Julia has been on a horse every day we’ve been here. With a saddle and also bareback. The bareback seems especially good -- lots of balance work. Julia was scared yesterday but today was easier. Barb has the lead at the horse’s head and I hold on to Julia from the side. Both of Barbara’s horses are big and their walk is quicker than Julia is used to, but she is enjoying it.
Julia does complain a lot. A lot! About everything we do. It is all strange and new and out of her scheduled activities. And so, the walk in the woods was accompanied with lots of Julia noise. Still, she did it, she got through it, it will be better the next time.
It was hot today, each thing we did took lots of energy. We went to a local museum of natural history. Small and compact but with a few dinosaur skeletons, some good animal exhibits, and some explanation of soil and rocks. A number of good exhibits that could be touched, more than most bigger museums. Julia touched. Julia had trouble with the volcano exhibit -- too real, it was film, too noisy, too intense.
Julia away from her scheduled activities flounders. She seems more autistic, she is more willful, harder to control. She is small and control is easily managed even if I have to pick her up and carry her somewhere. I try not to get in the position of physically moving her because she will not be as easily moved when she is 15. We must work on discipline, listening, following directions now, so the behavior will be imbedded by the time she is 15.
We’ve done math work once; drawn in her travel journal twice; did morning parade once. It is hard getting any working time in at all -- it always seems so awkward. I hope it gets easier as the traveling goes on. I theorize that the strange new activities will not seem as foreign if we have some standard work to ground her.
I am explaining myself to those who ask, defining the new time, asking opinions, gathering ideas and information. This does feel like a quest.
A girl on the farm.
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