Happy Birthday to Me

OK - so the blog is more about me lately than Zach - progress is a little slow lately, but there are some notables. Please indulge me with a little self talk.

So, because Steve and I are visiting a special school today during our lunch hour, my girlfriends at work, (Ed, Ed, and Larry) took me out for a joyride and lunch at Moe's yesterday. I laughed really hard. This is why I like to go to work - they listen to me chit-chat about autism, nod and make eye contact like normal human beings, chime in with something to let me know they aren't tuning me out, and then we go on to talk about something nonsensical and goofy, like Ed's new crown made of gold which we now call his bling-bling. We actually did a cost benefit analysis of various crown material composites overlaying it with the form factor of the crown as part of our discussion. I love being an engineer dork sometimes.

Steve is temporarily taking Wednesdays off so until we find a sitter/nanny. I came home to homemade beefstew and chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. YUM!! He makes quite the little housewife I tell ya'. :) I am so lucky. The cake was GFCF and was awesome (I love being able to share it with both my children)! The kids sang to me (OK Zach just rocked back and forth) and the big news - Zach and Sophie blew out the candles together. He mimicked his sister - yes this is a big deal! YEAH!!!!

Mom's nerve block was yesterday. She sounded good when I talked to her on the phone. I will go over and visit her tonight to see how she is really doing and to tell her the news about Zach and his blowing. So cool.

So - yeah - how am I celebrating my birthday? Well, for starters, I awoke in a panic at 3:30 am in the morning remembering something I was supposed to do for work. Then at 4:01 am I hosed our computer trying to download software for my job. Then at 4:16 am I was in bed with Zach as he woke up crying. Then at 5:49 am after feeding Zach a muffin and some milk, he finally went back to sleep. Then Steve awoke and grunted at me to go take a shower because he wanted to get into work on time for a change. I still had yet to finish the thing I was supposed to do for work. ** sigh**

I got in to work and got rained on (and a little hail too) as I a had to traverse between the two buildings on our "campus" and all the umbrellas were stationed only in one of the buildings. Needless to say, I got wet. I've had several facebook greetings and several workmates wish me a happy birthday. I talked to my program manager about getting another office - I may even score a new work laptop. Then I went to the others on the project and had to give a "my bad" explanation on why I messed up on something. The nodded although they probably wanted to kick me off the planet.

Tomorrow my nieces have invited me out for Thai food and a movie. Wow. I haven't been out to a movie in about 5 years.

We received a call from the county stating that they believe they have something in place for us for an ABA approach that could start March 2. WHOA! We love L., our privately funded therapist, and I will not lose her. I am hoping the county figured out a way to integrate her in with all this.

So Zach hasn't shown a huge vocabulary increase (in fact none at all) but the blowing - this is really cool. Our therapist has been taking pictures of objects around the house that she will print out and we are going to use as a picture exchange sort of communication. I am looking forward to how this will work - I think it may be helpful.

So that's it for now. I am unusually upbeat today. I was thinking this was due to my birthday. But then I realized that spending a great evening with my beautiful family and sharing a meal with them only to have Zach mimic his sister is probably why I am really walking on cloud nine. Happy Birthday Me!