Clay Necklaces for Wearing Essential Oils

I've been putting the essential oils on my girl child to help with anxiety and focus. I apply them to her feet, over her heart, brain stem and behind her ears morning and night but with standardized testing this week I needed a way for her to have access to the oils during the testing. One option was to put one of the roller fitaments on a bottle of the oils and let her carry it with her. 

But, I wasn't real sure that she would remember or take the time to do it so I wanted a better option. I did what I always do and turned to Pinterest for inspiration and came up with the idea of helping her make a clay necklace. We got almost all the supplies at Wal-Mart on our weekly shopping trip except for the stamps which were 50% off at Hobby Lobby where I got a good variety in a pack for about $4.00. All items below came from Wal-Mart. 

The Air-Dry clay was about $5 and was the most expensive item I bought. The closure attachments weren't really necessary since you can kit make the necklace long and just tie a knot but I thought we might make some bracelets too so I bought some just in case. You can use pretty much any kind of string or cord. 

  First I took a small chunk of the clay and used a pencil to roll it out flat. Then, I took a bottle top and pressed out a circle to use for the pendant. We stamped the designs onto the clay circles and used a skewer (you could also use a toothpick) to make a hole where our cord would go through. 

The clay takes a day or two to dry then you just thread your cord through. I like to fold the cord in half and put the doubled end through a bit making a loop then pull the two loose ends through to make the necklace lay flat. 

You can then either tie on the closures or or just make the necklace long enough to tie a knot and slip it on and off their heads. Each morning before school, in addition to putting the oils on her skin, I add a drop of oil onto the necklace. The clay absorbs the oil so it's there during the day. She likes peppermint best and as it helps to increase focus, I think it's a great choice for her to wear to smell when she hits that mid day slump. 

On the necklace above, we also made a small bead out of some of the excess clay, poked a hole through it with our skewer and added it just above the pendant for a little extra decoration. We've learned these necklaces break fairly easy when left long and dangly, so I recommend making them shorter. Plus, it keeps the scent nearer to their noses. :)

Catching Up

I have had the worst case of writer's block EVER I suppose because for MONTHS I just have had nothing worthwhile to say. Sure there's been plenty of meaningful moments and much excitement going on around me but I've just been in somewhat of a funk and just really felt that if I didn't have anything positive to contribute to the already overcrowded-with-crap internet, then I should do like my mama said and not say anything at all. But now I have gotten into (and fallen in LOVE with) the world of essential oils and - hooray!! I have something positive to contribute, once again!! But, before I can even go into how the oils are helping us, I feel like I need to do some catching up on what's happened since our last trip to UAB. For months and months that would have been an easy job because NOTHING HAPPENED. We waited. And we waited. And we waiting some more to hear from UAB after all the testing we went through only for them to tell us we needed more testing. But we were going to get the results of the tests that COULD BE useful for the future testing at some point. We had actually received the short-version of the results of the UAB testing over the phone. After all those long hours of tests, we came up with two rule-out diagnosis, meaning more testing was required to tell us what we went down there basically just to confirm.  At this point, I have no doubt that my daughter is on the spectrum and definitely has attention issues. We were told that the final report would be mailed to us once it was transcribed which could take some time...and that it did.
  Then, one day, we get a call from Vanderbilt that we have reached the top of their waiting list for the Autism Testing and they gave us an appointment. After feeling burned by UAB, I asked if this would be the same deal as UAB offered us: we drag the girl-child through all sorts of testing and poking and prodding just to be told we have to do even more 3 years down the road before we have an actual diagnosis.  They said that was not the case with them and that we would within 2 weeks have not only our actual diagnosis for my girl, but also recommendations for things we could be doing to help her. Sounded wonderful to me! So, as it had been about 4 months or more since UAB was going to start typing their reports up and send them to us, I decided to call and check to see when we could be expecting them.  All were ready except for the report from the psychologist who was about to go on maternity leave. With our Vanderbilt appointment rapidly approaching, I called and asked - no, BEGGED- her to PLEASE dictate her findings so we didn't have to go through the same testing at Vandy.  Finally about a week before we left for Vanderbilt, we got the report.  This turned out to be more important than we knew because the DAY before we were to leave for Vanderbilt, they call us to let us know that our insurance would not pay for any of the testing they were going to do. After hours on the phone it was concluded that our insurance does not cover Autism Spectrum Disorders AT ALL. Seriously. In 2015??? Nope! Not.A.RED.CENT. (Apparently other providers had billed differently, because in two plus years this had not been a problem.) I flipped my wig. We had waiting over two years for this test, had our hotel room booked and paid for, and needed $1500+ the next day. Fortunately, we had the resources to still be able to go, but what if we hadn't? What do people even do who have severely autistic children and wait for years to find out what is going on and then can't afford to get the help they need? I'm very thankful that's not our situation, but the wrong of it all just tears me to bits. So, we headed off to Vanderbilt and acutally had a really great time. Vanderbilt got us a discount on a really nice hotel which shuttled us to the hospital and we were able to make a fun trip out of it. The hospital was GREAT with wonderful staff and it went more smoothly than I could have ever imagined. Vanderbilt was able to use the testing done by UAB and it saved us about half of what we would have had to pay and more importantly saved the girl-child from hours of retesting. Within two weeks, we DID have our diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder; ADHD, Inattentive Type; and Anxiety Disorder. Most of what they recommended we were already doing, but they did suggest she receive Cognitive Behavior Therapy on a weekly basis instead of every six weeks as we had been doing due to the distance from our doctor in Birmingham (She's worth every mile!). It was just such a relief to have the actual confirmed diagnosis and to know that there is an actual physiological reason for some of her struggles. Once the problem is clearly identified, the solution is easier to identify as well! Isn't that what someone taught us in school? Math maybe?

