The Brookston Family Blog

Porter found some toy tweezers in the box under his bed and proceeded to tweeze Sarah's hair, though perhaps pluck might be more accurate.



Note some of Porter's artwork on the wall behind his bed.

Sarah and Porter played in his room this morning and in an unprecedented move, Porter actually wanted to clean everything off of his train table and put them away. Then he put his new train layout on the table and wanted to place certain other toys there. Only he knew the plan as he decided which would be allowed back on the table. Once finished, he then insisted that Sarah take a picture of the new layout.



The proud builder.



A close-up of the jungle parking lot.



Happy boy.

I was hoping this post would be called Walking Tall, but my efforts to get an mpeg of Alice walking met with dismal failure. But I did manage to get this picture of her standing in the open.



Alice, outstanding in her field.

Today Porter was really swinging at his occupational therapy session.



Eager to get started.



Back and forth, then side to side. Porter was learning to swing himself here.



Swinging around in the basket.



Alice plays cheerleader for her brother.

Yesterday Porter got another new train set, this one is the Silver Line from Radio Shack. And even though I can't seem to make it work properly, Porter's still having a good time playing with it this morning.



All Aboard the Silver Line.

We're in the home stretch now, today should be the last day as only minor things remain to be done, such as put in the light fixtures, child safety locks, and some clean up. Woo-hoo, we'll have our kitchen back by the end of the day.



Day Nine.

I'm sure of the reasons why retreiving this particular piece of track from the box was such a cause for celebration, but celebrate she did.



Alice celebrates her triumph!

Given that Sarah has been burned out on pizza this week which has reduced our choices for take-out while the work on the kitchen is being done, the only way for me to eat pizza was to order one for lunch. I ordered a thin crust pure bliss (that's canadian bacon and bacon) today. I offered my crust to Alice to gum, since she likes toast and bread. She ate the pizza crust then came back for more. She essentially hovered over me noisily until I gave her the next crust. She took to pizza crusts like a baby possessed.



Urp. GIVE ME YOUR CRUSTS! NOW!

Porter's known his ABCs for a few months now, though he doesn't always say them from start to finish without straying or stopping, although it has happened before. Over the last few days he's been watching both They Might Be Giants' Here Comes the ABCs and Sesame Street's Do the Alphabet. Today I caught Porter making it from A to Z on video. He was playing with this plastic microphone he got in his stocking last Christmas.



Here's a Quicktime movie of Porter reciting his ABCs. You can either download the movie to your desktop or just click on the link to play it in your web browser (assuming your web browser has the quicktime plug-in installed).

When Porter was born, his hair was more white, a true towhead. When Alice was born, her hair had a reddish tint to it, like a strawberry blonde. Well now that almost a year has gone by, her hair has turned more blonde while Porter's has darkened slightly. In this picture, it now looks as if their hair color is the same, doesn't it?



In last night's bath, their hair color now looks virtually identical.

We've been concered about Porter's hearing almost since the time he was born. Even as an infant he rarely responded to even the loudest of noises. Clap right behind his head and he wouldn't even flinch. We had his hearing checked when was only about nine weeks old and were told it was okay. Then last year when we were going through the diagnostic procedures that led to Porter's diagnosis of autism, his ears were checked again. On that occasion, Porter was just getting over his latest ear infection and they saw fluid in his ears. His hearing test came back as borderline okay and they put its being so close to the edge down to the ear infection and recommended a further test. Then a couple of months ago an ear test at school further revealed some issues with Porter's hearing and further testing was again recommended. So we spoke to Porter's pediatrician about it and she sent us to Marin General for another test. Yet another ear infection pushed that back until today when we finally had his second hearing test.



This was taken just after the testing was completed.

What they did during the test was put headphones on Porter (which he absoluetly hated but was a trooper, nonetheless) and pipe sounds into one side or the other. Porter was given a colored wooden cylinder to hold up to his ear. When he heard a sound, he was then to put the cylinder down into one of the peg holes on the board. Then after that part was completed, she took a picture of the inside of Porter's ears. His left ear checked out just fine. His right ear, on the other hand, still had fluid in it. So now it's back to his pediatrician to see what can be done about what appears to be chronic fluid in his ear. Given that we've noticed, and his teachers have noticed, that he's often a step behind in songs and other choreographed group activities it seems likely that fluid in his ears cannot be helping the situation of his slower response time.

For reason we don't fully understand, a few weeks ago we finally got Porter to eat chicken nuggets by calling them dinosaurs. But he also seems to have figured out that they're chicken, because today he asked to have "chicken dinosaurs" for lunch. Since we have no kitchen yet, and also because we had to go out this afternoon anyway for a hearing test, I took the kids to Wendy's, which was on the way to the hospital. I went through the take-out window and was going to eat in the parking lot, but Porter was most insistent that we eat "inside house," as he put it. So we went inside to eat our chicken dinosaurs and freedom fries.



Given all the recent evidence indicating that dinosaurs were most closely related to birds, perhaps Porter is onto something after all. We may not know what dinosaur meat would taste like but it now doesn't seem too far-fetched to say it would taste just like chicken.



Of course, Ketchup figured heavily in the meal.



