Tarja turns 15 in the style of Tim Burton!

Wow, I am so incredibly late with updating my blog posts. So much has happened since I last posted. But first let me start with Tarjas 15th birthday. It's hard to believe that my baby girl is nearly a fully grown adult. But she is turning into the most beautiful, helpful, kind young lady and I'm so very proud of her.

We of course had a birthday celebration at home. She wanted money to buy a laptop with (she's
been saving for months) but she still got a few wee presents too. New clothes and girlie things. But this year she, her cousin and her aunties organised a special Johnny Depp/Helena Bonham Carter/Tim Burton themed birthday party for both Tarja and her cousin B at Nannys
house.

What a great night it was! Aunty J had made the most amazing Tim Burton themed cakes, and Aunty M put a lot of effort into food and decorations. Everyone dressed up and it was a memorable night.

A year of giggles and gigs.

Doesn't everyone love being spoilt? Yep, I know I sure do. And last weekend I was happily spoilt by one particularly hairy man who chooses to go by the name of Hank. (Rolls up eyes).

Anyway, so two weeks back marked the anniversary of our very first date. But Hank decided to have himself rushed to hospital via ambulance rather than celebrate. So I spent our anniversary worried out of my mind.... but all was well in the end and the following weekend he was still in the land of the living and cooking me a yummy meal.

So to celebrate our one year of laughs, giggles and numerous gigs, Hank cooked me a yummy meal with more starters than I've ever seen before, a steak dinner and yummy desert too. Oh, and of course... wine. Lots of wine. He gave me a gorgeous bouquet of flowers, and a card too. And what did I get him? Nothing. Zilcho. Yes, I am a bad girl friend. Whoopsies!

Halloween 2011

My kids love Halloween. When I was a kid we didn't really do the Halloween thing. But we do now. Mostly because my kids love sweets. And being given sweets for free is something they love even more!

This was the first Halloween that little Rosie has really been aware of. She was most excited. This year her big sister took her and Barney 'trick-or-treating' whilst I sat in making a costume (but that's another blog post). It was nice to sit inside in the warm whilst they went out together. It was so cute watching them walk up the road in their costumes, all excitable. Tarja said that after every door they knocked on she exclaimed "let's do that again!", making the neighbours laugh.

We carved two pumpkins, both in a 'Nightmare Before Christmas' theme. One was Mr Oogie Boogie, and one was Zero the dog. Rosie was dressed as a cat-witch. She loved her new witch costume but insisted that she wanted to be a cat, so Tarja gave her some makeup for that. Barney wore his new Grim Reaper costume, which was... well... grim.

A turkish wedding....

My little sister looked like a beautiful spanish senorita on her wedding day. I sat behind our Mum as we watched Maddi walk down the ailse, alone, followed by our littlest sister Hannah. Mum was balling her eyes out and desperately begging for a tissue, which I did not have!

The wedding took place outside in the gorgeous Sundial resort; a secluded oasis nestled in the pine hillside overlooking Fethiye Bay. We sat in the 40plus heat waiting for Maddi to arrive. When she made her entrance she just looked absolutely stunning.

Maddi and Tom just looked so in love the entire day. And so very, very happy. It was a really nice family affair; very personal. The wedding itself was followed by a photo session, then a meal in the upper terrace; an open air restaurant just for our party. We had speeches and anyone who wanted to could say something. Then a little boogie on the dance floor before heading back to our hotels, apartments and villas.

The wedding was so memorable, so personal and very special. We all wish Maddi and Tom a very happy life together, and I hope that they are really enjoying their honey moon right now in Sri Lanka. Here are some photos....

In our glad rags

I am going to write a separate post about Maddi and Tom's wedding. But I want to fill it with photos of the lovely couple. So I am just writing this little one with a few family pics of us on the day, in our glad rags.

Boy it was a hot day! Over 40 I believe. But we donned our best outfits, slapped on the sun lotion and had a lovely day in Turkey with our closest family. Everyone behaved themselves (I'm glad to say) - although we did at one point have to head back to our apartment for some time out. This was during the bride and grooms photos, so we weren't missed. Unfortunately for Barney, who was holding it all together so well... the music they had chosen at the end of the wedding service was the song that Barney has the most trouble with! Lol. I'm sure no one realised, but that Over the Rainbow song is a particular problem for Barney, so he got rather upset and had a bit of a panic attack, with some vomitting thrown in for good measure!

But all in all I think we behaved ourselves pretty well! Hehe. It was a lovely, lovely day. Such a beautiful venue. But I shall write about that more in my next post. In the mean time, for our family in England, here are some photos of us all dressed up. We don't polish up too badly! :)

Social Story – Holiday to Turkey

When Daddy and Barney recently took a trip to England, I made a laminated social story. A social story is a tool used with kids on the autistic spectrum to help them visualise in advance something that will happen. We don’t use them for everything with Barney, but we have found them very useful for the bigger things in life, as he gets very anxious about new experiences. In this situation they work really well. So here is the social story I have made for Barney about our trip to Turkey in one weeks time. The front page has the days of the week to countdown. This has a velcro arrow with it, which you can’t see in the photo. He moves the arrow along each day and it helps him to visualise how long it is until certain things will be happening.

Pages 1-7. Laminated.

Rosie’s Charm Necklace…

I wanted to post a photo of the charm necklace that was made on Rosie’s naming day. It has charms with wishes from all her family and friends. There are a couple more still to arrive (three, I think – there’s just about room for them!) It is an 18 inch necklace and it’s pretty heavy now. She is one lucky girl.

Barneys first day back at school went pretty well in the end. He was totally nervous, and anxious, but managed not to have a panic attack. Writing the letter to his school teacher himself (see post below) really seemed to help. In future I shall try this method with him to see if it helps calm him in other situations.

