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I think I've worked this photo thing out
Here is a photo of the sort of Lego chocolate colored brick cake that was made for Lego Lover’s birthday. It didn’t come out quite right due to the marshmallows not being properly covered with frosting. Next time it should be better.
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Birthday excitement
The birthday went off really well, especially considering Lego Lover slept very little the night before. I thought he would become cranky but he managed to hold himself together through the entire day. I think he was on a birthday high all day.
The day started fairly early when he woke in a pretty good mood. We had to wake his brother so that he could open his present or he might have been waiting quite a while. As soon as he saw the package, he knew exactly what he was getting. He just loves his mega sized Transformer. The only problem is it makes sounds/noises quite easily and there’s no way to turn it off. It only takes the slightest touch. It took quite some time to get the parts out of the packaging and then it was a while before it was all together. So Lego Lover had a great time going through this process and afterwards had much opportunity for play.
We worked on making the Lego brick cake in the afternoon. That didn’t go completely pear-shaped but I think we learned a few lessons to improve the end product next time. We used marshmallows, as I had seen suggested online somewhere, and placed them across an already frosted cake. Then I took the remaining frosting and heated it slightly so I could drizzle it over the marshmallows. They didn’t get as covered as would be ideal but the effect was sort of there. Lego Lover liked it.
Once the Scientist finished work, we went to Whiteman Park, a local state park (about five minutes from us), to meet up with family. The plan was to keep it simple with cake, drinks and a few corn chips. Lego Lover received his presents pretty much as he arrived. He ended up with mostly money and a Bionicle set he wanted. We had cake and then it was play time for a while before we headed home to have “Krabby Patties”.
After dinner we went up to Hillary’s Boat Harbour to get an ice cream and returned home soon afterwards. Lego Lover managed to stay awake until midnight but the tiredness ensured he fell asleep pretty quickly that night with sweet dreams of the Christmas to come.
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Rash revisited
Lego Lover again has a rash, rather similar to that which he had back in July when he developed hives. He doesn’t seem to have hives at this point. The rash started in his armpits, much like last time and has spread into nearby areas but has improved in the past couple of days. I took him to see the doctor a few days ago and he said it’s dermatitis and gave instructions about wearing loose clothing and use hydrocortisone cream. The armpits are improved but it seems to be spreading again and now has a patch in the groin area. Fortunately it hasn’t been all that itchy. The cause is mostly unknown aside from a contact allergy triggered by heat and friction. I rather doubt laundry detergent is an issue since he’s not had an ongoing problem so I guess this will continue to be a mystery.
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A tic
A throat clearing tic has found its way into our household over the past few weeks and it’s driving the family rather bonkers. The tic has attached itself to Lego Lover and doesn’t seem to want to let go. Lego Lover has had various tics in the past. In fact, he probably always has some sort of tic happening. But this one is quite disruptive. It has been bad enough some nights that I hear this quiet throat clearning right through the night while he sleeps. One night we were eating dinner and there was hardly a sound aside from the tic. I think the rest of us were clenching our teeth to stop from saying anything. Occasionally it’s just a bit more than one or more of us can take and words just fly out of our mouths. It matters not that it just feeds the tic. A grumble just has to be be made. Hopefully the tic will soon get bored of our family and move on to someone else for a while.
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Hives
The night after our 4th of July picnic, Lego Lover came to me complaining of itchiness. This is a relatively common complaint from him and seems to mainly be caused by dry skin, I guess. But on this particular night, I happened to look at his arms and saw there were raised bumps all over them. This was no ordinary itchiness. Further investigation showed spots all over his arms, upper legs and chest with angry looking red patches under his arms. My first thought was hives but I wasn’t completely sure of it so I woke the Scientist and he wasn’t sure either. Then I called a health advice phone service available locally to speak to a nurse. After much discussion, she seemed to think it could be chicken pox. Since Lego Lover had this many years ago, I was somewhat doubtful about that being the cause but we operated under the assumption that it could be a second case of chicken pox just in case. What kept running through my head was that if this was chicken pox, it was going to a really awful case. He already had hundreds and hundreds of spots. After giving him Zyrtec and putting lots of cream on the itchy spots, I put him to bed.
Sunday morning I noticed that some of the spots had faded so presumed it probably wasn’t chicken pox. But I did take him to see a local gp, who confirmed that it wasn’t chicken pox but hives and apparently some eczema. I was told to keep him on the Zyrtec and use calamine lotion and/or whatever was recommended by the pharmacist. What a relief to confirm it wasn’t chicken pox and it wasn’t contagious. Fortunately we didn’t have to alter plans to go to a family lunch that day.
Over the past week and a half, the hives have faded considerably but are still there. We’ve no idea as to the trigger but I’ve noticed they get a bit worse for a while, especially at night, but then they get a bit better too. We haven’t been to see our regular gp as yet because they haven’t been bad enough (after the first several days) to warrant further medical attention. Hopefully they will simply resolve and disappear on their own in near future.
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My amazing son
I cannot believe the amazing things done by Lego Lover in recent times. He has made so many leaps in his social interaction that it’s very much like having an almost different child. Emphasis is on almost. Several weeks ago we were at a family lunch and the normal behavior for Lego Lover is to keep a wide berth between himself and just about everyone else. This has always been especially true for the cousins. This particular weekend was the occasion of my nephew’s birthday and it just so happened he received two different Lego sets. Enter Lego Lover and his expertise with Lego. What eventuated was a certain amount of interaction between Lego Lover and the cousins. We adults all watched with dropped jaws as he carried on some conversations. It continued to be amazing because he joined in at the playground for a bit and then sat comfortably with his cousins on the swing out on the back patio for awhile.
