[Mason] Age 4 1/2, Glasses, and a New Speech Class -- Part 2

Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Continued from yesterday's post which included the new glasses portion. You can find that post here.

I had originally intended for this to only be one post, but once I started adding pictures in and getting detailed on the glasses portion, I thought it was getting a bit long for one post. So, here we are in Part 2 -- Mason's new speech class and some fun facts about age 4 1/2!

As I mentioned last week, Mason transitioned from using our insurance to get speech services at a private speech provider to getting services through the public school district back on December 6th. At that time, we had met our out of pocket max on co-pays so we opted to keep him at the private speech place as well as the public school for speech until the public school went on winter break for two weeks. For those few weeks, he was getting speech four times a week.

Day 1 of his new speech class, I was worried how he would react. I mean this was a whole new environment, a whole new teacher, all new peers. There were a lot of changes all at once! But Mason... ROCKED it! He went easily with his new teacher and was so excited at the end of the session to tell me all about it. His teacher said he did SO well also! He's been about twelve times now and he loves it every time I drop him off. Right after they got back from winter break, he practically dragged me down the street to get to class. He couldn't get there fast enough! It makes my heart so, SO happy to know that he loves being there so much and he's learning so much too. His teacher asked me the other day how long he has been reading for and honestly, I didn't know what to say! We noticed that he could read some words, but we thought he was just memorizing the books that we'd read over and over at bed time and just knew what was coming next, but no, he can READ the words on NEW books too! They were reading a little book they put together that had little sentences on each page like "snow on the hill. snow on the tree. snow on the ground." and he knew exactly what the words were, but he said "snow" more like "know" and she said just to work on pronunciation. Seriously. The kid blows me away all the time at how much he knows!



They made gingerbread houses one day before winter break
in speech class. Mason was SO proud!


And with that, I thought I'd do a little recap on Mason at four and a half, since all of these changes seemed to happen around that time. I'm terrible at recaps and I always wait so long to do them because I'm always worried I'm forgetting something. So I wait and I add and I wait and I add, but for now, I'm just going to go with what I have and then update you at age five (say what!?!) in July if I remember anything else.

He LOVES letters and numbers. He can count from 1-100. He can count by 2's (2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 16, 18, 20 - we're still working on that) and by 10's (10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100). I attribute most of that to YouTube Kids videos. Yes, YouTube Kids videos. I've sen a big change in Mason from wanting to watch all those Toy Review videos to actively searching out counting videos and letter videos. He also loves clocks and while he can't tell time, the other day he told me "12 and 7" when it was 7:00am, so I think he kind of has the idea. I'm planning to get him a clock "puzzle" type thing for Valentine's Day as a little gift.



He sings along to songs in the car. On November 15th, my beloved country radio station started playing Christmas music and ONLY Christmas music. Now, while I like Christmas music and all, I believe November 15th is a little bit early to switch over to those songs only. So, I changed radio stations. I made the move from 105.1 to 104.3 and have never switched back. I actually quite like their morning show (Bachelor loving friends - Ali Fedotowsky's fiancé is one of the hosts) and I really like the music. Mason NEVER used to sing along to any country songs and now he sings along to almost all of these songs. It makes me so happy in the mornings to hear him belting out words while the songs are on.

He LOVES helping me bake. We made cookies for Santa. We made muffins. And we made more cookies. He RUNS to get the chair from the table and pushes it over to the counter. I get all the ingredients ready for him and then he pours them all in to the bowl and mixes. I love his passion for baking!



He knows all the days of the week and all of the months in the year. If you ask him, what comes after Wednesday? He will say Thursday. And if you ask him what comes after April? He will say May. He can also just recite them to you Sunday-Saturday or January-December.

He's started asking questions. For a while, his speech was getting significantly better, but he was still lacking the conversation portion of speech. You'd ask him a question, but he'd never ask one back. While I'd say he definitely still can't fully have a conversation with someone, he has started asking questions of his own vs us just asking them to him. He'll say things like "what doing mommy?" "where's daddy?" and things like that. Seth and I actually went to a parent training class back in November for emerging talkers and I asked about how to get him to ask questions and it's like he knew because shortly thereafter, he started asking questions!

He gives the BEST open mouth kisses. So slobbery yet so full of love!

He's a BIG helper at the post office.





