EIP Goals

Grandpa came over on Thursday afternoon and took him over to his house. Henry was busy as usual. When he came home, he was a bit wired. Very hard to get him to sleep.

On Friday afternoon, we had our 6 month meeting with Elsa, Henry’s DDD development coordinator. We had to review our early intervention program (EIP) goals that we wanted him to accomplish. The process is incredibly silly, but that’s government bureaucracy. For example, our two goals were continued progression of language skills and cognitive skills. Then we had to create statements as to why language and cognitive skills are important. I’m not joking. Hmmm…why is it important for one to be able to communication and think?…hmmm. And the answer couldn’t be something like, “Communication is a crucial part of human development” or “We want Henry to be able to perform age appropriate activities” or “Henry needs to be monitored because he was born extremely prematurely which makes him at very much at-risk child. Duh.” Nope. That’s not “specific enough.” If we said we wanted Henry to be able to become “independent,” we had to say why. For example, “I want Henry to become independent so that I can cook dinner without holding him.” That would be considered a “legitimate” explanation. I believe that I created one explanation about wanting him to distinguish poisonous creatures from non-poisonous creates so that he wouldn’t get bitten by a rattle snake, black widow, or scorpion. Again, I’m not joking. That was considered an enlightened rationale for wanting to continue therapies. Thank you state government for creating bureaucratic hoops to early intervention rather than providing services for the obvious! It is OK for me and Jeff because we can play that game. I was rather proud of my goal of Henry avoiding rattle snakes. But the process does lead one to wonder about how children of parents less argumentatively inclined fare under this system.

On Friday night, Jeff and I went to a Catholic Services dinner honoring several people in our community. My cousin Tom invited us and my parents. It was a really nice dinner. Our table included Jim and Molly (Jim is my mom’s first cousin), Tom and Jennifer (Tom’s my second cousin with whom I went to school; he was a year ahead of me), and my parents. Tom and Jennifer have four children ages 5, 3, 3, and 2 years old. We are looking forward in getting them together with Henry. The dinner ended with a band called Hot August Nights, who played Neil Diamond songs. The singer did an amazing job impersonating Neil Diamond. Looked and sounded just like him. Meanwhile, Henry spent the evening at my parents’ house with Aunt Erin and her childhood friend Jill. When we returned to the house, Erin said, “Wow. He is an active little boy.” Indeed, he is. They read a lot of books. Henry spent a lot of time going back and forth between the living room and family room, moving toys to different places. Erin was impressed that when Henry falls, he doesn’t fall apart. He stands up and keeps moving.

On Saturday, we had breakfast at Joel’s Bistro. There was an “indoor Tour de Tucson” which was taking place outside in the courtyard. A band was playing and there were several cyclists on exercise bikes in front of the band. During breakfast, Henry was really using his fork well. He pierced and then got to him mouth four pancake pieces completely on his own. Toward the end of breakfast, a steel drum band from Tucson High School took the stage. They were really good. Afterward, we walked around the grassy areas on campus. Stopped into the Arizona State Museum. Henry wasn’t enthralled with their displays and didn’t get the whole “quiet voices” thing so we made it a quick trip. He visited his grandparents in the afternoon.

On Sunday, we went to Tohono Chul park for breakfast. Henry decided that scones were edible (previously had rejected them) and had fun putting black beans in his mouth with his fingers. This resulted in a HUGE, crusty mess, especially when he decided to put his beany hands on his head. Jeff cringed. I thought it was pretty funny. And, he did manage to each quite a bit of the black beans that way. His pronunciation is improving dramatically. He called the beans “black beans” distinctly. We then headed to Harelson Elementary to play on the equipment. Henry enjoyed walking up and down some hills. He is getting really good at it too. We then headed to the grandparents for an afternoon visit. Jeff and I met up with them and Henry for dinner at Swenson’s. Henry likes saying “Hi” to everyone. He waved and blew kisses at a senior citizen patron a couple booths away. She blew kisses back. He really wanted the attention of our waitress. He leaned backward in his high chair to watch her take an order from the booth across from us.

On Monday, Jeff reported that Henry and Karina were running around chasing each other in the living room in the afternoon. At one point when Henry was chasing Karina, she stopped and he barreled into her. Grandma picked up Henry and Jeff in the late afternoon. She dropped Jeff off at the UA to meet up with me for dinner and basketball. The NIT tournament is running the first two rounds on our campus. We went with Kyle, one of my colleagues who knows a lot about sports, so it was a lot of fun. We had pizza and drinks beforehand. Got to the gym to watch the last half of UAB vs. Santa Clara. Waited around for the UA vs. FAU game to start at 9PM. It was the latest that Jeff and I have stayed out since having Henry. We were happy that UA won! We got to my parents around 11:40PM. We were a little surprised to find everyone up. Apparently, Henry refused to go to sleep. We got home around 12:30AM. I carried Henry to our rocking chair. When I tried to put him in his crib, he woke up. So we snuggled on the bed. Henry usually snuggles with Jeff in the night. It was nice to have some mommy-Henry snuggle time for an extended period. I unfortunately had to get up at 4AM to pump (my favorite activity).

Henry was a log this morning. Not exactly a surprise. Alicia has an appointment tomorrow morning, so I get Henry all to myself. I’m looking forward to that!

I forgot to mention an exchange that Henry had with my parents sometime last week. They asked Henry what Grandpa likes to watch. Answer: “Ball!” Then they asked him what Grandpa likes to drink. Answer: “Pepi!” (that means Pepsi).