We thought this could have been a one-off event but it was repeated to some degree not long afterwards as we visited the home of the cousins. Only the uncle and the two younger cousins were at home but Lego Lover again joined in with some of the play and was very comfortable. I think Lego Lover must have allowed some of his self-imposed restraints to be eased a bit on that first time and so he has had more confidence since then. We’ve not had a further occasion for him to visit with his cousins but I feel somewhat assured that he will continue to be more at ease in their presence, at the very least.
So this brings me up to a visit last week with another boy with Asperger’s. Lego Lover has “met” this boy a few times in the past but would never have anything to do with him. The other boy recently started homeschooling and his mum has been in regular contact in hopes of working out some sort of relationship between the boys. We didn’t have any particular expectations on the first visit but we made sure both had their Nintendo devices and their Pokemon games. The other boy has problems understanding about personal space and was a bit too far into Lego Lover’s space at first. But after a while both were playing their games and eventually talking to each other. Again, I was quite please but it was a jaw-dropping moment. That’s not to say all went smoothly. The other boy has a whole collection of cheats he has used to level his Pokemon to what I guess is the highest level. Lego Lover isn’t happy with that and refused to battle him after a while due to the unfair advantage carried by the other boy. It wasn’t an issue that was immediately resolved but we two mothers mediated to some degree. It worked out to be a learning experience for both. We are hoping to have regular meetings of the two boys and they have now exchanged a couple messages by email.
As a side note, I would also like to point out the amazing thing the other boy did. We went into the cafe at the park and this boy went up to the counter on his own, ordered his serving of chips (fries) and paid on his own. He did a beautiful job and was extremely polite. He was on his own, with me just behind him in case help was needed. It was also very impressive.
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A Lego Lover's Tenth Birthday
The birthday boy had what he called an awesome birthday. He didn’t wake up first like he intended but he had a really great day. I had to go out to buy balloons and a couple other bits and pieces early on so that I wasn’t at home when he woke up. I’d already wished him a happy birthday when he was still struggling to sleep in the wee hours of the morning so he was mostly anxious of my return so that he could open his gifts. His big gift from us was a Lego City Harbor set, one of the most coveted on his list. He also got copies of both season one and four of Spongebob Squarepants from my parents. While Lego Lover started building, I baked his cake. Since I have the strongest lungs, I then had the privilege of blowing up the twenty-five balloons. Game Fanatic, who is balloon-phobic stayed mostly out of the way during this process. Lego Lover had intentions of keeping them all in one area of the house but they ended up drifting around after awhile.
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Talk about pain
I remember this night ten years ago quite well. During the day, I started having contractions but carried on with my usual activities. I visited our very favorite local bakery and the owner (a Vietnamese lady) was shocked to see me out and about while in early labor. But she had a not-so-great surprise for me at the time. She announced they had sold the bakery and then introduced me to the new owner. I was quite sad about that but didn’t have time to dwell on it just then. I don’t recall too much else about the other activities during the day.
The real fun started around 11pm when my contractions became strong and were close enough together to make our way to the hospital. The Scientist and I set off with Game Fanatic in tow and arrived about half an hour later. It’s amazing how time seems to slow down when you are strapped into your seat but in regular waves of pain. I was quickly sent off to the maternity section where an incompetent junior doctor was in a hurry to be done after a very busy day in the ward that day. Meanwhile I was howling with pain in a way that never occurred during labor with Game Fanatic. It’s strange how different the two labors were. The Scientist’s mum was phoned to take Game Fanatic away as he was quite distressed by my pain. So it was then many hours of battle with the junior doctor who was trying to break my waters while my legs were clamped together because I was in continuous contractions. Various problems created a need for surgery so that Lego Lover was born at 6:30am by c-section. The next few hours were a blur and I don’t even recall when I next saw him because he was taken away while I was being stitched up.
The next few days were a monotonous period where Lego Lover slept a lot and I didn’t. Christmas was almost a complete non-event for me since I only had the company of a sleeping baby for all but a short part of the day. The big positive was Lego Lover was a champion nurser from the start and I was happy to miss out on all the pain I had experienced the first time around.
And here I am now, sleepy but still alert. Lego Lover is struggling to sleep so I am waiting up with him until he succumbs to the drowsiness. It’s been almost too much for the poor boy, with the excitement over his birthday and Christmas. He’s done pretty well this year and only really lost the plot once when he got too frustrated with a game on the Wii a few days ago. It should be a blissful day.
Now to get him to sleep so I can sleep so I can wake up early enough to make that scrumptious Devil’s Food cake he wants tomorrow.
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Another year older
The Scientist passed another birthday today, and it has gone well, I think. Lego Lover and I hatched a plan to get him a Lego Mindstorm set many months ago. I’ve been putting aside money all year and the Scientist’s parents contributed significantly towards the total. I paid for it in cash so there’s no financial pressure to pay it off now. The Scientist and Lego Lover should have some great times ahead of them as they work out how to use it.
The Scientist also got a copy of Ironman from Game Fanatic. This was something of a surprise, too, because Game Fanatic has made a habit of giving only games as gifts the last year or two. The Scientist is quite pleased because he’s been wanting this film on dvd since it came out.
I baked a ginger cake at the Scientist’s request and it came out really nicely. I’ve been having too many mishaps when baking lately so it was nice to have success on this one. Lego Lover thought it tasted great, too, which made it doubly pleasing for me.
The day itself seemed to go quite well and I think the Scientist thoroughly enjoyed himself. Hopefully he’s now having a good night’s rest.