Today is the first day of summer holiday. We started it by doing something quite interesting. Wayne at Presidents Choice Children's Charity invited us over for a video shoot at Queen's Quay Loblaws to help raise funds in support of the Kids Breakfast Program. As usual, we were picked up by the nice people from Universal Motions and they all turned out to be nice and helpful and fun to talk to.
Today's event involved almost 20 children among which 5 children have special needs. We were served pancakes and eggs and cereals while the camera was capturing the faces of the children.
Meanwhile, I brought Jason his own gluten free breakfast which included scrambled duck egg, rice toast, rice crispy with chocolate soy milk. Quite a menu there eh? From what I can see, he is the only one at our table who actually finished the breakfast!
We were seated with a group of younger kids mostly girls. Ever since I quit teaching Kindermusik, i haven't had the luxury of interacting with typical "talking" kids anymore. So I must admit I had a lot of fun talking to them cuz they are so cute and so innocent! Espcially 5 year old Anastasia who said her favorite ice-cream flavor is "pink"!!!!
As breakfast came to a close, the kids loosened up and Katy the young chef teacher came to talk to the kids at each table. She is so nice and reminds me of a kindergarten teacher. She really knows the "talk TO the kids, not AT the kids" drill and she just knows what kids love! As the kids were all talking about their favorite things to do for the summer, Jason raised his voice and his arm forward to catch her attention. His eyes were following her and was apparently paying attention to what she said. I was so happy to see this cuz it's so different from the Jason I observed in his boring morning circle at school!!! If only someone like Katy's demeanor can be Jason's teacher that would be a dream come true! But is this so hard to find?
I know I had sidetracked a bit cuz lately I've been thinking a lot about Jason's schooling options. After last week's all-day training for Classroom Suite, I decided I am done with Miss B. She doesn't deserve our time anymore so I wrote a letter to the Principal that if she is not leaving next year, we are. We are supposed to hear from the Principal in late August. Let's keep our fingers crossed.
Oh, back to the breakfast event. After breakfast, Katy played some games with the kids and had each of them make a chef hat decorated with crayons and stickers. I put a butterfly sticker on Jason's nose and he was laughing hilariously, almost non-stoppable. Then he said "bunny". I didn't understand and thought he said "Barney" but in the wrong context. He repeated it again and I knew he actually said it's "funny". This is such a memorable moment because it's probably one of his first attempts to share his feelings with me about a situation and that he really understands the meaning of "funny". It's such an immense joy to watch him enjoy his moments. I am so grateful to the Lord that despite his disabilities, he shares my fun-loving character and a great sense of humor, which I am sure will help him/us navigate the rest of our journey a lot easier.
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