Mands: 11

Today was far from a typical day for our little youngster Tony. When I arrived, there was a nurse in the living room here to assess Tony’s care needs. The nurse, Cindy, was having a conference with Marlaina, and Whitney was on the couch, so I joined her. Tony was free to move about the room. He was being very good and it was evident that he posessed high levels of energy. He would color a little, then walk across to visit different areas. He was being very talkative. Even when he isn’t saying actual words, Tony’s running narration is sounding more and more like true conversation every week!

While Tony was free range he did some interesting things. Over by Marlaina and Cindy he said “bye bye turtle” and put his turtle on the floor, then he said “bye bye cup” and put his cup on the floor. He also walked up to his clown and started tacting its body parts completely unprompted. While he was coloring with those super-glide crayons, everytime he runs out of the tip, he brings the used-up crayon to Whitney or me. We are working on the two word combo ‘more crayon.’ Sometimes he does say ‘more’ echoically.

The other change-ups from our regular schedule included a trip downtown for a specialized car seat and an early nap in order to prepare for a late (4:30) session with his new OT Britney. She and he both did well and she was impressed with his fine motor skills. Good job guys!

After the trip downtown and before Jill arrived, we got some work done in his room. We worked hard on most of phase II and accopmlished a lot. While we were doing receptives with Potatohead Whitney set a green stackable cup in front of herself and gave Tony a fully loaded Potatohead and asked him to ‘put Potatohead’s arm in the cup.’ At first we were slightly confused, because Tony was walking across the room with the plastic potato limb in tow. What we soon found out was that he was headed for his own drinking cup! Smart boy!