31 for 21: day 2, 2012

I have a lot of catching up to do.  I have a ton to fill you in on Ms. Maya.  My intentions were good this summer, I was going to post about all the fun stuff we did.   In the end even Maya's birthday did not get posted.   No excuses now that it's October.    So here goes...

In July, one day we went to the children's museum with some friends.  I asked Maya's respite to come along to help.  Maya adores her and they are almost like big and little sisters.  We haven't been to the museum in a long time.  That one especially is huge and most of the activites are better when the child can play on their own.  I can't remember how old Maya was when we went last, I just remember all the other kids were having a ball and Maya was mildly interested.  I don't think she was even walking then, which makes a huge difference.

Anyway, Maya was so excited to be there this time.  As soon as we entered she took off towards the huge structure that is all about climbing.  It's like a huge maze up in the air.  I should preface this by saying that Maya has struggled for a long time with climbing jungle gyms.  In past posts I've written about this.  I've chalked it up to sensory issues, but basically she doesn't like walking up ramps that have holes in them.  She sees through the ground and I think it confuses her.  Well this structure is all about holes and seeing to the ground.

Every time this girl does something, it surprises me, but not in a shocking way.  It's almost like I expect her to surprise me.  So when she does something like forget that she was afraid of walking up ramps, I think it's just the way it's supposed to be.  She walked up, crawled and climbed (with the help of her respite), not once, but twice up that structure.

We spent over 4 hours at the museum and at the end Maya was crying because she didn't want to leave.  It was crazy, because she NEVER cries for a thing like that.  In fact usually if there is too much going on, she turns to me and says "bye" which is her signal that she wants to leave.  This time she was having so much fun playing with all the different activities she didn't want to go home.

Last time we didn't venture into the art room, and this time we spend at least 30 mins there.  She was just so content painting the rocket ship (see photos below).  Give that girl a brush and a big rocket ship and I guess it's all good!

It was so wonderful to see her engaged in all that was around.  She even played with the her friends that came to the muesum with us.  They arranged flowers in this one section for a little while.  Once they moved on, she continued playing on her own for a long while. At least a long while in "Maya" terms.

I kept thinking to myself that I felt bad that she had missed a therapy that morning.  Then I realized that this whole experience was way more therapeutic than any 50 min therapy.  Sometimes you just have to play hooky and enjoy life!  It was good to be reminded of that.

Maya crawling through a tunnel on the high structure.

Walking on the structure with her respite.

Painting the rocket purple.

Rocket ship painter.

Aarranging flowers on the table.

Moving flowers from the garden to the table.

Planting the garden again.

Hand and eye coordination needed to garden here.