Leaving the hotel the morning of testing and Vanderbilt.
The girl-child wasn't real excited...

  So that puts us where we are today: Social Skills on Monday, Occupational Therapy on Tuesday, after school activity of my daughter's choosing on Wednesday (right now it's a "Gooey Science" class at her school), horse back lessons are for now scheduled for Thursday, and a Girl Scout outing on Friday. We squeeze the cognitive behavior therapy in there somewhere, too. That's just our typical week with no kinks or extra appointments (which we seldom have a week without, but you get the general picture). This is where the essential oils have come in. Not only is my daughter a prime candidate for benefiting from the oils with her anxiety and attention issues (she is the reason I tried them), but with all the stress and hustling, this mama needs to be on top of my game! As I have written in my introductory blog, I by no means seriously think of myself as the Mom Bomb. The majority of the time I am a HOT MESS, I tell you. I am less than well-organized for sure. My phone stays dead half the time and my husband says living with me is like a constant scavenger hunt because we are always searching for where I've left something: my phone, my glasses, the kids (just kidding on that one-they are hard to lose, trust me! ha!). But these oils, y'all! I can breathe again with them. Literally and figuratively. The baby is at long last sleeping through the night meaning I can get up and go to the gym with friends at 5 a.m. I feel healthy and am using the oils instead of the pharmaceuticals that made me feel so sluggish and blah. The oils are a game changer, I tell you. I actually feel like I'm winning for the moment! Or at least staying in the game. I'll talk more about how we are using them in future blogs, but don't worry. This is not going to become "Allison Sells Oils" blog. I still plan to blog about the crazy, the heart-wrenching, and the wonderful things going on in our lives. Until next time!!

My 2 Cents on Suicide

In the wake of Robin Williams's suicide, everyone seems to want to put in their two cents. So here's mine.

Depression is an awful, debilitating disease. I've been there and am not writing this to judge but because I hope someone contemplating ending their own life might read it and it may make a difference. This morning, I heard Henry "The Fonz" Winkler say when people are depressed they can't see what is just outside of their own minds. I think that's pretty well said. I had some serious struggles with depression as a teen and have often been asked what someone could have said to have helped me. I'm not sure that anything could have. Once you are that sick, sick enough to consider suicide, it's hard to believe anything other than what your sickness tells you. However, there are some beliefs and truths you can try to know and hang on to. I hope maybe one of these what I consider truths may stick with someone who falls into depression and may be the thought they cling to while seeking proper help. To me, that's worth all the people I'm about to tick off. My fear is that some depressed teen without some of our life experience sees and hears the media hype and what appears to me to be some making Robin Williams out to be some sort of martyr for depression and they follow suite. I believe he was tormented by depression and I know living with it can feel like hell on Earth. However, suicide is never ok and retweeted quotes about a genie finding his freedom make suicide sound like an acceptable solution. There is danger in that!  We have to remember:

