How much can you pack into twenty-four hours and still have a few more hours to pack things in? These and other fine thoughts are running through my head. After getting cleared of no covid, yesterday Owen sneezed and his eyes got really watery, really quickly. I could tell what was happening. I prayed and prayed and prayed some more but here it was. As the night went on he got more and more nasally and it meant it would go one of two ways. Spike a fever really quickly and need an antibiotic or stay right above his normal temperature and be really nasally for several days. So far it feels like it will get out of his system pretty quickly. Plus, he had tons of energy today and no high fever. When he woke up for I think the third or fourth time he was ready to “be with mommy”. Before he got sick I told him he was going back to school today. What an emotional rollercoaster that was because not even an hour later I was almost completely positive he would not be able to go. He did well though even though he asked for his teacher constantly and then said, “be with mommy”. I’m going to look at the bright side of it all. I got to dance with my boy in the kitchen. He started singing to a song on his tablet and I asked if he wanted to dance with me. He came a’running to the kitchen. At first, he put his feet on mine and we move around a little and then raised up to my neck and wanted me to hold him to dance. My day was made at that point. Moment after moment he did amazing things. His reading level has increased over the past few weeks. He was watching a video and I asked him what one of the ads said for another video coming up. He didn’t hesitate and read it all to me. He ran to the “potty” and when he was finished he said, “that’s a” wanting me to tell him what it was. He said, “toywet” but very softly. We always call it potty so he stood there sounding toilet out. The letter L is hard for him but he asked me to look up the word on YouTube and he was happy. My day was filled with these moments of joy. He was watching a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse video and when Daisy was playing the xylophone with the band he started yelling for his xylophone. He stood there playing the xylophone and singing with the gang, and he did it in numerous languages. Music has always been something I wanted to share with Owen so that he knew he could play any instrument he wanted and sing until his heart’s content. When he wanted his xylophone I cried. He wanted to be a part of the band. He fell asleep quickly with his loud fake snoring going and in my arms. I’m praying he feels better tomorrow but incredibly thankful for his amazing progress. Some days feel impossible and other days feel possible. Never give up on the hope of tomorrow. Find your strength and keep pushing forward. Smiles to all and donut daze!

Sleeping is optional I have decided. At least Owen was quiet about it, kinda, sometimes. I decided today was the day to accomplish something, anything, all the things. But instead, we sat a lot. I put a few things away, folded some laundry, and started some more. That is all hard on Owen. Especially the laundry because my washer and dryer are in the basement. If I’m in the basement too long I can hear him running all over the house looking for me. I tell him where I’m going but it’s hard for him to comprehend that I’m downstairs. He knows where the basement is, he’s been in the basement but he struggles with it. The machines make noise, they shake the house. Every noise is a noise. He will try to go downstairs to get to the machines if I run them too much during the day. I try to run them at night or when he is at school but that doesn’t always happen. “Hear it”, he says when the world makes a noise. Birds flew over our house earlier and he stopped what he was doing and ran to the window. “Birds”, he said. A fire truck was off in the distance. “Hear it”, he yells. I did. It’s amazing how many noises I thought I heard until I realized I better hear all the noises. Me knowing where a noise comes from can make the difference between a meltdown and us being able to talk about it. He doesn’t want to wear headphones and white noise keeps him in a loop, pointing out certain tones he hears. He has been making so much progress the last few days. He pulled up the search on the tv and he had to arrow through the letters. He could spell part of the words he was looking for and then he started sounding out the rest of the words. I helped him spell one and then he saw it in the list for what he wanted. I’m very thankful for this growth. Each day brings triumph and trials but through it all, we grow together. Take one step forward and know that you have accomplished something. Each step is a bold step to your future. Smiles to all and donut daze!

