Found it from a friend and Thought I'd pass it on.

Diane Adreon, M.A.

Teaching adaptive behavior is one of the areas that are often overlooked for high-functioning individuals with autism spectrum disorders. However, adaptive behaviors have a tremendous impact on our ability to use our skills in common situations in everyday life. The following adaptive behavior skills are important if our children are going to experience success without our daily assistance. Of course, every child is different. Often it is not possible to master these skills by the end of high school. However, most of our children can improve and become more independent if we consciously work on skills in these areas.
1. Teach your child to wake up to an alarm clock. It is common for parents to wake their children for school. However, as your child grows older, it’s a good idea to teach him to wake up to an alarm clock. You may have to experiment with buzzers, music, and various degrees of volume. Sometimes, for individuals who are particularly hard to wake, you may need to have them walk across the room to turn off the alarm clock. Eventually, this skill would include having the child learn to set the alarm clock. A more advanced skill would involve developing the child’s ability to accurately estimate the amount of time needed to get ready and determining to what time the alarm should be set.
2. Teach your child to refer to a clock and/or watch to complete a task in a certain period of time. A visual timer, such as the Time Timer*, may be helpful. The Time Timer dial graphically shows the child how much time is left. One way to begin teaching this is to have the child guess how long the task will take and then comparing how long the task really took to accomplish.
3. Teach your child grooming (shower or bathe within the last 24 hours, hair combed or brushed, deodorant, clean clothes). Our children find routines comforting. Therefore, help your child establish healthy routines. Many children find it easier (in the long run) to follow rules such as having a shower or bath every day, rather than every two to three days. Specifically teach your child each step in washing properly (i.e., 4 times across each armpit with a soapy washcloth). Poor hygiene is a problem poorly tolerated by the community (Peter Gerhardt, personal communication).
4. Teach your child to be responsible for his/her belongings. Start with things such being responsible to keep track of the toy train that he/she brought to your relative’s house or into the car. Build into the routine that it is the youngster’s responsibility to find the toy after the visit, bring it to the car, & bring the toy from the car into the house. Progress to items such as school backpack & supplies.
5. Teach your child to learn to use visual cues to remember tasks. This might be keeping medicine in a certain place, so he/she remembers to take it at breakfast each morning. Or, it might mean, writing lunch on a piece of paper & taping it onto the school backpack to remember to bring lunch.
6. Teach your child how to cook. Young children can learn to make a sandwich and prepare snacks that do not require cooking. Later, teach your child to follow a recipe independently and use kitchen appliances safely.
7. Teach your child to use the phone. Start by teaching your child to answer the phone, take a message & relay the message to the appropriate person. Progress to skills such as calling information to obtain a phone number, calling a store to see if they have a particular item in stock, calling technical support to fix a computer problem, and ordering take-out food.
8. Teach your child how to go places independently. This may be walking to areas nearby, riding a bike, using public transportation or driving.
9. Teach your child to carry certain items when he/she leaves the house. This would include: Important phone number, money, house key, and possibly a cell phone.
10. Teach your child about personal safety. Consider skills such as knowing who to hug and kiss, and when it is more appropriate to shake hands, how to discretely carry money, NOT giving personal information to others over the internet, and what to do if you are walking down the street & someone unfamiliar approaches you or you feel that you are being followed.
Diane Adreon, M.A., is associate director of the University of Miami/Nova Southeastern University Center for Autism & Related Disabilities. She is also the co-author of Asperger Syndrome and Adolescence: Practical Solutions for School Success
Courtesy of APPC
Source URL: http://www.autismsupportnetwork.com/news/life-after-high-school-ten-skills-teach-your-child-autism-223421

Your eyes, your smile, your lessons to me.

  Oh my son.
  I'm quite in awe over you. Your siblings taught me so much and yet I still sit here and stare at you listening attentively to all that you have to say. A week ago today, you began to show me that you were then able to recognize your family and friends. You smiled ever so gently with those cute little dimples. Oh how prominent they are.
 The past two days you have cracked a chuckle here and there. You look up at the fan and in your mothers eyes, I see you as if you are speaking with your angel. You smile so big. Your arms and legs move with excitement and you bring your mother her knees. There is no greater joy my son then to watch every monumental milestone in your short life. I want you to read this one day and remember that at this moment you were and always will be my baby.

 As a log here is what you did 10 minutes ago:

Me to David, "okay papas, mama is going to feed you some more, but I don't want you to throw up okay?". I guess he disagreed with me. How he proved his point after I was done asking that from him. He threw up on me. Down my shirt, on my pants and it found it's way to my socks. Yeah he didn't quite concur!

Family Poem/Had to share

Inspirational Family Poem

Matthew 20:20-21

from The Rhyming Gospels, a poetic paraphrase of Holy Scripture,
by Bernard Williams.

Then the mother of James and John
Came forward at their bequest,
She knelt down before Jesus
To make known her request.

Jesus looked down upon her,
Asked, “What is your desire?”
She said, “To serve in your kingdom
My two sons do aspire.”

“Command one to stand at your right,
For both I want the best,
The other put at your left hand,
This, then is my request.”

"Kathy with a K"

Yesterday my baby boy smiled the sweetest smile for the first time in his life. He was listening to Kathy talk to him and he looked up and smiled. What a beautiful moment it was.

The day before he cooed when I was talking to him......Some of the greatest moments with our children are these moments. Milestones like this come once in their lives. Live to enjoy ever second and never ever forget them.

There is so much to talk about!!!

   First things first! I had my precious baby boy! We had a face to face introduction April 11th! Before I continue with that part let's talk about the week before.
  
