Halloween

Sophie wanted to be Emma Wiggle for Halloween again this year.  It didn't matter what we suggested she made it quite clear that Emma was the choice.  So, Emma it was!  Sophie's grade is part of the parade at school as well.  Here she is with her nurse and EA.

Lucas was Smurfette.  What can I say, I have a daring boy with a good sense of self and humour!

Zoe was Rapunzel and she came trick or treating with us for the first time.

Lucas went with all his buddies again this year and a couple of the moms tagged along with them, they became the candy haulers as it is all about the quantity for these boys.

Sophie went with all her school friends for the third year, these girls love Sophie to pieces and Sophie was so excited to be out with them all for trick or treating.  They are always sure to bring Sophie some candy from each house.  She can't eat any of it so I get a few snacks ;)  Zoe had a blast with the older girls and they made her feel so welcome.

The best part is it only rained a tiny bit and it was much warmer than last year.  Hurray!

Musical Lightbox

Last winter we were gifted a switch adapted musical lightbox.  Sophie has become very proficient at using her switches so this was a nice addition to her adapted toys. I haven't used this with her as much as I should because she really enjoys the response she gets when she activates the switch properly.
 

 The lightbox is from American Printing House for the Blind.  It lights up and plays music when the switch is activated.  I am hoping to get a latch timer for Sophie because she finds it hard to hold the switch down for any extended period of time.

Since Halloween is on its way I added some little spider and pumpkin stickers for her to look at when the lightbox lights up.  She was very interested in them and I will have to think up more ideas of what to place on the lightbox to keep her visually interested when playing with it.

Halloween

We had a great Halloween, even if the weather was awful, pouring down on us all day and night.  It was much warmer than last year though, which was cold and wet.  The primary grades at the school did the parade around the block in a brief dry spell and all the kids had so much fun showing off their costumes to the neighbourhood.  Sophie loved having her friends all around her, two of them right by her side the whole time throughout the parade.  She is such a lucky girl to have such amazing friends in her class and school.

This year we decided pretty early on what Sophie was going to be for Halloween.  We talked to her about it and asked if she would like to be Emma the yellow Wiggle from the Wiggles.  As some of you may know, Sophie is the number one Wiggles fan on the planet.  She gave us huge smiles whenever we asked her if she would like to dress as Emma so we knew it would be a hit with her.  We are so glad that Emma is a part of the Wiggles group, she brings something new to the show and it just made sense that Sophie would finally be a real live Wiggle, if even for just one day.

To make the day even more awesome, Sophie's EA and nurse came dressed as Wiggles as well!  So Sophie had a whole Wiggles singing group with her, just as it should be!  It really did make my day and I know that it probably meant the world to Sophie.  It was one of those things that didn't maybe seem like such a big deal to others, but to us it just was one more example of how awesome the team that we have with Sophie at school is, that they love her and think about how to make her day great every single day.

Lucas, oh Lucas.  What can I say, he just continues to be his awesome self.  He and his friend decided to be cheerleaders.  And boy did he pull it off.  We lucked out and found a cheerleader skirt at the thrift store and then it became this crazy adventure to find all the other pieces to make the outfit.  We had so much fun and it came out so great.  Dare I say he is a very pretty girl. lol.

He and his friends laughed their way through the night even though it was pouring rain, they sprinted to every house and were on a mission to get as much candy as they possibly could.  He was so excited when he was given a can of root beer, his favourite haul of the whole night.  :)

Making Sophie's costume was more involved but it came out amazing.  We hit up every thrift store and clothing store to find the yellow shirt to no avail, in the end I ended up dyeing one and it came out the perfect colour!  My mom and I found all the tulle and accessories and she sewed them into the perfect Emma Wiggle outfit. 

The day is over in a whirlwind, so much work for one day but so worth it!

Happy Halloween!!

Halloween sneak peak

I have been having fun...stress...fun getting this years Halloween costumes for Lucas and Sophie found and assembled.  My mom has been on sewing duty since she is way faster than I am.  Lucas is totally excited for the big night and Sophie is full of smiles every time we ask her about what she is going to be.  I love that we have made these ourselves again, it always seems better that way.  Only a couple more days to wait....

 

Supervisor Sophie :)

Weekend fun: sensory squishy bag

A few weeks ago I made a squishy bag for Sophie to play with.  I found the original idea at Play At Home Mom here back in the summer and then adapted it slightly when I found the post by Adaptions4kidz here.  These two blogs are a couple of my favourites for finding inspiration for fun things to make for Sophie.

I loved the idea of putting the foam stickers on the outside of the bag so that Sophie would have something tactile to touch other than feeling the gel in the bag itself.  I had the ocean stickers already so it was a perfect theme.

