Portage visit

It seems that with every week that goes by, we have a meeting with another organisation to try and help Emily.

This morning we had an initial assessment by Portage, a "home-visiting educational service for pre-school children with additional support needs and their families" (not the act of hauling a canoe over dry land from one body of water to another). It lasted about an hour and, even though there's still issues with Emily, it's good to hear that we're doing all the right things. Just wish the right things resulted in the right outcome instead of a child that still needed to be assessed.

We're going to get a home visit every three weeks from Portage to see how things are going and give us hints, tips and strategies to get Emily on the straight and narrow developmentwise.

For those playing along at home, we're now seeing the Sutton council language therapist, on the waiting list for a paediatrician, Fennie's is sending round a therapist in January to view Emily's progress at the nursery and we're on the list to see a private paediatrician in December.

The stuff is all there in Emily's head, and we can see it dripping out in dribs and drabs. Hopefully ONE of these organisations has the key to getting it flowing out in great gushes.

Emily IS Brick Heck

Brick Heck

The more I watch "The Middle", the more I realise that Emily is very likely going to be Brick Heck. He loses himself in books, would rather read something than play with something and doesn't really care about social interaction. Well, the main comparisons end there, but they're enough to have be start calling Emily "Brick".

Emily's also developing some rather odd habits. She now likes to stand on her head with her bum in the air and just sort of balance on her neck. She's been doing it at Nursery and the first time freaked them out enough to let me know they thought she was going to break her neck.

We've had some crazy times in the last 2.5-odd years and this isn't even the tip of the iceberg.

I just hope that her Brick tendencies subside and she develops her social side as well. There's no prize for the bookiest girl in the library.

Learning's going well

We've been worried about Emily's learning and talking and in recent weeks it's been going a LOT better than it has ever.

She's starting to say things in context, and not being prompted. Tonight she said goodbye to Helen without being asked, and said cake when she looked at one of Sue's dessert chocolate eclairs.

Last night, while watching the Gruffalo on DVD, she said something that resembled butterfly when said creature appeared on screen.

Wordwise, she's already saying "read" with book in hand, to an annoying level. However, instead of saying "drink" or similar, she's just letting out incessant screams.

We're getting there, and I can't wait until she's talking in multiple words.

We're off to see the language specialist again tomorrow, and I'd like to think that she's going to see quite an improvement in Emily.

Emily - Can't sleep or won't sleep?

It's been a fun weekend with Emily.

My mum arrived on Friday night, so Em's got one more family member to wrap around her fingers and to plead "read" to.

We went out last night and dropped my mum off so she could visit with my aunt for a few days. On the journey down, Em fell asleep. This was around 6pm after an intense 15 minutes of trick or treating around the neighbourhood.

On the way back, around 8.30pm, she woke up and quickly fell back asleep once we got home. Having put her straight to bed on getting home, we heard footsteps on the stairs about 40 minutes later.

Around 11pm I felt it was time that not only Emily get back to bed, I was also quite exhausted. On arrival in bed, I nodded off feeling exhausted. Emily, however, was refreshed and up for a party. It was around 1am when I went to the other room to try and get some sleep, with her still babbling and singing to herself.

One odd thing I noticed in the babbling she was doing was that she actually counted BACKWARDS from 10 to 6. With a little prodding, she also managed 3 to 1 as well.

In the last couple of weeks, I've been really amazed by a lot of stuff Emily has done - from being much more lucid and expressive, saying more words - like  "read" and "no" - in context, and now demonstrating insomnia.

It's just a pity she had to drag Sue and I into her "can't sleep" hell as well.

Sesame Street and Emily

While the Sesame Street DVDs contain enough warnings to ward you off ever letting your child watch them (apparently we're all brain dead retards for watching them in the 70s) it DIDN'T stop me buying some "old school" episodes on DVD for Emily.

While on holiday I put an episode on featuring the song "Exit" by Little Chrissy and the Alphabeats. It may be from 1974, but it didn't stop Emily dancing and singing along.

