April 2nd is WORLD Autism Awareness Day

On December 18, 2007, the United Nations General Assembly adopted resolution 62/139 which declares April 2 as World Autism Awareness Day (WAAD) in perpetuity. The UN resolution is one of only three official 'disease-specific' United Nations Days and will bring the world's attention to autism, a pervasive disorder that affects tens of millions. The WAAD resolution encourages all Member States to take measures to raise awareness about autism throughout society and to encourage early diagnosis and intervention. It further expresses concern at the prevalence and high rate of autism in children in all regions of the world and the consequent developmental challenges.

Let's use this day not only to promote autism awareness, but to celebrate our children and their special talents.

We love you Matthew! :)

Egg Roll at the White House

John spent the night outside waiting in line to get us tickets to the annual Easter Egg Roll. We had extra tickets so we gave them to our neighbors, Wendy and James. We took the Metro into the city and Matthew loved the train (and the elevators too)! We were in the last group to enter..they closed the gates at 2pm. We had until 3:30 to explore the activities on the White House lawn and there were so many options! They had the traditional egg roll, an egg hunt, face painting, egg decorating, 12 different stage performances, about 50 strolling characters (i.e. Clifford, Snoopy), an animal stage, magicians, and reading nooks. It was a busy place and lots of lines. We saw many of the characters, attended a performance (Steve Songs), and participated in the egg roll. We also (by pure chance) saw the President, Condoleeza Rice, and Barney Bush (see post below). Matthew was very well behaved and enjoyed himself. We were given a PBS Sprout framed polaroid of our meeting with Curious George and a nice cardboard framed photo of our family standing (on a platform) in front of the White House...the line for this had actually closed but they let us in b/c John was in uniform. On the way out, they gave us a commemorative poster and a goody bag with a coloring book/crayons, postcards of the White House pets, a Maisy sticker book, "My American Journal", and a special wooden Easter egg. It was a very fun, exciting, and memorable event!

Celebrity Sightings!

I will post several pics from the Egg Roll at the White House today, but first I wanted to post the pics I took of the President, Condoleeza, and Barney the dog! We noticed that Barney was playing on the lawn so we snuck over to see him and then the President walked by and we were like "OMG take a pic, take a pic!" So I grabbed my camera and zoomed in. (You can click on the pic to get a better view.)

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter! John's mom is in town so we took her to brunch at the Army-Navy Club in Fairfax. They held an egg hunt for the kids and Matthew had lots of fun...but wasn't too fond of the big bunny! Then we came home and had our own egg hunt.

Tomorrow we are going to the Egg Roll at the White House so I'll post pics of that expedition as well. It should be exciting...the First Lady and Elmo will be there! :)

Peeps Show

I saw this on The Washington Post (our local newspaper) and thought it was cute. Peeps are one of the few candies Matthew can eat due to his GFCF diet but he's not really into them...other "legal" candies include: Starbursts, Skittles, and Smarties. They held a peeps diorama contest and have the top 37 (out of 800 entries) on-line for you to view and vote on. Some are really funny...I like the plumber's crack, American Idol, and Sesame Street themes. Check it out: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/gallery/2008/03/21/GA2008032101983.html?hpid=artslot

"Autism: The Musical"

I haven't see this yet but I watched an interview on The Early Show and it looks interesting. Follow the link below to watch the two video clips...the second is a continuation after the commercial and has comments from two of the cast members. (BTW, Henry is the son of Stephen Stills of Crosby, Stills & Nash.) I was impressed with their verbal skills, especially Wyatt when he was talking about bullies at school. I dread Matthew having to deal with bullies in the future...maybe we'll enroll him in Karate so he can "go Kung Fu" on them if necessary! :)

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/03/19/earlyshow/main3950206.shtml

ETA: you can watch the documentary on-line at: http://www.hbo.com/docs/programs/autism/video/

Preschool Welcome Song

The last week or so Matthew has been singing a new song at the kitchen table. I emailed his teacher b/c I had never heard this one before and she sent me the lyrics. Here's a video of Matthew singing the Hello song and the lyrics so you can sing along!

1. Arms up
2. Hugs
3. Kisses
4. Count: 1,2,3
5. Sing:
“Our busy day has started. We must say hello. Hello, hello, and we must say hello.
Who came to school? Who came to school? With all the other boys and girls who came to school?”
6. “I did!"

"More cake"...

Here's a close up of the GFCF Elmo birthday cake (made by mommy & daddy)...Matthew really likes it (you can tell by looking at his pants!) and keeps asking for "more cake"...and yes, he had leftover cake for breakfast!

Matthew's 3rd Birthday Party!

We celebrated Matthew's 3rd birthday on Saturday. His b-day is actually on Thursday but we wanted to have the party before the school spring break as some of the families plan on going out of town. It was a beautiful day and we spent most of the time in the backyard. The party had an Elmo theme and Matthew looked very cute in his little red shirt. We made a GFCF cake which turned out pretty good. The kids and their parents were here for about 2 hours. We opened presents after Matthew's nap and he received some really COOL stuff...thanks everyone! Here's a video - I've been sick lately so that's my hoarse voice singing in the background...

Matthew's New Coloring Desk!

Last night I was perusing the "free stuff" section of CraigsList and found an ad for a child's desk. It looked really cool (it has a place for crayons and a cup holder!) so I sent an email saying we were interested and could pick it up ASAP. The generous lady wrote back and said come & get it, so John jumped in the car and took off! The desk is in almost perfect condition and Matthew enjoys sitting in it to color. The pic shows his first official coloring book experience (Curious George theme) and he did really well. There were a few times when he actually stayed in the lines!