1. God gifts us with life. It is not up to us to decide when to end it. Suicide is sinful. 

2. The family is left wounded for life in a way that can never be healed. They will forever wonder why they weren't enough and what they could have done differently. The children may never feel whole again because of his actions. Suicide is selfish. If I ever have a thought of suicide, I picture my daughter on her wedding day without her mother there. I have no business marring that beautiful day for her. 

3. Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. As The Lord and my mama have reminded me many times, "This too shall pass." But not if you don't let it. Not if you choose to miss out on years of years of joy and laughter and babies and grandchildren all because of a temporary problem or time of pain becoming overwhelming.

4. The world will not mourn your death and remember you like the celebrities. You are not Kurt Cobain, Robin Williams, or Marilyn Monroe. You matter very much to those who love you but seeds in sick minds can grow in strange ways when fed by mental illness. Suicide is not the way to find the love and acceptance you are needing. More likely feelings toward you will be of anger. 

5.Suicide does not always work. Ever see the guy on Oprah who shot himself in the face with a shotgun and lived? You think life is hard now? Try living with permanent disfigurement, brain damage, etc. from an unsuccessful suicide attempt. 

6. Our life is not our own and we are not here for the soul purpose of our own pleasure. My teenage years were rough. I had some pretty miserable times. However, the empathy and "grit" I developed during those times allow me to love and advocate for the special needs child God has blessed me with later in life.There is more to your story than what you are feeling now! 

The Sparks Experience (Part 2)

We arrived for another 8:30 a.m. appointment at the UAB Civitan-Sparks Clinic thinking the day's Psychology portion of the test would be the final portion of my girl child's testing there. We were quite wrong.

The above picture was taken on a brief break from the morning's testing and describes perfectly how we both felt about the day's events.

Just as on our last visit, we only had minutes to wait before being taken back to the testing area, another small room with a table for Presley and her trainee-tester/intern and an observation window for me to watch through as the psychologist (couldn't have been older than mid-20's) asked me questions about myself, our family, Presley's birth, growth and development, etc. The graduate student who had followed us throughout our last visit was there again and it was nice to see a sweet, familiar face. 

The Psychology portion of the test was long (about 3.5 hours) and difficult for my girl-child. The testing including three things she hates: answering questions (a LOT of questions), handwriting, and mathematics (word problems). 

After I answered all of the paychologist's questions, she explained to me what would happen next. Apparently, the two days we have spent at UAB are NOT part of the actual autism testing. The stamp on our schedule last visit that said "On Autism Clinic Waiting List", was an indicator that we are still on the waiting list for the actual autism evaluation by a psychologist who specializes in Autism Spectrum Disorders. That evaluation consists of my girl spending the day mostly playing while being observed by the psychologist, from my understanding. We will be on the waiting list for that to occur for approximately another two years. (WTH??) The testing we have already done will be useful for that evaluation, but is not part of the evaluation itself. The results of the two days' worth of testing we have already done will be presented to me in the Parent Conference scheduled for Aug 4 (in one month). Along with the results of the tests, I will be given recommendations for other places we might look at going if we don't want to wait two years. The tests we have already done may be able to be used elsewhere. So do we put her through all this again just to possibly have to wait there, too? We've already started the processes for testing at Vanderbilt as well, only to start over at UAB, only to be told maybe we should start over again if we don't want to wait two years. My head knows that we are the lucky ones. She is not dying. She is verbal, extremely high functioning and we know what's going on with her even without the official UAB or Vandy (or wherever else) diagnosis. My heart wonders if I have done more damage than good by bringing her to UAB and putting her though all the tests, for what seems to me right now, nothing. 

By the end of the day's testing, my girl was in tears and, watching her through the observation window, seeing her frustration, so was I. Finally, I couldn't take it any more. I knew she had shut down and she wasn't going to be able to answer the last question. I went I to the room with her, helped her through by all but telling her what to write, and we made our exit.

