Sam

So, apparently I have a school kid now. This was his first week, he started on Monday. I can hardly believe it. We had a meeting last Friday to go over Sam's IEP (Individual Education Plan) and register him for preschool through the Mt. Baker School District. His school is called the Educational Resource Center (ERC). He goes on Mon, Tue and Wed from 1:00-3:30, but he rides a school bus, so it'll be more like 3.5 hours he'll be gone.

I am super happy to have him go to school, especially at this school. My Mom knows his teacher, she worked with her at Head Start and she's great. I know he's going to lvoe going to school and I can't wait to see him grow and change. I was super happy when I found out he was put into the afternoon class since neither of us are morning people. Once a week he'll have a 20 minute session with the Occupational Therapist there to work on fine motor skills, specifically around drawing/writing and learning to use scissors. The great thing is that since it's special programs, he'll have people focusing on his specific needs, like improving his listening and attention span. Also, since it's through the school district, there is no cost to us, and with where we're at that is pretty great for us.


Sam has been doing well. He knows about the baby in my tummy, but I'm sure he has no concept of what that really means. I am glad that Amy, who babysits him once a week, has a 3 month old daughter so he is around a baby pretty frequently. Sometimes he talks about things he'll teach the baby, like jumping, spinning, and running.

He's still a total beanpole, he doesn't eat a whole lot, which means his endless energy supply continues to baffle us! he loves to read books and "play" computer games - usually that means I play and he watches. He still LOVES to play puppets with his hands, and now he'll have conversations between his puppets.

Sam still crawls in our bed every night. It's really been a struggle for us trying to work on getting him to stay in his own bed. When he wakes up at 2 in the morning and we're both tired, neither one of us wants to fight with him for an hour about where he's going to sleep. I'm not sure what the best solution is, other than to persevere. It's all good lessons for what we'll do with the next one, but that doesn't really help us figure out what to do right now.

Other than that, Sam is a pretty great kid. He gets distracted and doesn't listen too well, but he's also 3 1/2 years old. I'm really excited about entering this new phase in his life and seeing where it takes us!