I really had to think what day it was. When your days become all rolled into one you may have skipped a month at some point. Lessons learned, many many lessons learned. Always, always, always ask for the rapid test. Always. A million hours later the results say no sickness. It only came in right before bedtime. I didn’t really need the confirmation but I really needed that confirmation. We showed no signs of sickness but I still needed them to tell me he could go back to school. All I can say it’s that’s behind us now. But here I sit thinking am I going to take him to church tomorrow. I want him to be safe. I don’t want to go anywhere but I know that’s unreasonable. One day at a time I remind myself and we will see what he has in mind when he wakes up. He missed seeing his grandma today so that might be our destination. I have to keep focused on all the good that came from this week. He feels like he is making huge strides and progress. I fixed him breakfast and as soon as he was done he said, “sausage please”. I told him it would be a few minutes to cook but I would fix him more. He ate it all. I saw him look in his YouTube history to find the video he wanted. I couldn’t believe it. He opened it up, scrolled through the list, and went to the video he wanted. So much goodness in that moment. The even more amazing part is the video that he opened was a video of the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse in another language. Later in the day, he had an in-depth conversation with Siri. I listened to him ask her phrase after phrase. “Turn at the light in Arabic” and I thought oh now he will be telling me how to drive in all the languages. He moved on to “giraffe in Russian” and “banana in Arabic” but the list kept going. Some short phrases and others much longer. All progress, every single bit of it was progress. He has trouble with instructions. Yesterday I asked him to hand me two books off his desk. I told him where they were and the colors. I pointed to them. I asked him to look for the chair and then he could see his desk. He ran off onto the other room looking for it. I told him to come back in. After several tries, he brought me the books. He’s come so far but it’s moments like these I have to push through. He doesn’t understand when I point to something that I’m drawing an imaginary line to something in the distance. Today we worked on that skill. We walked through the house with directions and naming the different objects that he saw. He felt a little more connected to what was in the rooms but I’m not sure that it was enough yet to help him understand instructions or that concept. As the day closed he was extremely tired and so was this momma but I cling on to the hope of a better tomorrow, but progress was made today. He sat in my arms or next to me most of the day. It felt like he needed that security as much as I did. Even through our challenges, we grow. Find your strength and keep believing in tomorrow. Smiles to all and donut daze!

I would have to say we slept a little bit better than the night before but early is early no matter what time it is when late is late. Still no sign of sickness but before he can return to school Owen had to be tested. To say it was a stressor is an understatement. He never keeps his hands out of his mouth, a mask lasts five minutes if we are lucky, and generally, he likes to touch everything, all of which are things we shouldn’t be doing right now. My emotions, my sadness, my anxiety were all heavy taking him to get tested. He’s so young, he doesn’t understand, he’s my baby. Luckily we didn’t have to wait and even luckier there were three people to help us stay entertained while I filled out the paperwork. Two of the guys had camouflage pants on. This was the big conversation for Owen. He told them they had blue pants on as he always does and then finally said, “no they are camo pants”. I was able to get him to say a few phrases in Arabic and German and they were surprised. I think this was to soothe my nerves as much as it was to get him busy. Thankfully between all of us, we were done pretty quickly and out the door. Trying to keep him from putting his hands in his mouth and touching his nose would have been a job for even an octopus. I put some hand sanitizer on his hands and told him to rub them but he still wanted to put them to his face. It’s all so much for him. We got home and I wanted to cry. I’m hoping we will get the results quickly and he can go back to school on Monday. He was sitting in front of the tv describing every single thing he saw in great detail. “It’s pink green brown there’s a legs it’s a bell and a face it’s a it’s a it’s a clock”, he went on and on about it. As stressful as this time has been it has also been a huge joy to hear his amazing school journey come to life. I can tell how much he is learning and applying by his vocabulary and thought process. While I was fixing his dinner he asked for turkey. I got some out to put on his plate and he starts to walk away. I said, “don’t walk away if you want turkey”. He said, “run” and took off running. I had to laugh. He came back in a few minutes and ate all of his turkey, asked for more, and ate his dinner. His night finished off strong even though we had a few behavioral moments throughout the day. He sat next to me and again gave me great details about a video he was watching. “Giraffe eyes closed”, he said. I was thankful for his words today. Trying to find more peace than worry can be hard sometimes but the key is to find the shining moments in your day and focus on them. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. Make today matter. Smiles to all and donut daze!

