It has been a busy week, but a good one. I kicked butt on my electric unicycle this weekend and Jeffrey said I was ready to hit the beach paths around Mooloolaba, where there are people everywhere. We went down on Sunday afternoon, and it was so fun. We only had one small incident where we were crossing a bridge and a dog on a lead got in our way. We also ran into two men on electric unicycles and we stopped and had a chat with them - they had really big-daddy unicycles which have already gotten me and Jeff talking about upgrades. Haha. It is very fun!
On Sunday morning we attempted a family sports day, because my other nephew, Baz, and his girlfriend were in town. They stayed with Lolo and Dida for a few days, and they all came down for a baseball session and a unicycle attempt in the park across the road. Arley got upset because he wasn't hitting any balls, and so he took himself home. Then Carmie was tired so she went home. We adults were left in the park by ourselves, so Baz had a go unicycling, and was actually a fast learner! Afterwards they came over for coffee, and it was a nice time. Good to see Baz again after almost three years. Arley was very upset with himself after Baz left, because Arley barely spoke to him :(
Last week Arley seemed to go really well with his new groups, and even went swimming a couple of times with them. He was desperate to go on Saturdays too, because Carmie has a teen girls' session then, and he was jealous. So I organised with the owner of the business for him to have a session at the same time, with the owner's son Kianni. Fifteen minutes after the kids arrived (my friend dropped them off) I received a call from the owner saying Arley wanted to come home, that he was done. Argh, I was so annoyed. The groups are 25 minutes drive away, so I wasn't going to rush down there to pick him up, only to have to go pick Carmie up when they were done. So I made him stay for a little while, and what followed was a series of very angry texts from Arley demanding that I pick him up, that I was so mean, no parent should ever be so mean to their kids...insert massive eye roll!! I went to pick him up an hour early, then we went to a cafe to kill the last hour until Carmie was done. Now Arley says he is never going back to the groups again. So, he has gone to begging for four groups a week, to zero. Could there be a bigger pain in the butt??!! He even refused to go on Wednesday this week which was the session that we started just for him and his buddy Liam, which meant Liam was all alone. When Arley says he's not doing something, there is very little we can do, because if we make him go, then everyone suffers! His anxiety escalates and all is lost. To give him a social outlet, my friend Andrea, Chayse's mum, will be taking Chayse and Arley out every Thursday afternoon. He wasn't jazzed about going this week, but we coerced him, and he had a good time. They went to Timezone and then rode the paddle boats at the mall, feeding the hundreds of fish chunks of bread. That's right up Arley's alley, so it went well.
As for Carmie, she is doing really well. I am notorious for taking her to appointments at the wrong time, and often the wrong day, and I did it again today. I drove her down to Caloundra for her dungeons and dragons group, only to be reminded that it isn't on this week. Carmie was ready to kill me. Haha. I made it up to her by taking her out for ice cream. We ran in to her friend Sprinkle, so I bought Sprinkle ice cream too so she could join us. It was really nice getting to know one of Carmie's friends. Sprinkle is an awesome kid, and I'm glad Carmie has her as a friend.
We had an intake session with our new behaviour specialist this week. I have high hopes for this guy. He is bringing some new strategies and will be teaching us all to get on the same page, support workers included. He said it will be a lot of work, the changes will be slow, and there will be a few meltdowns, but he thinks he can help the kids. My fingers are crossed!
Also, the kids and I graded up in Taekwon Do on Tuesday! Both kids are now green belts, and I am a blue belt. The order is white, yellow, green, blue, red, black. I am so proud of the kids. Arley was definitely feeling the pressure on Tuesday, and acting up a bit, but we got him out of his funk and he kicked but. Then Carmie totally kicked but. We had to spar each other as part of our test, and I wasn't holding back, but Carmie did so well. It's her turning kicks that are killer, she can kick at head-height! We all did really well :)
And that's it for our week!
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