Bill called me this morning after dropping Lila off at daycare. He usually brings the iPad to help Lila with the transition from home to daycare, and today was no exception. When they got there and he put her down, she wanted to play “Toca Kitchen”.  The other little girls started crowding around her. Bill asked them if they usually just watch, or if they ever help her. One of the little girls (Mia) said they just watch.

Bill told them that Lila may ask them to help, and if she does that they should try and help her. Just then she was cooking something on the game – she doesn’t like to press the back arrow, for whatever reason it gives her a lot of anxiety and she uses Bill or I to press it for her. She grabbed Mia’s hand and put it over the arrow so Mia would press it. Mia was pretty excited that Lila had asked her to help (and she did)! Just the fact that she had that interaction with another child made my day – very exciting!

Janet had me contact Lila’s school and ask who their augmentative communication specialist is – working with them to see what direction they would like us to go in: Dynavox, Proloquo, or GoTalk Now (which is what we’re currently using) . We will see what happens, I would love to be able to send Lila to school with her iPad or an AAC device of some kind!

We started using a Core Board on GoTalk Now last Friday at our SoonerStart session with Janet – so we’ve been working on that this week. We also added some new episode choices for her (Wonder Pets). She has been coming over to my phone and wanting to watch videos of herself this week. She LOVES watching herself – I may try to figure out how to turn that into a picture card!

She is all about anything and everything that has to do with me performing alongside her favorite shows while we are watching them… I KNEW all of that dancing/performing would come in handy! I perform “The Wonder Pets: Bee & Slug”, multiple songs from “Frozen”, and chase Umi-dollars with Lila on my back while watching “Team Umizoomi” every single evening. We have never forced Lila to make eye contact, and because she trusts us and enjoys the interactions, she does it freely and willingly. Makes my heart so happy!

She turns 3 in three weeks, can’t wait to see what she does next – we’re just doing the best we can to keep up!