I have to look at the bright side, have to. Some days become very overwhelming. The emotions sit heavy in my heart but today felt like we were on the right track. Owen did not sleep at all last night which means back to the drawing board for supplements. Two nights of the new one and it went from okay the first night to him waking up at three ready for his day. This is how it goes. I keep thinking I’ll find the right combination but his body reacts like mine to medicine or supplements. He ate a huge breakfast. I should call it more like he grazed all day. He kept eating but he’s growing so it works for me. He is absolutely in love with the scale. I think it’s because it talks back to him. When he steps on it he waits for her to say the number and then he laughs hysterically. He next wants me to get on it. He once again laughs when she says the number. He repeats “one hundred” but never the rest of the numbers. I’m like I wish. He had been running around and he came to me. He took my hands and started dancing with me, singing followed. Happy tears wanted to fall. It felt huge. It was the most amazing thirty seconds. He never really wants to sing for me unless I ask him. He got so excited to dance and sing. Later he came to me with a video pulled up on his tablet. It showed colors across the screen like a sunrise of yellow, red, and orange but no sun and a lion in front of it. He said, “that’s a” trying to get me to tell him. I asked him to tell me what it was instead and he said, “that’s heat”. I asked him where the heat came from and he said, “the sun”. He went on to tell me the lion was hot. The progress was outstanding. They have been working on these skills at school and I try to reinforce them at home. He was able to look at the screen and tell me about the sun that he didn’t see. He could infer about it all. He’s become my little weatherman always wanting to talk about the weather and what it’s doing. I’m so proud of his success. Later in the day, he was doing something and I said, “dude”. He rode off on his little scooter repeating “well come on dude dude come on” and laughing as he did it. He was happy the rest of the night and he fell asleep quickly in my arms. Now to hope and pray he sleeps later. Follow your dreams, share your heart, and never give up on the hope of tomorrow. Smiles to all and donut daze!

I feel like we made progress today. Thankfully Owen has not acted like or shown any signs of sickness. He seemed tired but he was still pretty energetic all day. I feel like he is really starting to understand his use of words and he is interacting more with Siri and Alexa to get them both to understand what he is saying. There are still letters he has problems with and words become muffled or he will run them together trying to say them. The word “singers” he has an extremely hard time with because of the S in the beginning and the hard G sound for him. He says the word and almost leaves both of those letters out. I think about how far he has come though. He used to ask me to find every single video he wanted and sometimes this would lead to huge meltdowns because of me not understanding what he wanted. Now I remind him to speak slowly and tell him that he is doing an amazing job. I don’t want him to feel frustrated or lose hope when he is doing it. I also remind him that Siri and Alexa don’t know everything and they are limited to what they can connect to. He had them dueling again for languages. It’s great to hear him having conversations with them. And again I think how far we’ve come. I still wonder how many languages he understands and how many he knows. He can sing in more languages than I can count but I can’t always ask him a question and he responds with a correct answer or responds at all. Questions are not always something that he comprehends or can relate to. It can take him twenty minutes to answer me or it could even be the next day but his memory is long. He has talked to me about something that happened when he was much younger and he will ask about people he hasn’t seen in years. He amazes me. I don’t think the dude stopped eating today. However, he did not like my food choices. He can tell what I’m eating if he is in another room and this can completely upset him. He used to love peanut butter. Today I was going to give him some. He came into the kitchen and I said, “have a bite”. This had him screaming, “it’s a peanut butter butter butter” and off he ran to the living room, threw himself on the ground, and his feet were up in the air. The smell, the sound, the look of it, something has changed for him so this truly was a hard moment for him and not something that he just didn’t want to eat. I try to be aware of the differences with him and what he can handle. Overall he had a really good day. He even played Old MacDonald on the ukulele for me, without me asking. I told him that he had to play with his toys instead of only his tablet and he went to his instruments. This made my day. My miracle music man makes this momma happy. Find your happiness, share your joy, and know that you matter. Smiles to all and donut daze!