What can you do after a day like that? For us, we decided it was best to chase down a castle we had seen on Pinterest that is located in Birmingham (I LOVE GPS being on my iPhone!)

Next, we hit The Summit for Johhny Rocket's (she is showing her tiredness and relief to be out of UAB in the pic), a Steel City Pop and a movie of her choice, How to Train Your Dragon 2. 

Hopefully, when she looks back on this Summer, she will remember the fun we had afterward and not just all the tests and therapies she endures.

Backward Chaining

One of the most dreaded tasks here at the Wright house has long been the nightly bathing of our girl-child. It has been a major source of frustration for us all. Not only does she hate having to do it (she gets frustrated and quickly loses focus), but it falls at the worst time: the end of the day when everyone is tired from school and work and we are rushing to get everyone fed and bathed, homework done and lunches packed before bedtime while the baby has reached her fussy time and is screaming, causing the dog to start barking and me to want to throw in the towel and move us all to France where we can just splash on the eau de toilet and say to heck with frequent bathing. The easier thing to do is to just bathe her myself, letting her play under the water while I do all the scrubbing and rinsing. But since one of the main points of parenting is to prepare our little ducklings for life on their own, and since I know she is capable of self-care, she has to learn at somepoint snd with the arrival of her baby sister, so came that point. However, we soon found that the harder we pushed her, the more frustrated she (and in turn, we) became and bathtime only got worse, typically ending in her breaking down and her dad or I having to finish bathing her. I mentioned our dilemma to our beloved Dr. Le during one session and she recommended we try something called backward chaining. Basically, it just means breaking down a process into steps and teaching the steps from last to first, one at a time, before moving back to the next step, so that each attempt ends successfully, building confidence with experience. Since each attempt ends on a positive note with praise, the dreaded task becomes less dreaded for all.  Here's how we applied the theory of backward chaining to shower time. 

We broke shower time down into 12 steps. (Looking back now, we probably should have added "get into shower" and maybe reversed steps 1 & 2, but oh well.) 

Having the list written on the shower wall in bathtub crayon (washes off with a little scrubbing) has helped tremendously as my girl-child is a visual learner and also because it takes away the stress of "what comes next?" and helps her to stay focused.

 The first night, I did the first 11 steps for her and then had her turn the water off (step 12). I praised her big and she was proud that she had done well. The next night, I completed the first 10 steps for her and then she rinsed t & b (tootie & booty [step 11]), turned off the water (step 12) and received another big praise. "Hey, this isn't so hard!," we started thinking. We will continue this process, adding in one step each night, until she is doing it all on her own. We were advised to wait until we had mastered just the shower (keep things as simple as possible!) before we made a whole new backward chaining process for the "after shower" tasks of drying off, combing hair, etc. 

 To keep up with our progress and add in motivational rewards along the way , we made the chart below (I'm obviously no artist but it serves its purpose).

We drew the chart in timeline fashion and we work our way back from right to left. After she completes each step, she gets to "take ownership" of it's completion by drawing a picture of choice (checkmark, smiley , etc.) in the box for that step. After each few steps, there is a reward. After the first 5 steps were mastered, we had "UNO Night at the Wright House". After mastering the next 3 steps, she got her choice of a toy, bowling or Zen-Beri yogurt. (Last week was insanely busy so we will have our Zen-Beri date this week and then fill in that box as right now she's still owed that reward.) We are now only 2 steps away from her doing it all by herself. Tonight, I will just turn the water on for her (step 1) and she will do the rest. While I may still have to give her some verbal cues along the way, I will give those less and less each shower as I also reduce my physical proximity during the shower. I've started leaving the room instead of hovering over her and just sticking my head in at times to make sure she is still on task. She will earn a park play date with ice cream for herself and a friend when she completes all 12 steps on her own and when she does the whole shower process on her own 4 times (without verbal cues), she gets the big doozie reward of a trip to her choice of water park. 

 So far, this process has helped us tremendously and I have been excited to share because while it seems so simple now, I never would have thought of it on my own. She no longer goes straight into, "I can't do it"-meltdown mode because she has already done everything  except the 1 new task for the night and she knows it will be a simple one. If we do have trouble with a step, we just try it again the next night and don't get upset about it. The main thing to remember is to keep it positive!

