Taking the Scenic Route

This semester, on Wednesday, my mom comes up to Speech Therapy to pick Zora up during Zane’s Friendship group and spends the day with her.  This time we are switching things up.  She is going to have a day with Zane instead.  He wants to go the Kansas Cosmosphere in Hutchinson and to “Subway, Eat Fresh”.  Zach got off work to go with Zora and I to tour different magnet schools.

By the end of the day, we think Earhart will make the top of the list, with Hyde a close second, and Buckner (the closest one) as our third choice.  We liked all the schools we went to, but those seemed to be the best fit for Zora’s personality.

Posted by my Mom, on Facebook: Out of the mouths of babes… I had ZANE day today and we went to the Cosmosphere & Space center. We saw the IMAX show on the Hubble telescope with some of the spectacular pictures it took. At the end they showed deep deep space and showed irregular ‘blobs’ of solar systems, etc. After the last note of the music played Zane said “Just like in the beginning’ (Gen. 1). He gets it!

This morning at the YMCA, while I was trying to wedge Zora’s feet into her tap shoes Zane disappeared. He hasn’t done that in years. I went to see if he went to the bathroom, ended up getting a staff member to check for me because he would answer (not unusual), but he wasn’t there.  Then the staff joined in the search, and his ST happened to walk in the door for her workout and said she hadn’t seen him outside, so I ran back to where I started and saw him through the windows in Kid Zone. He apparently wandered in there when they were slammed and hadn’t had time to notify anybody yet. I thanked them for keeping him there, because me panicking and him safe was SO much better than him wandering around the facility. I decided to forgo the cardio workout and go home after her lesson. lol.

Zane spent a good chunk of time on the computer, then showed me the list he made.  It is to turn the wi-fi/internet on his DSi.  He wanted it on, but didn’t know how to do it, so he looked it up online.  Apparently, the place he found, assumed you didn’t have a computer at home and started with “go to the library”.  He was insisting that we go to the library until I convinced him that we could do it from home, but to wait for Dad to come home and he would help him.  This is the note he made:

And Zach helping him go through it to get it hooked up.

He was feeling very happy when it was on.

During the day I kept noticing Zane taking pictures of himself with his mouth weird and doing other odd things.  I couldn’t figure out what he was doing.  While we were at the restaurant he kept working, finally producing these hilarious masterpieces with his DSi.  Cool!

Swimming across an area over her head.  Go girl!

Gymnastics Again. He is in a class by himself, literally. Next week there will be another kid, but she moved to another class when we chose to take a break in December. He lasted 45 minutes, which is pretty good considering how intense it is when it is one on one.

“Zora, will you please play with me?” Never thought I would hear that phrase unprompted, but it was said today, several times. Zane was enjoying the DSi feature of allowing the systems to sync up and play a game together. Zora was thrilled until she started getting frustrated at always losing the game.

Zane had to wait for Oma and Opa to unwrap the gifts.  It was worth the wait.

And Uncle Steve & Nora, who gave Zora her heart’s desire (bike) for her birthday, came through with Zane’s heart’s desire for his birthday.

Then Oma & Opa’s gift:  A trip to Chucky Cheese.  Much cheering ensued.

You know the sweet part?  Zane didn’t really want anything, so he happily gave Zora  his tickets to get what she wanted.

Than back to the house to meet up with Robert’s family, who came to join us for cake.

Zane decided that he didn’t want a Mario themed cake, and for a while he wanted a pirate ship cake.  Then, being a sucker for TV advertising, he begged for this for his birthday cake:

He wanted it with chocolate chip cookie layers instead of the pictured cake, notable for a very literal kid.  We chose chocolate frosting to go in between the layers.  It doesn’t look fabulous, but it was SO GOOD.  There was not a bite left, and that never happens.  We remade it a few days later just to have leftovers. lol.

Those are trick candles, they keep reigniting, amusing Zane.

By the end of the evening, he was “Peopled out” and went back to the corner, found his new book, and got lost in that.

Perfect day.  The days events would have been turning him into a crazy person a short time ago, but he not only handled it, but enjoyed it.  So proud of my boy.

So far this day is awesome, except for Zora constantly saying “it’s too booooring” every 2 minutes.

And, in Birthday preparations…

Kids are throwing me for a loop. I assumed that Zane wanted another Mario themed cake and Zora would want either a car and/or princess cake…nope, he wants “Pirates, with a 3D boat and 3D captain”. wuh whut? Zora wants a Dora cake. Both want “a cake with cupcakes around it”. Zora wants star candles. This shall be interesting.

and later….Now she wants a rainbow cake. That sounds so much better to me, I hope she doesn’t change her mind.

And, a quiet evening with coffee, drop of vanilla extract, some cinnamon and nutmeg, a bit of milk, curled up to watch Hell’s Kitchen finale.

Robert and his kids spent the night.  Fun was had by all.

They brought the rockstar and the kids all jammed out

The girl’s interest waned and they found better things to do.  The leaves, the sun, and a beautiful autumnal day.