Sorry the pics are sideways, blogger is being a pain

 I also made a Halloween version.  I had some foam pumpkins and spiders, I found a big googly eye and some pompoms, threw in some glitter and voila, a Halloween squishy bag.  We had played with both of these a number of times but it wasn't until I put them on the light table that Sophie really got interested in them.  It just made everything in the bags jump out and she was very curious about them.

Sophie was a bit of a monkey though at the end and thought it was hilarious to throw the bags off her tray and make me pick them up over and over.

Going,                                                                                              going,

wait for it......gone!                                                                               Now laugh at mommy!

I am so glad that she loved these on the light table, it was a reminder that I need to try more activities with it, I think it helps her CVI alot and helps her focus her attention so much better.

This weekend we also played with the light box with gel clings, used the ipad and did some of her switch work on the computer.

Her favourite app, Awesome Xylophone

She worked very hard with switch scanning and is getting close to mastering the proximity switch embedded in her tray.  Still some work to go with the head switch but that will come.  They aren't using the head switch at school just yet so she doesn't get as much practice with it.

Being a monkey again trying to get the wires :)

Sophie had been quite sick last week with pneumonia and a double ear infection so it is nice that she is happy again and having fun playing.  Hopefully we will be able to put the antibiotics and prednisone behind us for a good long while now that December and all that comes with it are not too far away.

Supergirl and the alien minion

Halloween was a blur.

This year Sophie was Supergirl and Lucas was dressed in a morphsuit.  He was an alien minion along with his friend and another friend was the alien leader.  I know, where do these boys come up with this stuff?

Sophie had a super fun day at school, they all got dressed up for a parade around the block and then had a Halloween party after that.  Two little boys in the class walked with Sophie the whole way, they never left her side.  I love that she has such great friends already, it just melts my heart.  Sophie had alot of fun watching all her friends in their costumes.  She got to hold on to her Super Sophie doll that her great grandma made for her (the inspiration for her costume) and all the kids loved it and asked about it.

Sophie with her awesome new EA and amazing nurse

She was so tired from the activity filled day that she promptly fell asleep when we got home and slept for an hour.  Before we knew it it was time to get into costumes again and head out for trick-or-treating.  We were so rushed I only took about three photos of the two of them!  Urgh!

Sophie was invited to go trick-or-treating with three of her classmates.  I was so excited for her!  Sophie's three little girl friends were giddy with excitement to go trick-or-treating and it was a blast.  The highlight of the night though was that the girls made up a song for Sophie during the day and gave me, Sophie and the other moms a concert in the driveway.  I was almost in tears it was so awesome.  I had heard that they had gone up in front of the class to sing the song as well.  It was called "Super Sophie" and they wrote it themselves.  I WISH I had it on video, it was the cutest thing and they were so proud to sing it for us.

friends :)

Trick-or-treating was freezing and it was pouring rain, so I stayed out for about a half hour with Sophie and the girls and then we headed home so she could help hand out candy with daddy.  I went out and found Lucas with his buddies and their moms and we had a fun time for an hour or more.  Lucas is now all about quantity on Halloween night, those boys were running to as many houses as possible!

Yes, Lucas accessorized with a tie. That's my boy :)

Lucas and his three friends had so much fun and we are already talking about next year's costume!

Halloween activity bar

Sophie and I had a little time alone today while her dad and Lucas went swimming so I thought it would be fun to put together a Halloween activity playbar for her.  Sophie has used these types of playbars for many years, usually in the child life room at her therapy centre. However I also taught the daycare how to make them.  I supplied them with seasonal items and they would add to it from there.  They had rainforest themes, Christmas, Halloween, butterflies, etc.

So since Halloween is just around the corner I pulled out some items I had purchased for this activity.  I had bought the spider lights (which I also used for her sensory mirror) as well as some pumpkin bells and a few reflective patches.  There is also a glowstick pumpkin necklace.  Once it was all rigged up it looked pretty great.

 

The light or glow aspect is one that I always try to incorporate into Sophie's play, because of her CVI (cortical vision impairment) it is helpful to have the mirrors or lights to catch her visual attention.

 

 The full glow effect

The wonderful thing about this kind of activity is that it doesn't have to cost alot.  I bought everything, right down to the elastic to hang everything, at the dollar store.  Luckily the daycare didn't need the activity bar when Sophie graduated so they donated it to us.  So thoughtful!

I was able to raise or lower the bar depending on what Sophie seemed interested in.  When she was making lots of arm movements I lowered the bar so that she would hit the bells to make some noise.  I raised it back up a bit when she was more interested in the webbing on the tray.

hitting the bells when she moves her arm

I added in some spiderweb and a flashing spider onto her tray at the end and Sophie had a ball getting her hands all over the web.

This is such a great activity for Active Learning, a philosophy I have talked about on the blog before and one that is so important to us.  Sophie is able to play at her pace and make everything work without any assistance. 

Halloween is just around the corner, we have found Lucas and Sophie's costumes so now it is just a waiting game until the big night!