old age, developmental testing, and new words

So for the first time, someone from school asked if I was Julia’s grandmother. No offense taken, but I might be looking rather haggarded (which doesn’t seem to be a real word) these days. I admit that I am sick of house work. I have no excuse not to do it – when will I find a job AND an excuse for a messy house?? Okay, those two thoughts – feeling haggarded and being sick of housework – have almost no connection, but then I'm old as Julia's grandmother today, so my thougths are muddled.

Finally, finally, got the call from the developmental clinic that we have been trying to get into and after talking to a doctor (I think) about Julia, the first reaction was that they might not be the right folks to be testing her because what they do is mostly medical related developmental delay. Oy! I backpedaled and convinced them to do the evaluation, if, for nothing else than to rule out any medical diagnosis. I don’t think that anyone who we’ve talked to was the exact right person.

My child the puzzle. Oy, again.

So we made an appointment for January and I have to get all of Julia’s records over to the clinic. And there must be an easier way to do that apart from having them mailed from each of Julia’s providers. The number is mounting up.

Meanwhile, Julia moves forward. She used on and off correctly, and closed and open correctly. This has taken a long time and plenty of opening, closing, ons and offs of doors, windows, lights, closets, and refrigerators. In speech therapy, Carol practiced "is" with Julia and Julia is trying to use the word at times. Julia also used "behind" correctly while we were driving. It was a school bus that was "behind white car." We also worked on taking turns in speech and I see that Carol forces the issues more than I usually am willing to, so, I will follow Carol’s lead and do as much as I can taking turns even if it is only for a round or two of turns.

I sent out a plea on my yahoo adoption groups about our testing dilemma and received a whole bunch of replies with ideas, hints, etc. One mother suggested Montessori school or using Montessori materials. This is a great suggestion and I thought I’d try some during the winter break. We will be working on social stories as well.

On a sillier side, Julia loved our pasta, sausage, and broccoli dish, that David was warming up for her lunch, for her breakfast. No, we haven't given her left over pizza but I have a feeling it would be a hit.