SunshineMama

Help Zach see the world!

Let me introduce you my little hero: my son Zachariah

Zach is almost 8 years old. Zach is also autistic. (CLICK HERE to see a scrapbook page and the journalling I did on Zach a couple years ago.)

We caught his autism early....at 13 months old. He's been in intervention since he was 18 months old, as it took us 5 LONG months to find a program and someone that could help us. Both Zach and the state of Vermont have come a LONG way since then.

Zach is now in second grade and is caught up with the rest of the kids in his class and is even ahead of some of them in some subjects. It took him until 4 years old to regain the small amount of words he lost at 13 months. His vocabulary still has a little ways to go, along with his pronunciation, etc.

Zach ADORES bugs......he would live outside catching bugs all day if he could. It wouldn't surprise us if one day he ended up working for National Geographic, trekking through the Amazon and the jungles of Africa discovering and researching new species of insects. He also loves to look at biology books and can tell you where many of the body's organs are and what they do.

Zach is also in love with the great big WORLD! He's fascinated by maps, topography, geography, etc. The walls in his room are covered with maps of Italy, the planets (he loves space, as well), the US, Vermont, etc. Just the other day, my dad, who is the greatest "Dumpster Diver" in the WORLD, saw that our neighbor had thrown out a perfectly good GLOBE of the world! In PERFECT condition! My dad pulled it out and brought it in for Zach. It even has the mountain ranges in topographical form on the globe! Zach has been ECSTATIC about it since my dad brought it into the house!

Anyway....along with his autism, Zach also has a lot of Obsessive Compulsive behaviors. Right now, he's having a hard time transitioning into the end of fall and the onset of winter. With his love of bugs (and he has bug jars EVERYWHERE in our house!), he's been really upset that most of the bugs have either died off or gone into hiding for the winter. My mom had a WONDERFUL idea to give Zach something to look forward to during the winter months. She got the idea from a movie she recently watched.

Zach loves the world.....he loves hearing about different places, loves to find things on the map (and now on his "new" globe), etc.

Mom thought it would be a great project to have him receive post cards from all over the world! We're planning on buying a brand new map of the world and putting it up on his wall. We're going to get a package of little stickers so that we can pinpoint where his postcards arrive from. I'm also going to keep all of his postcards in an album so that he can page through them and look at them whenever he wants.

But I need your help for this project! Would you be willing to send Zach a postcard? This would be something he could look forward to each day after school.......the post office where we get our mail is right next to the school and he loves to open my little box with the key. It would be such a blast for him to look in that box each day with the hopes of being able to "travel" some place new without even leaving our little town (though he's just ITCHING to get out there and see the world himself!).

So......whadda ya say? Want to help put a BIG smile on my little guy's face?

Zachariah Martin
PO Box 153
Ferrisburg, VT 05456

I'll be updating here with a running list of where our postcards come from. :) Thanks in advance for ALL of your help! We'd love to get a postcard from ANYWHERE.....even if you're just down the road from us! Don't forget, he's also got a HUGE Vermont map on his wall, too! :)

Update on my dready-babies

It's been a while since I've done an update on my dreads. It's hard to believe that they'll soon be 3 months old!

Right before we left for Norway in October, my sister and I did some maintanence on my hair. Many of the original dreads that my mom had backcombed had relaxed so much that only the ends were locked up. My sister, Kerri, and I combed most of them out (that was quite the experience). We then redid them with a different method - Twist & Rip. It sounds brutal, but it wasn't as bad as it sounds. It's more like chaotic braiding.

It was a month and a half ago that we did those and they're coming along really well. I stil have some of the original ones in and they're a bit on the loopy side, where the other ones are rounder. They all have a bit of character to them and I love em all. :)

I've got some fun beads in the back and along the sides. I've taken out most of the beads that were in my hair last month. Actually, some of them fell out as my hair tightened. I was warned that I would have some casualties along the way. It's okay, though. I didn't mind getting some new beads and adding some new hippy bling to my hair. The only thing I'm bummed about is that some of my most favorite beads fell off and I don't know where they went. I suppose I should just take that as a good excuse to put some new ones in. :) The bead that you see at the bottom left of this picture has a sun etched into it. It's groovy, indeed. :) There was only one of them at the bead shop, so I made sure to make it mine. Didn't want him to be all lonely there at the bead shop. He needed a dread-friend. :)

Some of the ones in the back are a little on the loose side, but many of them are locking up quite tight. (What is up with Zach's bike in the back???  I didn't even realize that was there until just now....looking at this picture.)

I keep them washed every 2 to 3 days and they love the shampoo bar that I got as a sample from DreadFX. it lathers up so nicely and makes my hair smell SUPER nice. The shampoo bar has Hemp seed Oil, Tea Tree Oil, Peppermint, Green Tea, Rosemary and Lemon grass. I make my own soap and was using my Patchouli soap for a while on my hair, but decided I would give this a try when I got it as a free sample. I love it! :)

I've tried talking my Davycakes into letting me dread his hair, since it was down to his shoulders. Nope, he wouldn't let me. Instead, he asked me to cut his hair a little, just to get it off the back of his neck. He wanted it tapered a little bit so that it wasn't cut so straight across the bottom. It made me sad to cut some of it off, as I ADORE his hair, but he lets me do what I want with mine, and he DID grow his out for me....so I gave his hair a little bit of a trim. I just console myself with the fact that his hair grows REALLY quick and it'll grow back again.