If that's what the warning was all about, I fully embrace ignoring it because Emily just loves that song, as well as all the other letters and numbers the episode are brought to you by.

Holiday developments

We've been with Emily every waking minute since we came on holiday last Wednesday.

Since then, the amount of words she's used has seemed to noticeably increase. Not only is she filling in more words in her books, she's also started saying the odd word in context.

She'll wander from adult to adult with a book in her hand saying "reeeeeed" to get you to read her the book. Unfortunately, she tends to want the same book read over and over again. We're trying not to extinguish her enthusiasm and using words in context, but there's only so many times you can read "The Gruffalo" in one sitting.

Apart from speech developments, Emily's holiday adventures has also featured her starting to hit out and both Sue and I. I'd like to think this is a phase she's going through, but as such it's a phase that needs nipping in the bud. I understand that she still can't make her needs and desires known and that can be quite frustrating, but to punch or kick out is not a viable alternative.

I just wish she understood the effect saying "read" with a book in hand had, and that she could extrapolate that to other needs like "drink" and "eat".

Small steps I guess, but in the last five days there's been quite a bit of progress.

Improved speech

It's happening, slowly, but it's happening.

Emily's actually putting words together and letting us know what she means and wants.

We were visiting John, our family friend, last night and an exhausted Emily hopped onto the sofa next to Sue and said "bed". It was VERY obvious what she wanted and a real leap forward in her getting her point across to us.

She's been improving in various other ways lately as well - she says "sit" or "sit right down" when she's sitting in her chair, but last night was really the first "request" she's made where she's actually been able to express herself clearly verbally.

Hopefully more speech comes soon and we won't be able to shut her up. I realise I am going to regret what I wish for when it happens.

Christmas presents and discounts

With Christmas coming and the expectations of "toys, toys, toys" from Emily, it's good to know there's a way to claw back some of the money I'm going to spend.

Voucher Hub is a site that gives you codes, specials and discounts for your favourite retailers so you can make sure you're saving every penny you can. The site's easy to use, and you can be shopping and saving pennies in seconds!

I know that with Emily getting older and wanting more "branded" stuff for Christmas it's going to get expensive. I'm looking to save a bundle getting stuff using Debenhams voucher codes, Ebay voucher codes and Littlewoods discount codes.

Here's hoping that Christmas 2010 is easy on the pocketbook and one for Emily to remember.

Christmas for Emily

It's always a parents' dilemma - Christmas.

Do we perpetuate the capitalist pursuit of (generally Chinese made) products and goods, or do we use the holiday to expand social awareness? If you're a child, I imagine it's "toys (the ones I want) and that's all". I guess a happy medium is ecologically sound toys - you please your kids and they're environmentally-friendly.

I found a site called Earthwhile that sells a lot of stuff including eco-friendly toys. There's something intrinsically satisfying knowing that you can please your child's blood lust for "more toys" and not impact the environment. They have wooden toys as well as a really cool model car (read "I want this!") that's powered by " a miniature solar-powered hydrogen refuelling station that converts water to hydrogen using energy captured from the sun".

How cool is that?

I doubt Emily's going to be lusting after a hydrogen powered car - model or otherwise - for a while, but it's nice to know there's places out there that you can satisfy your child's toy desire AND be good to the environment, and maybe even teach them a little something in the process.

Ain't Christmas grand?

Hearing exam

Sue took Em to have her hearing test today. We were hoping/assuming that it was more a rubber stamp exercise than anything else.

There was a problem though. Em's currently in the middle of a horrible cold, and like most people with colds, every orifice in her head is currently bunged up.

The doctors said, after a variety of tests, that Emily's hearing is slightly below average, but as her ears were bunged up, it's not conclusive. Thus, we have to go back in December and have a cold-free re-exam.

Funnily enough, Sue was chastised for bringing Emily in with a cold, but as we've waited THIS long to get the exam in the first place, there wasn't much that was going to stop Em getting looked at - including having a cold.

Hopefully December's results are mode conclusive and slightly better than this time's.