Father's Day Gifting

This will be Father's Day #2 without The Man. They say it gets easier. So far, I still think they are full of it. It does not get easier. It never hurts less, just in a different way that you learn to live with. I still miss everything about my dad every single day. I most especially miss his advice. There are many times when I know exactly what he would tell me to do or not do to (Should I get an anchor tattoo in his memory? Ummmm...NO. I can just hear him telling me that money needs to be spent on my kids), but sometimes, I'm not so sure. I most especially wish I could get his advice on the girl-child and her diagnosis. I wonder if he'd say I was doing the right thing or if I should just let her be. He thought she hung the moon and I'm sure he would have had something to say about the subject. I just wish I knew what.

 Not long before my dad died, we were inspired by a church sermon and afterward had a heart to heart. He told me how proud he was of me. He told me he thought I was doing a great job with the girl-child. I told him how proud I was of him and named all the reasons. Best gifts we ever gave each other, right there.

 I wish I could hear him talk. He loved telling me stories about growing up in Tennessee and about being in the Navy. He use to force anyone who came near our house to watch his old Navy slides on a projector. I wish I could hear or atleast remember every one of those stories now.  

 So for those of you who still have your dads, my advice for you for tomorrow would be to forgo the neckties, golf clubs, etc., or atleast, in addition to those gifts, give your dad what he really wants from you and what you really need to give him:

1. Ask his advice on everything you can think to ask. You will need it later, believe me. Ask him about anything you may think you might ever need to know, just in case. He will be glad to know you value his opinion.

2. Tell him why he's awesome. Or write it.  After we lost Dad, we were going through his desk and found a card I'd given him that told him how much he meant to me. He'd kept it where he kept all his other important documents. I also have the comfort of having had that Sunday afternoon heart-to-heart. It means more to me now to know he knew. 

3. Spend some time with him, listening to whatever he wants to talk about. I don't care if it's politics, the weather or his childhood. Let him talk and hang to every word. 

For those of us without our dads, we will honor them through memories and flowers  but more importantly by living out all that our dads worked so hard to teach us. There is no better gift I could give my dad today than to raise my kids the way he raised me, teaching them to work hard, be honest, and be kind to others.

Happy Father's Day, N.G.! You're still The Man.

What To Do With All That Produce (How to Blanch)

We have already been blessed with an abundance of yellow squash and bush beans from our garden this year. We wanted to freeze the majority of our goods before they went to waste and were told that we would first need  to "blanch" our veggies. Of course, my first thought was....

Ok, so that's not the Blanch(e) they were referring to (although I do love those Golden Girls. R.I.P.) I first went to Google for the why and then to my mom, the guru of all things in general, for the how. Mom said she'd come on over to help, so I then called the hubs to pick up some BBQ, threw together a quick squash casserole with some of our bounty and I was ready to host my first ever blanch party. 

First, why bother blanching....

 1. It seals in color, flavor & nutrients making for some bright, yummy, healthy veggies.

2. It stops the enzymes that cause the veggies to ripen and ruin even while frozen, so they will look just as good coming out of the freezer as they did going in.

Now on to the how...

1. The prepwork: Snap the beans (break off end pieces and discard them then break beans into whatever length you want them - about 1 inch for us) and slice the squash. This is the fun part where you get to do your chatting and catching up. 

We had already washed the veggies as soon as they came out of the garden, but we washed them again anyway.

2. Bring veggies to a boil.

 (Some of the websites I looked at said to add salt to water, but we didn't. It is very important not to over boil. Beans were left in maybe a minute or two past the point of boiling but as soon as the squash's water started to boil they were taken out.

 For the squash (because I only had one of these), I used this pot:

3. Drain hot water.

4. Carefully (especially with the squash) transfer veggies into large bowl of ice water.

5. Remove ice by hand and drain water by pouring back into colander.

6. At this point, I did dry the squash a bit (carefully) so it wouldn't stick together in the bag as much.

7. Label and freeze (or eat/cook). Some people blanch just for the benefit of the locked-in color, flavor and nutrition and would at this point eat or cook the produce. For us, it's time to store them in gallon zip-lock freezer bags (be sure to get as much air as possible out of the bag when closing it) and put them in the deep freeze.