AMANDA BAGGS = INTERESTING LADY

Amanda Baggs can really make a Mama think…

OMG. I LOVE ERIC TOO.

Just click on the Watch on Youtube link.  I hate when youtube does that.  Mami no likey!  But here’s another awesome kid…

WHAT DO YOU LIKE?

Ro loves this game, and I love playing it with him!  SO amazing to hear what is flying around in that fantastic brain!

Ro:  Mom, what do you like best about yourself?

Mama:  Do you mean how I look or how I am?

Ro:  How you are.

Mama:  I like that I can love a lot.  What do you like best about yourself Ro?

Ro:  I like that I’m nice…and I like my hair.

LOL!!! I’m so in love with him.

I never imagined that we would see the day when Ro was asking and answering such abstract questions.  It’s enough to make a Mama cry like a whiny Caillou!!!

THE BEST DAY EVER

**POST STOLEN FROM OUR OLD BLOG OVER AT THERONANJAMESBLOG.BLOGSPOT.COM.  MAMA IS VERY, VERY LAZY.  VERY LAZY.  VERY.**

I’m pretty sure I have another post entitled, “The Best Day Ever”, but I am blessed with so many of them…what the hell – another Best Day Ever!!!!

We have been witnessing more “brain explosion” here lately. This is how I like to refer to Ronan’s super-learning periods, in which he acquires a huge amount of comprehension in a short span of time.

He’s always advanced like this. I remember two straight years of fervently testing various methods of teaching him how to use the computer mouse (something he desperately wanted to do) and really having no success at all.

Then, one best day, I looked over at him at the computer table. There he was pointing and clicking like he had been doing it as a career his entire life.

It clicked.

And with Ronan, sometimes you can try to help for years, and with every method you can think of, read or learn about, but still…when it clicks, it clicks.

Sometimes, it’s a certain word that turns the click to his understanding, and sometimes it’s just time. Whatever the reason, when a skill that you have been trying so hard to get him to comprehend clicks, it’s just the best day ever.

And not because I want him to be more “normal” or “typical”, but because I know he gets such relief and joy from being able to express his thoughts and feelings to others.

How do I know this?

Well, this is what made the best day ever!

Recently, Ro has been passionate about the Universe. Planets, stars, galaxies, moons…all of it. Did you know about the moon called Callisto? Well, Ro will tell you 10 details about it in 10 seconds!

Anyway, being such an artiste, he decided that he wanted to draw pictures of planets, then scan them, and THEN iron them onto t-shirts for himself and The Loudon to wear. Needless to say, they are awesome, as are all of his creations.

We did a Jupiter shirt for him last week. He was so in love with it, he could barely contain himself – this is something I love so much about Ronan. It’s just so fun to watch him in his excitement over something that others might find so insignificant.

Ronan: MOM!!! I LOVE MY JUPITER SHIRT!!! LOOK AT IT, MOM!!!

Mom: I love it, Ro!!! You did a great job drawing it!

Ronan: (pausing…wheels visibly turning) MOM!!!!!! (quietly incredulous and sighing with relief)…I can TALK to you now, Mom. I can tell you about my feelings. I can tell you how I love Jupiter so much!!!!

Mom: …she isn’t speaking, because she’s crying.

I’m so glad that makes you so happy, Ronan James.

THE BEST DAY EVER!

Music, my first language

 When he was a baby, singing and music were the language that he understood. It soothed him when he cried, and he babbled beats to songs and sounds of instruments as his first words.
When all of the other toddlers were learning functional language, Ronan, although still pretty much non-verbal, was already fluent in music.

This is a painting he did that represents this…

In his own words, “This is my music.  Music gives me feelings.”

I always describe Ronan as someone who is aquiring language like a foreigner learning English.

Buy this original art by Ronan James at:

www.ronanjames.etsy.com

From Sacks pg. 156: 

           

Wittegentstein remarks: “Augustine describes the learning of human language as if the child came into a strange country and did not understand the language of the country; that is, as if it already had a language, only not this one. Or again: as if the child could already think, only not yet speak. And ‘think’ would here mean something like ‘talk to itself”.