He loved his teacher. So much so that he came home and made a present for her! He got a box (the one our new kettle came in) and painted it, then stuck gold paper, lolly sticks and red glitter all over it. It was pretty big, and very colourful. Today he took it into school with him, and the teacher must have liked it because he came home with a special sticker and a Pirates of the Caribbean light up pen! He has had a few nervous outbursts at school where he has started to panic and felt sick (when moving rooms or going to assembly etc) but the teacher has managed to calm him down pretty well. She lets him sit with her in assembly. Barney says she lets him do anything he likes. He is very impressed!

I was also impressed as she phoned us after his first day of school to let us know how he got on. I am going in on Friday to speak with her. So far so good.

I was reading on an autism site last night about how the obsessive lining up of toys can often be one of the first signs of autism in a child. Barney still likes to line up his cars, but not as much now as he used to. I remember when he was 2 or 3 years old he would spend literally days at a time lining his cars up in various straight patterns. He could fill the entire hallway with his perfectly straight geometric car patterns. Once he had lined up about 200 cars he would start again with a different pattern. Even now, whenever we are going out for the day somewhere where he will need to entertain himself, we always take a big bag of cars for him to play with.

The naming of Emily Rose

Wow! Yesterday was just the most amazing day. It was magical, memorable and very special. Everything went perfectly, without a hitch. I think it was one of the loveliest family occasions we’ve ever held. Marty and I were just delighted with how fabulously it turned out, and completely touched and overcome by everyone’s beautiful wishes and gestures.

To make it even lovelier, my dearest friend from school days came over for the weekend to celebrate with us. It was just so lovely to have her here. Barney totally fell in love with her and talked the ears off her. He is really missing her now that she’s gone.

Everyone put so much effort into making the day run smoothly. My Mum let us use her huge house out in the countryside, which was the perfect location, surrounded by cows, sheep and horses. The kids all enjoyed running around the fields together. My sister Jenny re-iced and decorated Hannah & David’s remaining tier of wedding cake. As always she did an awesome job. Rosie was very impressed with her cake and just wanted to get her hands all over it!

Hannah, Steve and Mum cooked some really tasty food, and others made deserts. I hear Maddi’s

pavlova’s were really nice, and Anna’s buns were delicious, and a real hit with the kids! (And big kids!) Jenny’s girls made a bannoffi which I can testify was just scrumptious! Aunty Maddi made Rosie the best sign which was erected outside so that people knew which house to come to. She put a lot of effort into that sign. So glad I asked her, since I was just going to get an old sheet and some house paint, which wouldn’t have achieved a very classy look! I did make a little display of some of Rosie’s photos and some little things from her life so far… he hospital bracelet, first baby shoes, etc. We put that on the table with the wishes book and charm necklace.

I wanted the ceremony to be quite relaxed and chilled. We had planned to hold it outdoors but we have had such a terrible summer that it was just too wet. But Mum’s living room was big enough for everyone. The family sat in the middle of the room on the two sofa’s and the guests sat around that on chairs. My brother in law, David, ran the ceremony for us and did a great job. He was really personable, and it was lovely to have a member of the family involved like that, rather than a celebrant who none of us knew. It felt more homely and sincere.

The ceremony itself was only about 30 minutes long. David explained what a naming ceremony was and why we wanted to have one. He read out a poem about parenting that I had chosen. Then he asked everyone to come up one by one to add their charms to Rosie’s necklace, starting with her siblings. Badger made several touching wishes for his baby sister, which showed his maturity. He wished her to fulfil any ambitions that she has, to get married and have a family of her own, that she would be smart and beautiful, and that she would live peacefully in the way that she wishes to. Badger’s charm to Rosie was an angel. Tarja’s wish was that her beauty would never fade, and she chose a beautiful black glass bead with pink roses painted onto it. Little Barney said ‘I wish that you would have a happy and a stronger life’ as he placed his pink heart charm onto the necklace. I was so proud that he got up and said it aloud like that. He also took it upon himself to film the entire 30 minutes of service on my camera! That should be some viewing! It was quite funny as when people were saying their wishes etc he kept going up to them real close with the camera and making them giggle.

Every family member got up to say their wish for Rosie and placed on their charms, including me and Marty. Then our friends did the same. If Rosie develops everything that has been wished for her she will grow to be one amazing individual! I was very touched by the different wishes. People had really a put a lot of thought into it.

Marty and I made some promises to Rosie, as did her two guardians and her Grandmother. The guardians, Aunty Maddi and Aunty Hannah, wrote their own promises to her. I was almost in tears when they read them out. They both reflected their own personalities, and they had both clearly spent a lot of time really thinking about how they would like to make a difference in Rosie’s life. Everyone was clearly very moved by their promises. I can’t help but think what a lucky girl Rosie is.

Maddi, Badger and I performed Rosie’s special song. Anyone who reads the blog regularly will know what that is! I sang it with Maddi singing the harmony and playing guitar, and with Badger on the bongos. He did a great job, and Rosie joined in with him at one point as assistant bongo-er, which made everyone laugh. She clearly liked her song and was wriggling away to the rhythm.

All in all the ceremony was, in my opinion, a really moving, precious experience. And it was followed by lots and lots of glorious food, drink and good company! Rosie was a star throughout, despite missing her nap and being totally exhausted. Barney was a happy chappy since his best mate from school came too.

There are lots more photos. I think that you can click the link below to see them (it’s a new blogging feature that I haven’t used before!) I want to say a HUUUUUGE thankyou to everyone who came. Every single person there made it a special event. I personally was deeply moved by everyone’s kindness. Rosie has a beautiful necklace full of memories and a book filled with good wishes that she can treasure for the rest of her life.

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