The kids are in the middle of evil government testing week. This is the way to determine if your school is “good” because everyone knows that sitting kids down and having them fill in bubbles is the best measure of their intelligence. Just ask Einstein. Or Leonardo da Vinci. Or Legolas (apparently Orlando Bloom, the…
More tales from the autism front. Today’s questions come from the mother of “Tara,” a 3-and-a-half year old who was just diagnosed. Keep in mind that I’ve never met these people, so I’m basically just relaying what we did in these same situations. Our son, Newt, was diagnosed with high-functioning autism at the same age and…
The kids turned in their science fair projects last week. Neither of them made it to “the big show,” but that wasn’t a huge surprise. They’ve historically driven me nuts by procrastinating for two months, deciding last minute that they want to do a “great job,” and then getting angry because they didn’t get chosen. I…
Our kids go to a Montessori school. In theory, that means Newt and Elfie are supposed to be learning to fend for themselves. I know that sounds ridiculous since the point of raising children is to make sure they can be contributing members of society when you kick them out of the house, but apparently…
So last week, I wrote about what my son, Newt, was like as a young child and what led us to get him tested for autism. This week, I’ll give you the not-so-brief rundown of what we ended up doing for school and what we didn’t do for therapy. On the day he was diagnosed…
We’re a family of three, not four this week (or four, not five, if you count the dog). Newt, our 10-year-old, is away for two nights with his classmates at a wilderness camp. At Lake Tahoe. In the snow. Fortunately he’s not snow camping (because that’s only for crazy people). They’re in cabins with heat…
One thing I love about our kids’ school is that because they’re a charter, they can do crazy assignments whenever something interesting comes up. The other day, my son, Newt, came home looking like he’d won the lottery because his teacher had signed him up for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). If you’re an adult,…
So yesterday I was lucky enough to come across this post from Grass Oil by Molly Field. This is worth a read for two reasons: one, it’s a serious, cautionary, Worst Mom Tale (and by that I mean “worst” in the best way possible — you know, kind of how “bad” and “phat” somehow got…
So I’m back in the saddle. At least that’s the plan. Research shows that if a person smiles, it actually causes her brain to think she’s happy. So in keeping with that theory, I’m just concentrating on doing what I do best — writing, complaining, yelling at the kids — in an attempt to start…
So after more than three weeks of mini-hell, we walked the kids back into their old school today. They were greeted like heroes coming back from the war. The only thing missing was the swell of orchestral music in the background. We’re picky when it comes to school. Like, super, uber picky. If I weren’t…
So come on in. I made some Arnold Palmers. And a nice jello salad...