I feel like we made progress today. Thankfully Owen has not acted like or shown any signs of sickness. He seemed tired but he was still pretty energetic all day. I feel like he is really starting to understand his use of words and he is interacting more with Siri and Alexa to get them both to understand what he is saying. There are still letters he has problems with and words become muffled or he will run them together trying to say them. The word “singers” he has an extremely hard time with because of the S in the beginning and the hard G sound for him. He says the word and almost leaves both of those letters out. I think about how far he has come though. He used to ask me to find every single video he wanted and sometimes this would lead to huge meltdowns because of me not understanding what he wanted. Now I remind him to speak slowly and tell him that he is doing an amazing job. I don’t want him to feel frustrated or lose hope when he is doing it. I also remind him that Siri and Alexa don’t know everything and they are limited to what they can connect to. He had them dueling again for languages. It’s great to hear him having conversations with them. And again I think how far we’ve come. I still wonder how many languages he understands and how many he knows. He can sing in more languages than I can count but I can’t always ask him a question and he responds with a correct answer or responds at all. Questions are not always something that he comprehends or can relate to. It can take him twenty minutes to answer me or it could even be the next day but his memory is long. He has talked to me about something that happened when he was much younger and he will ask about people he hasn’t seen in years. He amazes me. I don’t think the dude stopped eating today. However, he did not like my food choices. He can tell what I’m eating if he is in another room and this can completely upset him. He used to love peanut butter. Today I was going to give him some. He came into the kitchen and I said, “have a bite”. This had him screaming, “it’s a peanut butter butter butter” and off he ran to the living room, threw himself on the ground, and his feet were up in the air. The smell, the sound, the look of it, something has changed for him so this truly was a hard moment for him and not something that he just didn’t want to eat. I try to be aware of the differences with him and what he can handle. Overall he had a really good day. He even played Old MacDonald on the ukulele for me, without me asking. I told him that he had to play with his toys instead of only his tablet and he went to his instruments. This made my day. My miracle music man makes this momma happy. Find your happiness, share your joy, and know that you matter. Smiles to all and donut daze!

Well, we got ourselves in one of those quarantined things again. I can’t even say how much my heart is breaking because it’s all so much. I’d like to say I get it but I don’t. And if I don’t even get it how am I supposed to make Owen understand it. He kept repeating all night “be with mommy”. I told him over the next week he has to stay home with me. That’s the only thing I can say to him to make him understand. All I can do is pray and try to keep him busy and on some type of schedule. His teacher told me he has been doing well and when we came home today his words felt very vibrant. He wanted me to help him with Siri but his vocabulary and pronunciation are becoming stronger so I try to make him ask her for everything. Plus, he wants me to ask for a particular song or phrase and then he doesn’t even listen to more than a few seconds and he asks for something else or the exact same thing again. I told him that if he wanted me to help him that he had to at least listen to the song longer. He ran off asking her for some phrase in “Thailand not Thailand it’s Russian”. He had dueling Alexa and Siri again tonight. I truly am thankful for all his words. I waited years to hear his words and even longer for the amazing connections he is now making. I think we are on to that breakthrough phase. It seemed like he ate all night long. At one point he ran to the bathroom and said, “gotta go potty”. I’ve been trying to not follow him right in the bathroom so that it will give him time to go through all the motions. He went potty and then I heard him say, “wash your hands”. I could tell he moved the soap dispenser and the water was on. He turned it on full blast like he always wants to do but he quickly finished, maybe too quickly, and then I heard him say, “then you dry your hands”. He came running to me and I told him how proud I was of him. It is hard to let him go through his own accomplishments when I want to help him through it all. My expectations of how something should be done can defeat the success of him doing it on his own. I’m learning to focus on the goal of his independence. We have to remember to train for the possibilities not only the performance. He is doing great things in this world and will keep growing, and so will I. Tomorrow is a brand new day. Let yesterday go and focus on the future. Smiles to all and donut daze!