After all, you need something to dip your fries in.

I've often called Porter a trainhead because of his obsession with trains, but this time I mean it literally.



It may be hard to see, but the white puffy stuff at Porter's forehead is steam escaping from a steam engine, which is what he's wearing on his head.

After Porter got home from his escape with Grandpa, he lounged on the sofa watching Do the Alphabet, hosted by Big Bird.



Yeah, I'm cool.

Day two of summer vacation and day seven of the kitchen remodel was another dull day confined to the living room. Porter escaped with his grandfather after his language therapy session with Joanne. Alice and I, on the other hand, just rattled our cage.



Porter shows off his rocketship PJs as his need for a haircut becomes more and more apparent.

More color appeared today as we get visibly closer to the finish line.



Day Seven.

Porter, when told Grandpa was coming, begged to have his shoes put on. He then sat by the window and waited ... and waited ... and waited until Grandpa finally came and there was much rejoicing.



I have got to get out of this place.

For the first time I can remember, I've been highly anticipating Father's Day this year. First there was the mystery of the green package that became the silver present that Porter was so excited about. Then there was the enigmatic "appointment" that Sarah and the kids went to yesterday morning and then Sarah left on an unknown errand in the afternoon while the kids were napping. So I went to bed last night like a kid on Christmas Eve, filled with impatience and high hopes for the morning.



Though sleeping in until 8 was a treat, Porter could hardly contain himself and eventually woke me up.



First there was the card that "Scrapbooking" Sarah and the kids made for me.



Then I discovered that the mysterious appointment was to have their picture taken as I unwrapped the results.



Finally, it was time for the piece de resistance, the green box.



It turned out to be a mug with Porter's foot print on it. Very cool.



The foot mug.

Here are the portraits that Sarah and kids had done for me as my Father's Day presents.



Fun & Funky in Color.



Reserved & Respectable in Black & White.

This afternoon we took the kids over to the Civic Center, where they were holding the Marin Art Festival. We thought it would be a fun way to get the kids out of the house for a little while. Much of the art was crap, the sort of stuff people who don't know art think is great. You know, like Thomas Kinkade, painter of light. But there were a few highlights and it was nice to be outside in the fresh air and sunshine.



Porter 1, Hot Dog 0.

Sarah takes Alice for a ride after a much-needed afternoon nap.



Ye haw! Ride 'em, Mommy.

Okay, yesterday was the orignal finish day estimate. Here's where we are on Saturday. Rusty, our intrepid cabinet craftsman believes he'll be here tomorrow and Monday. A master of understatement, I'd say.



Day Five.

Alice seems to have contracted the cold Porter's been harboring since our return from Seattle. She's been coughing little Alice coughs and leaking from her diminutive proboscis. Luckily she slept well this morning so she weathered the trip to Porter's O.T. pretty well, staying with me in the waiting room.



Flashing her baby blues.



Uh, oh, the plane's going down. Babyzilla's got it in her crushing grip.

At O.T. today, Porter made me this Father's Day card. Apparently he glued the tree down himself, chose and then used a punch to create the little leaf, rabbit and other shapes on the tree, then glued them to the tree. Also he colored the tree himself.



I never thought Father's Day could be so cool. What a rush to have your son hand something to you that he made just for you.



On the back of the card was what I believe is Porter's first authenticated signature. This one was created without any aid whatsoever. All previous signatures, I must confess, were forged by me or else I guided Porter's hand. Sorry about that Sarah.

After a two week absence (last week: sick; before that; in Seattle), Porter had a triumphant return to occupational therapy. According to Theresa, his therapist, he did just great today. He paid attention, did what was asked of him and overall hit all the marks she wanted him to hit.



Porter perfectly constructs a vertical person by placing the puzzle pieces down in the correct order asked for.



As a reward, Porter got to swing on the swing he so loves.

Porter has been talking about a present for a few weeks now but we'd been unable to get any more information out of him about it. At school yesterday I was handed a small box wrapped in green tissue paper with stickers on it and tied with string at the top. My father's Day present from Porter, I was told. Micki also told me she would be surprised if it lasted the day without Porter opening it himself because he had been so excited about it for days. So I put it out of sight in his backpack to at least get it home unopened. When Sarah got home from work yesterday, he pulled her into the spare bedroom and got out wrapping paper saying that "we need scissors" and "wrap present." Sarah came to me and asked if I knew anything about a present and I told her about the green box. Porter and Sarah excitedly took the box into the spare bedroom with scissors in hand. They emerged later with the silver package pictured here. About 6:00 a.m. this morning Porter came in to our bedroom with the present and handed it to me. It was so adorable. I managed to avoid that opening but later Porter tried again downstairs. Will we make it to Sunday without opening it? It's looking doubtful. At this point I don't even care what's in the box. I'm so touched by him being this excited about giving me a present that that quite frankly feels like the present itself. What more could I possibly want? It's one of those moments I refer to as "melting," when all my defenses are stripped away and I'm overcome with warm feelings of love and become uncontrollably emotional. It's these moments that make life worthwhile. See, I'm melting again right now as I type this. Damn.



Porter tries to give me the present again this morning.



What could it be?