If I'm Holding My Hand Up Then I Win...

...even if I just threw my last domino in the floor instead of playing it. Hmmmmm, this may work for toddlers, at least in John's own mind it works, but I doubt it's a sane playing strategy for others. On a good note though we were impressed with how fast he was deciding on what dominoes play and how quick he was to figure out what 'I Win' means.

School Wednesday went pretty well. John started the trip by taking his hearing aids out in the driveway and then riding pretty quietly into town. By the time we got to Columbia, rather too early, he was giving me the sign for 'hungry' and so I stopped to get him his favorite Happy Meal. Well silly mommy, I thought it would be nice to drive the mile more to school and park so that John could get out of his carseat and sit to eat and not have to be put back into it before getting out. Ah how little I know about this parenting thing, we got to school and instead of being happy that he had food or even his favorite 'Red Drink', Coke for the rest of us, he went, shall we say, ballistic, screaming, arching his back, stomping his little feet, which don't feel so little with shoes! So I got him out, put him in his gait trainer and assisted him across the solid-sheet-of-ice parking lot and he gleefully ran into the school. He ran right to the gym, did his couple of laps through the hallways and was ready to go back. Stopped for the obligatory 'drink' sign at the coke machine and made it up the two wheelchair ramps with no assistance, other than stopping him from rolling backwards when he stopped to play with the handrail that he still can't reach. Up at the classroom level he did his best impression of running towards the classroom, alas it was 15 minutes early yet and his therapist had another kid she was working with. I stopped him before he rounded the wall, curtain, thingy to the room and my what a hullabaloo he raised, you would think that I had smacked him or something, good grief. He was finally settled with a puzzle for a few moments, and did great signing for the animals and putting them in their proper places and such and then he was off screaming again because Miss Amy was not paying sole attention to him. And this is why we tease that John has Lack-Of-Attention-Disorder ;)

Once the drama king was finally in class he did very well, remembered his signs, paid pretty good attention and even verbalized well but the very best part came when Amy let him ride the little trike, well actually it's not a trike it's a scooter thingy, you sit on it, it has handle bars and you push it with your feet. At first John was unable to go anywhere, but he was happy, happy, happy! Then slowly but surely he figured out how to move it and got a good 20 feet or so before he was tired out and ready to go back to class. Therapy went well afterwards too!

The trip to the library was aided by the umbrella stroller which John rode in for a few minutes but then well the books rode in it because after all the books don't caterwahl when they are in the stroller and draw the attention of everyone in the entire library. Finally on the way home he slept but was oh so excited when we got home and daddy was there to greet him!