so proud

There are so many things I am proud of when it comes to Cole. He always impresses and surprises me with his skills; some I'm not always aware he has. As a parent of a special needs child, you are constantly trying to balance your child's vulnerability with their ability. I admit there are many times when I err on the side of caution verses letting Cole show me what he can do. I try to let go but it is so hard, especially when your child has a disability.

On Friday, Cole and I had a great morning. Connor was at Grandma and Grandpa Schusted's house. Cole and I had so much fun together. We snuggled a lot and just had fun. The plan was for him to go with a PCA in the afternoon so my sister and her new baby could come over and raid my bins of boy clothes. I drove to the place to meet the PCA and Cole refused to get out of the truck. This is something he's done three times in the past ten days. I'll admit it's been frustrating on my end. I selfishly need some time to myself and on this particular day I had plans. Cole had other plans for us. There is no way I would ever force him to go with someone. Cole was obviously loving our time together and didn't want it to end. I don't blame him. I love him lots, too.  So Cole gave the PCA a high five, wiped his tears and off we went to get Connor. 

I called my sister, who graciously said, "Lets not change the plans. I'm sure Cole will do just fine." This was one of those moments I was just writing about. I wasn't sure how Cole would do around baby Ethan. He saw him at the hospital and was not too interested, but having Ethan in his home was a whole different ball of wax. Cole can be very protective of his domain. Isn't it wonderful of Tara to be so confident and easy going!!

Once again, Cole surprised us.  We played at home for a while and soon enough, Tara pulled in the driveway. Cole was so excited. He said, "Tara's here!!  See baby Ethan!" When Tara got in the house, Cole immediately pointed to the bouncy seat (if you remember, he dug it out from storage a week ago and wanted Ethan to come over to sit in it). He said, "Ethan sit her. Cole buckle him in.". So Tara brought Ethan to the bouncy seat and Cole was right at her side. Tara tried to buckle him in and Cole took over- gently. He snapped the two buckles and said, "There she is. She is sleeping". (Cole often confuses his pronouns) Isn't that great!!  I know Cole loves his cousin, even if he can't express it as we do. Cole does it his own way. 

It was more stressful having Cole home while we were going through the baby clothes. He wanted to go on a bike ride, yes, in November. Thankfully he's getting more used to indoor activities and he's really playing a lot with Connor. All in all it went great and I was so pleased at Cole's behavior. He just continues to amaze us.

PRIDE IN HOMEWORK

I'll make this quick, but I wanted to share. I was so proud of both boys tonight. I was working on homework with Connor and Cole wanted to join in. He'll do anything Connor is doing. We have tried countless times to get Cole to do his homework and his patience lasts about eight seconds, and I'm not exaggerating. 

Connor was doing an awesome job circling his sight words and coloring in the lines. I printed off some tractor coloring pages for Cole and let him join the fun. While the pages were printing, Cole grabbed a sheet of paper and started drawing. He drew a house with a chimney and some smoke. I was so impressed!  He then wanted his tractor pages stapled together just like Connor's homework was. He proceeded to color in tractors, adding in the sun, sky and grass. He colored horses brown and tractors green... such a great job. The best part is how proud Cole was of himself and the fact that he was doing homework like Connor. He kept saying, "Good job Cole!  You did it!  You're doing homework."  Cole even starting writing out simple math problems 1 + 0 =. It was so fun to see the boys working so hard and more importantly, having fun. I hope the boys want to keep this up! I'm so proud of both of my boys- they are such amazing little love bugs.