This is a Positive Post, Really

 

though i'm not feeling it.

  Here is the week i'm having.  As my friend says, (some of it) is "rich people's problems" (and she's in missions; by her definition EVERYONE in this country is rich.)

All the RED indicates changes made this week!

But you can see it's a trying week.  Max is finding it so, too.

The New Pants

  Max needs new pants.  Boom & i took him to WalMart.  Max said he wanted sweats, not jeans.
  There were 3 elastic-waist pants in his size, maybe, which turned out to NOT be sweats, and one sweats a size smaller.
  Max agreed to try them on, then, after we made arrangements with the lady in charge, decided not to after all.
  But he still wanted pants.
  i didn't want to buy pants that i wasn't sure were going to fit, but the guys agreed to try them on when we got home, so i agreed to one pair.
  But Max wasn't ready to go.  i told him "No movie," but he still insisted on gong to the back of the store.
  Boom & i were ready to go, but you can't wrestle someone like Max in the store.  We went with him.
  He wanted a toy Diesel 10,
  So, to the checkout at last.  Yes, with Diesel 10.

  But at home, the pants didn't fit.  So i went to return them.  Guess what - i had pants and receipt, but Max had removed the tags.  The clerk kindly took them, but warned me to not expect that.
  So, another day for new pants. . . .

The Call

  While we were finding the pants, my phone rang.
  FSSA calling.
  When i turned in Max's new Medicaid paperwork last week, i was told to expect 2-3 weeks for a call.  This was less than one week.
  So, today, in an already too-full week, i added possibly the most stressful appointment of all.
  It didn't seem like something that could wait.

A New Way of Communicating

  Max communicates well with writing, better than speaking.  Over the weekend i bought a whiteboard like our Institutional Speech Therapist uses, and have been uses & have been using it with him.  He doesn't really write himself on it, at least conversationally, but he'll make the offered choices & indicate understanding, like with our paper scraps we'd been using.  It's not a dollar store board - been there, done that, not worth the cost - but it seems to be working well so far.  (The dollar store board won't erase.  This one, i think he'll go through pens very quickly, but we can write on & erase  it easily.)

Addition

  i forgot to tell you how proud i was of Max for telling us he wanted the hanger that was with those darn pants.  Mind you, i hate those clippie hangers, but he made it plain he wanted it, so into the bag it went.
  It also got returned with the pants.