Part of the day felt like progress and part of the day felt exhausting. After Owen woke early last night he went back to bed. At some point before midnight, he moved to the couch and before I even attempted to go to sleep I moved him to my bed because I knew we would be up many more times. He slept great after that and I watched him sleep great. I do not know how at two o’clock in the morning when he is completely asleep, he can find the tiniest of hairs at the nape of my neck and pull them. How is this even possible, I wonder, and does he realize he’s able to do it. It’s not a new thing, it goes in spurts, but he’s been doing it since he was little. He was very sleepy when he woke for the day and the first word he said to me was “sit”. I said, “good morning Owen time to get ready for school”. I started to get out of bed and he said it again, “sit”. I told him I couldn’t sit if he wanted to go to school. It’s amazing how quickly he gets out of bed when I say that. He doesn’t always respond with urgency after that but part of it is distraction and comprehension. Within a few minutes, we were off to the bus stop. He was very happy to be getting on the bus. When he got home from school I told him that one of his therapy appointments got rescheduled and we were going today. He was very excited. We had a few minutes before we had to leave and then off to his therapy we went. The running theme was that it was raining even though it wasn’t raining. This made him mad but not as mad as it did on the way home. I asked him why he was mad about there not being any rain and he quickly said he was happy. He is learning emotions and how to express them but sometimes he gets confused as to how to share them or use them. He squeals when he is mad but quickly tells me he is happy. Some days it is so overwhelming because he rides the waves of one emotion after another and expects me to be there right along with him understanding it all when I’m not even sure where the train is and has it gotten to any building. He screamed most of the way home at different points but once we got home he truly was happy. The highlight of my day was when he said the name of his school. He called it “my school”. The progress felt amazing. He fell asleep quickly tonight and I was thankful he was happy. Smile and let the world see you shine. Smiles to all and donut daze!

More sleep with a side of the occasional wake-ups happened but I think it was better than most nights. Overall we had a pretty good day. Owen was much calmer than yesterday but we only went to church and the drive-thru for “chicken nuggets french fries ice tea not ice tea ice coffee”. He likes to tell me what to order. He also likes to scream about the windows being open. Not only my window being down but he wants the restaurant’s windows closed too. I try to explain to him that we can’t get our food if the windows aren’t open but he only has one goal in mind. Things have to be like they have to be until they don’t have to be like they have to be and then it’s ok until it has to be like it has to be again. Staying in routine is much easier for him but even he likes to change it up or not do something he has always liked to do. Bowling has become one of those things. When we go he loves it but getting there is hard on him right now. When we drove to church this morning it was raining so I turned on the windshield wipers. The best part was having Owen not scream at the wipers. I finally got a new car after driving the other one for over fifteen years. He still gets agitated in the car about where we go or how I turn but not having the noises that my old car made brings tears to my eyes. The turn signal was too loud for him, the windshield wipers squeaked and went too slow, the seats made noise, every single thing was something to him. A new car isn’t something you simply get. And a new car that he might halfway like is a stressful decision. When we bought the car I took him with me to see what he thought. If he didn’t like it then it wasn’t the right one for us. We sat parked, Owen and I in the back seat, and the sales guy in the front turning on and off the windshield wipers for us to be amazed at how quiet they were. I lost count how many times he turned them on and off for us. Today was that victory day. He even sang “the wipers on the bus go swish swish swish”. We were almost to church and a car pulled in front of me. Owen said, “dude come on” and I had to laugh. He may have heard that come from me a time or two. He had a great night of dueling Alexa and Siri. “It’s not Arabic it’s not Espanol it’s Russian”, he said asking each one of them to say different words in different languages. He fell asleep quickly tonight but he’s already been up twice. Fortunately, I got him back to bed quickly. The joy fills my heart hearing him laugh at “gorilla noises not bunny not kangaroo”. Never give up on the miracles yet to happen. Smiles to all and donut daze!