Maks, School, and Music

Maks loves music and loves to sing. I have been trying to capture one of his moments but he gets too interested in the camera. I found one that is pretty good. He is singing Virginia Creeper by Old Crow Medicine Show.



In other news, we finally got Maksim's school district to do some evaluation of Maks and his academic and social abilities. In California if you are under 3 there is a early intervention program that is easy to access. Since we got home when Maks was 3.5 years old he didn't qualify. After trying several options and hunting around California's Department of Education website, we discovered that the future elementary school is responsible for evaluations. Jason went to the Principal's office and they sent him away. I sent him back armed with the information from the website and they sent him away again with numbers of people to call. Well after about 8 months of phone calls and the run around, it turns out that the elementary school is responsible. So I called them and they tried to send me away again. This time, I sent them a letter asking for the evaluation in writing. Well that started a fire under them and we have had a student study team meeting and Maks has completed a couple of tests and has 3 more this week. Why don't they say we need the request in writing? Why does the request have to be in writing??

At the end of the evaluations, we will have another meeting and we will decide the best plan of attack. I am so glad that someone is finally taking us seriously. Maksim is really smart and he has learned 5 years of English in 1.5 years (according to the school's speech and language therapist) but he has sensory issues and other social delays. He needs help from someone with expertise in those areas.

We have been seeing a therapist in Santa Barbara. His name is Ryan and he is pretty cool. We visit him every week and we just play. He supports us and reassures us that we are doing good things with Maks. He has helped us work on less aggressive play. (Maks likes to bump and bonk cars into everything!) Apparently, kids out act how they feel inside with their toys and since he is hurting the toys, he is hurting himself. So for about 30 minutes a day (more or less depending) we sit and play with cars and take care of them (put bandaids on them, take them to the hospital, snuggle them) if they get bumped. It is really working. I thought it sounded kinda weird and psychobabbly but it has helped his play become gentler and really helped him feel love in his heart at other times, too.

Maks' Grandma is going to come live in Ventura again so that she can help us take care of Maks. We are so excited to have some help. We need time together as husband and wife to regroup and recoup and be ready to help Maks. With a Grandma to babysit and take care of him, he won't have to spend time in day care either(which really stinks in general and keeps him from becoming potty trained.) Yes, he is nearly five and wears diapers again, but that is another story.

So things are great around here. Maks is amazing, smart, funny and fits our family perfectly. We can't imagine life without him. What if we never found each other???

We went to Chinese food last night on a family date. Maks was so excited because we have been going on dates without him. When we got to read our fortunes, I read mine, then Jason read his, then Maks read his own: "When you are a racecar you have to drive real fast for the greens but stop for the red ones." What a crazy kid! We love him.