Good Friday!

Today started off a little strangely.
Lauren took a long while to get ready for school - very distracted with TV, her books and just took forever to bathe, and eat her breakfast.
Thank God Friday morning traffic was kind. We got to school with time to spare for reading.
She seemed a bit teary when saying goodbye to me. First it was "goodbye Rabbit" (By the way, we are given character names by Lauren, from shows she like. And the characters change, depending on her mood. Today, it's characters from Pooh Bear. So, I'm Rabbit, Daddy is Pooh, Lauren is Piglet and her little brother is Roo). Anyway, she said Goodbye Rabbit and I replied "Goodbye Piglet". Usually, that's it. Off she goes.
But today, she lingered a bit, looked a little teary and then....Goodbye Mom. Hmm...unusual. I half expected her to burst out crying...but she didn't. Before I could fully say, "Bye Lauren"...she dashed off, found her usual spot in her class line-up. Quickly sat down, unzipped her bag, took out her book (The Wild) and started reading. She was ok. Not sure if she stayed ok the rest of the day, but I'll know tomorrow. It's Report Card day!

In the afternoon, we went for Speech therapy. Her speech therapist, Cindy, did a few activities with her like show her a card with a pix and word/s, and Lauren has to think of a sentence which requires the word on the card as the answer (eg. the pix shows a shoe, the question would be: what do you wear on your feet?"). The first time Lauren did this was 2 1/2 weeks ago and she struggled. Today, was a total turnaround. She was fantastic!. She got her what and where mixed up but got the concepts right. Cindy was pretty amazed. Next activity, Cindy read 4 - 6 sentence long paragraphs and asked simple questions. Lauren could answer all of them (except for one where she got 2 out of 4 right). Again, this shows she's listening and understanding. Good for a typical child. Very good for an ASD.

It's days like these that give me lots of hope that Lauren can make it. She can have a shot at normal life. We just need to continue to work really hard now.

By the way, after reading The Wild, we now have new characters. Tonight, I became Benny the Squirrel, Dad is Nigel the Koala Bear, Lauren is Bridge the Giraffe (Lauren's fav animal) and Luke is Sammy the Lion.

Nite all.