Sunny winter walk

Winter's walking in sunlight for a change. Warm rays on us all bringing smiles and a skip in our steps.Plants starting to peek through the woodland carpet and rustle the dry leaves out of the way. Dogs happy to be brought along. New smells. Trees and hollow to poke wet noses around.

A landscape still bare but full of spring promise.Plenty to see. Mosses, ferns, woodland plants and fungus. A pretty tapestry.Pondering the adventures to take. Up the soil embankment to the trees or to dipping our hands into the leaves again?Beauty in small things, in light and shadows, in new growth and in faded foliage.Keep to the path but we can peep over...... Windswept and cheeks pink with late winter sun.New shoots, such beauty and how happy it makes us. Little Bird enjoyed all the textures, sensory, learning new words.How different the light can be as we pass through dips in the forest.

A very happy boy collecting treasure on our walk and a huge surprise at the end....Some horses! A kind man brought one over for Little Bird to stroke - what a great moment.

This post is an entry for Britmums 'Winter Little Adventures Challenge' sponsored by Barny, individually wrapped bear-shaped sponges with a hidden filling. Find out more about Barny here 

Valentines Gifts in Unusual Places

Adidas Response Running Jacket 
£19.99

Adidas Questar Running Shorts 
£18.99

Nike Miler Running Vest
£12

Nike Filament Running Tights
£19.99

Nike Two Pack Runing Socks
£9.99

SportsDirect.com set a blogger's challenge to select five items from their website that would be perfect gifts for their partner on Valentines Day. We don't really celebrate Valentines as such but perhaps alternative presents (and ones that are useful) would be great and much more appreciated.

Daddy Bird is running the London Marathon this year for the Brainwave charity who help children with development disabilities fulfil their potential. Our son has been on the Brainwave programme and we thought it would be good to help them in return by DB using his running skills to raise money for them. So for Valentines Day there could be no better gift that some running gear to help him DB on his way for training and the actual event in April.

All the items I chose are pictured and listed above and there was a great choice to select from. Firstly a super Adidas running jacket which is good for running on these cold days yet is light and won't be uncomfortable or slow him down. Some proper running socks by Nike to prevent horrid blisters and they are made from Dri-Fit fabric so the feet don't get too ermmmm....sweaty :)

Men in tights indeed but DB has been telling me all about how great running tights would be on cold days, keeping his legs from being lashed by the wind and rain on the country roads where he trains. Apparently all the serious lunchtime runners at work wear them. The Nike running tights would provide super comfort without restricting movement. For drier, warmer days and probably for the marathon itself I would get him some great quality Adidas running shorts and a Nike vest that looks super but also is a material which will help him keep cool.

I think he would be so pleased with this running gear for Valentines Day as the marathon is so important to him for both his own personal achievement and knowing we are helping children like our son. There's a lot of love involved in his running so gifts such as these would mean more than your usual Valentines Day gifts as they have such as personal meaning to him.

Moments that matter

Emma and 3 has a fabulous blogger's competition in conjunction with Lloyds Bank to win an iPad Mini by blogging about our moments that mattered in 2013. Straight away my mind thought of when my son started to talk.

Now when Little Bird was born I guess I just took for granted that he would develop as most children do and would be walking around 1 years and talking around 2 years. He walked at 14 months, great! But then the words didn't happen and as time went on I started to panic and it became apparent that his development was different and very late in some areas. Last year at 3 years old there were still no words and the Child Development Team were in truth not very encouraging and they were not willing to try alternative methods at that moment in time. I cried. Of course, I had more faith as a parent would and swore I'd do whatever it took to at least try and help my little boy. We were doing all the usual methods that a parent does, nursery rhymes, games but we needed extra help.

We found a wonderful private speech and language therapist who showed us the picture exchange system (PECS) and this would enable Little Bird to ask for what he wants and should alleviate his frustration. He took to it straight away, this was in the summer time of 2013 and we practiced every day. He used it to ask for the toys that he wanted to play with and the food he wanted to eat. He put short sentences together - I want - and then the item. What it does is encourage a child to understand the point of communication as well as being able to ask for the things he wants. By the end of the summer he was a much happier boy, happy with being able to have his own voice heard through the pictures.

One day in late summer he was sat on the sofa with a beach ball that had pictures of animals on it. Suddenly he pointed at them and said 'cat, duck and dog'! The day after he picked up a bath toy and said 'fish'! Those first words were wonderful moments that matter and I shall never forget the joy I felt and the smile on my son's face.


From there more words came and although still very much delayed, we are getting more words every day. I have faith that we will get more sentences and one day we will be chatting away.

February puzzles

A little list for the start of the month so I have something to aim for and remind me what's planned. We have decided to home educate Little Bird and although for the moment he is still at pre-school for 3 mornings a week until July, time will go quickly and I need a bit of a plan on how to balance our week with therapies and other learning opportunities. I still expect to have to justify this to various 'authorities' so hence the plan.

I have a stack of autism books to read, currently I'm reading one called The Siege which was written by Clara Claiborne Park. A mother that wrote about her daughter's autism - a daughter Jessica that is now a grown woman and one that produces amazing artwork. As I read the book there are many parallels with Little Bird, something that hasn't happened before. You soon realise with a child with autism that it can be very difficult to find a vaguely 'similar' child and one you can perhaps glean some ideas for therapies from or to help you decide what to do for the best some days. I know all children are different but typical children seem to follow a more set development pattern and autism can confuse you so much.

Anyway, this book has given me some hope. As I read it I'm nodding furiously as to how similar some of the quirks are and the ways Clara approached some of the challenges in the early days have been similar to what I have done already with LB so that makes me feel better.

Source: Artwork by Jessica Park

We are currently working on jigsaws as all of a sudden he is putting the pieces together. He can do very complex jigsaws on an iPad but actual ones he was just walking around with the pieces, perhaps picking all the pieces out with faces on and them and making a collection of them. Now for 2-3 piece puzzles he will put them together in the traditional way. He sat with a box of 6 x 2-piece different coloured dinosaur puzzles and I realised he was picking out the right colours and putting it together. Brilliant! Even better was when I said 'Can you do the yellow dinosaur puzzle' and he straight away fished the yellow pieces out of the box and pieced them together. I continued asking him for all the other colours and he did them all. This is amazing to me. It is like all of a sudden, something clicks and he's away with it. Very proud!

A little box of yummy treats

In exchange for helping a friend I received some gorgeous treats for Little Bird. I opened the box and there inside were a buzzy bee fondant, two chocolate trains, two character shortbreads and a dashing gingerbread man. A lovely surprise.  They are from our local bakery which is family run and they have a chain of them over this side of Cheshire and into North Wales and the goods that they make are gorgeous. In fact I snuck into the bakery shop at the weekend after the battle re-enactment and secretly had a lemon tart. Yummy!  Little Bird was delighted with all his cakes and biscuits and chose the buzzy bee first. So today we will both be sharing (of course he wants to share with him mummy!) and enjoying our last day in January.

Happy yummy weekend xx