Last week, I spent 6 hours dreading a friend's head. I'll make sure to post some pics of that sometime this week. Her hair turned out SO cute! It suits her perfectly!

Have a wonderful evening, all!

 

Regionals in RI was a blast! I had a great time with my girlies and got to catch up with quite a few other girls in my sideline while I was there. It was nice to just walk around during stamping time and chat. I learned some great new techniques that I'm sure will show up on my Stampin' Mama blog eventually. You girls have my roster of techniques quite filled up, though, so it might have to wait a little while. haha!

I had a good chuckle a few times when a few of my blog readers came up to me out of the blue to introduce themselves. They recognized me by the dreadlocks. :) You have no idea how much that made me smile! :)

I'm in NH right now staying with some dear friends. I'm teaching a 3-day Altered Books course at a highschool over the border in Vermont and my friends only live about 25 minutes away. I always love the chance to come and stay with them and visit. :)

Tomorrow evening, I'm getting the chance to meet up with a fellow blogger, Mary A. I figured that since I'm this close to her this week, we could meet up half way and she took me up on the offer! Mary has an awesome blog- It's All About the Journey. Make sure you go check it out! Mary is one of the sweetest bloggers out there. She always leaves a comment on every post I make and she's an all-around sweet Stampin' Up gal. :) I'm really looking forward to having the chance to meet up with her.

Well, I should go be a good house guest and get my duff off the computer.

Have a wonderful week everyone! I'm gonna go eat Jan's good cooking!

"I hope you have one JUST like you..."

There are days when I wonder HOW In the WORLD this child and I are going to make it to her adulthood. Remember how mom always said, "I hope you have one JUST like you!" Well, I got one JUST like me......TIMES TEN!

Just two weeks ago, Davy and I came home from our week long trip to Norway. My parents (who are TOTALLY AWESOME, by the way....my mother is SUCH a "praise-whore" and will probably read this line OVER AND OVER AND OVER again to bask in the glory of it all - HA! You KNOW you WILL Mom, admit it!) came up for the week and stayed with the kids. By the end of the week, my dad said to me on the phone, "Erika, after a spending almost a week with your daughter, I would have taken two of you any day when you were little."

HA! Serves 'em right! :)

Honestly, though, I wonder how my parents ever let ME live to see adulthood. I'm convinced it was only for the pure entertainment value for when they got older (though my parents are STILL very young.....I turned my mom into a grandmother at the young age of 42....hey, we start young in this family!).

My Girly (yes, we really do call her "Girly"....she was 3 1/2 before she realized she had a real name....that's for another story) can exasperate me to no end some days. She's all hormones and attitude sometimes, like when she gets all moody and tells me, "No, YOU shut your mouth!" Other days, she's all mischief, like when she took the sprayer nozzle from the kitchen sink and hosed down the wall behind the sink....the mirror AND the electrical outlets, as well! Ya know, just for the heck of it. Then there are days when it's all arrogance, like when I was staring at her and she asked me why I was doing that. I told her it's because she's just so beautiful. Her reply? "Well, duh, Mom. I KNOW! CH!"

But then there are the days when I decide to keep her after all. (just kidding) Days like Monday, when she left an elaborately drawn picture as a "thank you" to the Tooth Fairy for the gift she left in place of my daughter's second tooth that fell out (or rather, yanked out). Or days like yesterday, when she left ANOTHER 6 thank you notes under her pillow for the Tooth Fairy. I've realized that I have to check under her pillow each night now. She's informed me today that she has another thank you note for the Tooth Fairy. I also realized that I'm going to have to tell my husband that he has to take over Tooth Fairy duty this Friday night and next Monday and Tuesday night, as I'll be gone those nights.

There are days like the one that I took this picture, when I can't help but just fall in love all over again with my Girly-girl. I was taking pictures out back in the "Fairy Forest" so that I could put a new one up on my blog. (The kids call the grove of trees and brush at the edge of our property the "Fairy Forest," which is another story.) Girly was behind me, playing in the trees, while I was taking pictures. Just as I was taking this picture, she ran up behind me and jumped on my back. This is the picture that resulted from that semi-tackle.

How on earth could I be mad at this little pixie-girl? I mean, come on! Look at that picture! It captures her true essence: the innocence of childhood wrapped up in a mischievious smile and sparkling eyes. So yes, I may have ended up with one JUST like me, and sometimes it scares the crap out of me to know that this is just the beginning, but I wouldn't trade it for anything.

This is definitely one of those pictures that I'll treasure forever. And you better believe that I'll pull it out when my grandkids come to visit some day, a long time from now. Oh, please let it be a long time from now.....even though she can be an impish sprite some days and moody as all hell on other days, I don't want her to grow up and away any time soon.

"What the daughter does, the mother did." ~Jewish Proverb