It was bad. Actually let me rephrase that; it was beyond miserable! The swelling took over every part of my body and walking to the restroom was a task. It caused pain in every inch of my living being. I couldn't really be comfortable in my pants because they were tight all over my legs. Even my sleeves to my shirts were tight on the arms. It wasn't good. I had put on a massive amount of water weight (30lbs). That wasn't including the baby weight. I guess I had something call ph something rather. It's potentially a danger to the mom. The word is close to edema; maybe.

 The Docs struggle to figure out what they had to do. My blood pressure runs pretty low on a normal day. Around the low end of the 90's. When they were taking my BP it was nearing the 130's. Well for a normal person with normal BP that's fine, but with me that was 40 points. It was difficult for them to truly diagnose me because they couldn't decide if they should.In the very end they did and said, "We have to have you come in in the am ma'am. You'll be having the baby tomorrow. We're inducing.". I wasn't reluctant at all that's for sure. I asked them, "So you're inducing, how long will it take before I start to see the swelling go down"? Their response, " Almost over night". "Then let's do it!" I replied.

I showed up the next day April 11th.... To be continued!

27 days left!

I kid you not I slept with my feet in the air all night. I think I may have to purchase 2 pillows just for this. Only because I'm sure my hubby is going to want his pillows back very soon. On a good note; one foot looks a little more normal now!!!!

I seriously thought I would be going in last night. I've had these things called "quickening". Oh and not to mention just a tad bit of fluid. I decided to go to sleep since it wasn't uncomfortable.I probably could get in trouble from some of the nurses but as the nurses know the L&D would end up sending me home.

It's nice to be able to walk on my feet or should I say foot without feeling the pain! I really hope someone can rub the water out them soon. Anyway, a small but I guess semi important update! 

Just like the month of February

The countdown has begun. We have about 28 days before we are to see our little one. Honestly I expect to see him sooner. Let me start by telling everyone what’s been going on in the Aguilar household.

Sis is now old enough to drive and has her permit to prove it. She drives better than some people I know. Trust me.  She is a cautious driver and already knows to respect the rules of the road. I have a feeling she’ll be ticket free for a long time.

My goodness her being 16 soon enough is striking a cord with me.  By the end of the year she will be enrolled in college and on her way to earning her Associates. Now don’t get me wrong we have our moments with her but most are pretty darn well!

She’ll be going to prom this year which is officially her first date. As a mom I’m a little nervous but I know she’ll be the most beautiful girl in the room! Her dress is classy and sophisticated and her shoes are just the same, just as a young lady should be.

Buggy just got back from a 120 mile bike ride. He made it all the way in 3 days. He was a bit disappointed because of lack of faith but now sits in pure satisfaction knowing that he proved others wrong. One thing about our family is that we can hold our own.  We’re just private when prepping our bodies for anything.

His birthday is right around the corner. He’ll be 14. In a year he’ll have his permit. Now unlike sis, he’ll end up with a ticket sooner than later. Beware of the future driver.

I love to sit back and watch him in church. He has such intimacy with his father. He praises him. What an awesome relationship he has with the Lord.

So far with Cici she seems to be a little excited that she will get to share the room with her baby bruder. She’s helped organize the room for her and him. She’s put his little socks away and talked about how well she will take care of him when he gets home. Hopefully that doesn’t change when daddy holds his little boy for the first time.

Speaking of daddy; he’s doing pretty darn well. He tolerating me isn’t he? May I ask that you lift him and his parents up in prayer? Recently we got news that his dad not doing so well. We’re preparing ourselves for an unwanted trip. His mom called to let us know that he feels he’ll never get to meet his grandson.  That he also knows he will not see his grandchildren again. He’s not doing well at all and we’ve known this; but never to this extent. All this has us at the edge of our seats.

Going back to the man of the home; good things are going to happen. He doesn’t know I feel this way though. There are a few glitches but you just wait and see. I’m going to one day face a whole new man that will walk with a glow on his face and be someone we never expected him to be. All the glory will be to God when it happens!

Myself let’s just say I feel like a WHALE!!! The past 4ish days I’ve had nothing but swelling. My feet get so bad it hurts to walk. Braxton Hicks seem to become a little stronger each time. I can defiantly feel the end is near. His head is down already and has been for about 3 weeks now. I can feel him roll back and forth now. At times I feel his little behind up against me.  What a wonderful feeling. Isn’t it amazing how our bodies can conform to the needs of a babe? I was told not to be surprised if he arrived sooner. Honestly I won’t. I actually think he will be here sooner.

I had my first shower ever! The women of the church got together and helped celebrate the soon to be birth of our precious baby boy. Really I never expected there to be 20 plus women there. It was a nice surprise. They saved me so much money too! I was blessed with plenty of towels, receiving blankets, wash clothes and more! Sis and I got home and hubby was pleasantly surprised that we got so much. So was I. I thank the Lord for placing us with such a wonderful church family. We have been blessed by them from the moment we arrived in that church.

We do have someone people though that really adore my husband; so much so they have learned to pick on him with love and kindness, of course. I love that they have also built a relationship with my sweetheart and often bring a gentle smile to his face. He’s just loved around here, more so by us. He does have to give one of the youth a scowling once in a while but this guy deserves it! Lol!! He’s a great kid though even if he ONLY listens to Mike. My husband never ceases to amaze me. He’s pretty content where he’s at and loving every minute. So for that I thought he deserved a new toy. We purchased a bike for him. A nice beautiful ruby red bike!

Welp, it’s time for me to hang this up. Since my sleeping schedule is off right now so is everything else. God bless you all until next time.