier to redirect and continue on with the group. Candy...toys.....soda.....chips....pizza....he passed by and kept on going.

That was a huge relief since I was feeling tender and vulnerable already. I didn't think I could handle the typical responses of ...."ENNnnnnnnnoooOO" when it was time to be denied.

In the history of his academic career, I have NEVER been able to do this.
School visits were always a dreaded necessity. Nothing but classroom observations to determine appropriate placement, Visits to address behavior issues, IEP meetings, coordination meetings with all of the aides in the classroom the teacher and school aides to manage consistency across environments, visits to pick up Spence because of potty issues, sickness, out of control tantrums, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc.......multiplied by 2 because Tyler needed all the same things. Plus the schedules were always different. Our school district had year round school.

The boys have NEVER been attending the same school or been on the same track. The district has different teachers for the varying levels of behavior issues and ages. ALL of those classes were on different attendance tracks. Because they were ALL in different schools. (just writing about this is depressing). Someone was always off track at home and having therapy hours during the day.

So, in hindsight, I am so grateful that it sucked rocks for so very long. It has made this school visits and weekly play dates the sweetest of moments. I am very lucky.

From now on, I'm going every week to both classes for that extra little something with my babies. This really is a piece of heaven.