Why???

When I started this blog it was because I had an amazing experience with my son one day.

We had been watching the movie Toy Story 2 repetitively (you know how it goes) and he was unbelievably reinforced by the experience to be a great kid in my house.  :)

In the movie there's a scene where the mom cleans out the house and holds a yard sale while her son is gone at summer camp.  After watching this moving many times, one day, my son asked to hold a yard sale at our house.  To many this might seem like something typical or even annoying.  But for me it was a WOW moment in my life when I saw my son do the transfer of information, where he took one piece of information from one aspect of his life, and could then put it into another.

IMMEDIATELY we got boxes, filled them with toys, went outside, and together, we held a pretend yard sale.

We sat in the driveway at his little, blue therapy table, and chatted about the toys we had for sale.  We talked about whether or not any people would come.  He realized we did not have a sign inviting anyone, and so instantly a sign was made from a cardboard box.  We chatted and played together in the driveway, with his younger sister, discussing a yard sale, toys, what it meant for them to be sold (and how they would never come back).

No one came to our yard sale, but we took the supplies back into the house and saved them for later that week when the same thing happened again.  Again, we played yard sale and roll played how to sit at a table, how to wait for customers, and even took out the change in his piggy bank to make sure we had change for paying customers.  We practiced eye contact while talking and discussed the emotions of losing a favorite toy.

While no one bought a toy (I sincerely believe he would have been devastated to really, truly sell a favorite toy) we made many great, and seemingly miraculous memories that day.

My son showed me in his choices that he could transfer the information he was taught, and of his own will and independence, put it into another aspect of his life.  That was truly amazing to me!  We also practiced imaginative play and role play that day, which truly was another WOW moment in our shared life experiences.

He's an amazing son and I am SO, SO, SO proud of him!  I started this blog after that time because I realized that in my day to day experiences with my son I was practicing skills, and taking risks that other parents might want to know about.  I thought they might want to know that somewhere out there, another mom drops everything to play "yard sale" with her son, not just because kids love to play, but because I had a moment where my son who is challenge by Autism, chose to leap into life and create some great memories.