Breakthroughs!

Do you ever have those times when you are just so proud of your kids that you want to shout it out to the world? Yeah. I'm totally feeling that right now. Aja has made SO MUCH progress lately that it completely blows my mind. We usually never go to the park. We always play around the yard at home (and even that is tricky at times with Aja). Reason being is that Aja HATES the park with a passion. She usually will just sit there and scream and cry and cling to me (wait she does that already. Hence her nickname Hip Leech). I think it's because the kids are moving around so fast, it's loud and she's terrified of the big toys. Makes going to the park no fun. I don't know why she is like that. I don't know if she's overly cautious or if her perception of things is off because of her condition. Either way, we take things slow around this household.

With limited things to do around here in Price, UT, we decided that going to the park is something we HAVE to do not only for our sanity, but for the sanity of the older kids who actually love the park. So we went. Of course, we get there and Aja immediately starts screaming. So I told Mitch to go off with the older kids and keep an eye on them and I would work with Little Miss. We went to a "quiet" part of the park and just sat on the bench and talked. Then Aja climbed off the bench and played in the wood chips for awhile. I took this opportunity to just talk quietly to her and kind of scooted my way backward so she would have to walk towards me. She followed (always keeping a hand on me I might add). I then went and sat on a step in the big toy and she again followed. We played there for about 15 minutes and then she said she wanted to "walk". So she held my hand and we walked to the toddler side of the park. There she walked across the little bridge they had there, she crawled through the tunnels AND even tried the balance beam! Seriously. I was so happy I was jumping up and down hooting and crying at the same time. I'm sure other parents thought I was nuts, but who cares! We both got dirty (because I had to do it first to show her that it was okay) and we both had a lot of fun! Also, Aja has been super brave and has been running around in the grass here at the house! She used to just sit on the sidewalk and scream.

Now this might not seem like a big deal to many of you, but when you have a child with special needs EVERY accomplishment is a big deal! I try not to read into everything that Cohen and Aja do/say because I know every kid is going to have their off days, but Aja does have something going on in her little head and we can't figure out what it is (we know it's not autism), but I'm SO HAPPY that I was able to break her out of her shell and get her to act like the almost 2-year-old she is!

So give a big WHOOT! WHOOT! for Aja!

Love this girl!