Baby Steps

Today was great, and I'm not saying that lightly. It was truly a day of "baby steps", though really I'm speaking metaphorically: today we hit some milestones.

First, we did not leave the house until 1pm. You read that right, one pm, and yes, there is a reason why that is huge. You may have heard about those families or those kids who can stay indoors and play all day, entertaining themselves quietly with constructive tasks. We are not one of those families. Or at least we weren't until today. All this holiday week I've been moving slower and slower, and noticing that the boys have allowed me to do that. It's been really nice, so today when we were still in our pj's at 11:30 I knew we'd have to test the boundaries and stay in for lunch. I made some soup, and while eating we heard on the radio that the Easter bunny would be at the mall until 2pm. That's when I looked up and it was one. We had played indoors happily all morning, and nothing was broken. Wow.

Second, Adam took three easter eggs from the Easter bunny and held onto them. He didn't throw them and run in the other direction for the escalator. Cool.

Third, we were sitting at Starbucks enjoying a cup of hot chocolate after the mall, and Adam (as usual) got down off his chair to sit and rock in the middle of the floor. As usual I pulled him out of the way of other customers. As usual he slid further out into the middle of the floor. Then I asked him to scoot closer to me, complete with gestures, and pointed where I wanted him to be. And he moved for me. Granted I said please, but this has never worked before. Awesome.

Fourth, we went to play with a group of people and had fun. That's not always an easy task with Adam around, but this was a new group for children with Autism and their parents. It was a lovely two hours, getting to know new mums and watching a whole group of children playing happily together. I've waited for years to find something like this, and it was worth the wait.

Funny thing was, sitting there chatting to the mums about their kids, and the diagnosis of Autism, and which special school or base the kids are going to...looking at the kids they all seemed just normal. Which was the best feeling of the whole day.