He LOVES sitting in my laundry basket (why???).






Some Mason-isms...

Seth - "Who's your favorite baseball player?"
Mason - ME!
Seth - "Who's your favorite baseball team?"
Mason - ME!
Seth - "Do you want to go to the baseball stadium and watch a game and eat hot dogs?"
Mason - YEAHHHHHH!!!!!

Mason : A, B, C, D... what next?
(with his little shoulders raised and his hands in the air)

Singing the ABCs...
A B C D E F G.
H I J K yeah yeah yeah yeah-O P.
Q R S.
T U V.
W.
X.
Y.
Z.

Cough cough. 'Scuse me!

Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty-teen!
(He has since corrected that to say twenty, but I never want to forget how he used to say it!)

Mason, what show do you want to watch?
Patrol! (for Paw Patrol)

While eating dinner...
I hold up a chip.
Mason holds out his hand.
(Seth and I laugh.)
Me : What do you say?
Mason : I love you!
(Seth and I laugh. My heart melts.)
Seth : Not quite. Can you say "I want chip please?"
Mason : I want chip please!
Me : Great job!!! (I hand him the chip.)
Mason : Thank you!

While in the car on the way to school, a song comes on the radio...
I love this song!

When a song comes on in the car, I start singing to it to get him to sing....
Wags his finger at me. No, no, no!
Guess he doesn't like my singing! 😂

Up high!
High five.
Down low!
Low five.
Too slow! (even though I low five'd him lol)

Seth and Mason are upstairs getting ready for bed and reading books.
Mason : Be right back! Runs down the stairs.
Me : What are you doing down here? Are you getting something for Daddy?
Mason : Yeah! Grabs pillow and runs back upstairs.

Rock a baby on tree top!
(Hold me like a baby and sing "rock a by baby on the tree top")

"Please, mommy? Please. Please. Pleeeeeeeeease!"
...and then I hand it over because I'm a sucker.









Happy 4 1/2 year old birthday sweet boy! Mommy and Daddy are SO proud of you and love you so much!



11 comments:

  1. I love all the things you do with your boy! He is smart and you help promote learning through your everyday life- I love that! I have two boys (2 and 7 months) and love seeing the things you do with Mason since he is a little older. THanks for sharing- he is adorable!

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  2. He's so sweet. Sounds like he has a great memory and that's so useful in learning!

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  3. For the longest time Connor used to say twenty ten for 30. He knew it was 20 plus 10 more. It's something I'll never ever want to forget.

    Mason blows me away with all he knows. He is one smart cookie. I love that you share his progress because like you've shared before, he is far more than a little boy with Autism. He is a smart, loving, friendly, smiley boy with a heart of goal. Autism doesn't define him.

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  4. Mason is amazing! I'm so happy he loves his speech class and is flourishing so much. That's awesome! And you and Seth are zucchini great parents for doing what is best for him. You rock momma!

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  5. What an awesome update Liz! I am 110% behind Youtube counting videos. I use them ALL the time to help my girls learn to count and such. Those songs really do the trick. So happy to see Mason thriving.

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  6. That sunset puddle picture is STUNNING!!! Mason is just growing in leaps and bounds, Im so happy he likes his new speech classes! That makes the biggest difference. And one less transition to make come Kindergarten time, right?

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  7. He is just the sweetest! So cute!

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  8. so sweet! I love 104.3, one of my favorites :) And I love how Mason is just blossoming and doing so well!

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  9. I LOVE how well Mason is doing. He has come so far. I know some days can be exhausting but it makes the little things so much sweeter and the accomplishments so much sweeter too!!

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  10. I'm so glad you did this little update! It's obvious the new speech class is absolutely doing great things. Mason is thriving, and amazing, and holy cow, he's learned and grown SO much in this past year! I'm totally blow away at how well he's doing so many things, especially reading! How awesome.
    I literally laughed out loud with the A B C D E F G.
    H I J K yeah yeah yeah yeah-O P. That is hilarious!!
    Side note (and total digressions): You know Graham in the Mornings on 105 is Graham from Bach in Paradise, right? Though, admittedly, I didn't realize Ali's fiance hosted the 104 morning show.

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  11. Wow his counting and days/months skills are so impressive! And yay for starting to ask more questions. Isn't it great when they start to be more interactive with the conversation!?!

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