Today's Brigadoon Visit

Today Mom, Madison and I went up to Brigadoon to hang out with Bond for about an hour. While we were there, I spent a lot of time petting Bond, sitting with him in his crate, and just hangin' out. I was much more engaged with Bond than I have been, and was initiating contact with him. It was fun for Mom and Denise to watch me interact with him. While we were there, Mom asked Denise about what is going to happen from here. So here is what is in store for us: There are two other dogs in front of me that need to be trained. They will start their formal training as soon as the holidays are over. Once they go to their new homes, Bond will start his formal training. That will include learning to track my scent, going different places, and practice being tethered to me. We're not sure yet how long that is going to take, so there is no set date that Bond will come home with me permanently. As it stands now, after the holidays Bond is going to come over to my house to do a home visit, and hang out on my "turf". We'll just kind of plan sporatic visits up to Brigadoon until his formal training starts, and then the "fun" (work) will begin! Here are some pictures of my visit today, and have a Happy Thanksgiving next week. My family has a lot to be thankful for this year, and one of the things we are thankful for is the support we have from all of you.

With Love,
Aaron

Saying hi to Bond

Playing on the kitty perch

Playing in the dog crate

Bond hanging out in the crate with me

Mom just thought this was an interesting picture...

Bond was getting ready to drag me around--for a second!

Giving Bond some lovin'

Taking a rest

Bond watching over me

Sleeping in the car after a long (1 hour) visit--or because I was up at 5:30....

Why try?

Yesterday was NOT a good day. It seems like we are having a lot of those lately. It was Veteran's Day yesterday so I was out of school. Sometimes I do okay when I'm outside of my routine, and other times I don't. Yesterday was one of those days. Mom went from mess to mess, cleaning up after me. As soon as she started cleaning up the mess I had just made, I went on to a new one. She tried to be proactive and play with me, but there are two other kids, and Dad is sick right now too. Mom's breaking point was a shampoo incident. She recently bought shampoo in the form of a bar because I was dumping liquid shampoo left and right. She figured that a solid bar would put an end to cleaning up shampoo and supporting Suave. :) She was wrong. While she was checking up on Dad to see if he needed anything, I got into the shower, grabbed the bar of shampoo and scraped/smeared it all over the bathroom. When she found me (she had been in there less than 5 minutes) I was standing IN the toilet, the bar of shampoo was in there with me (she is SO glad I didn't flush it), and bar shampoo was everywhere. She was not happy. She had a long way to go before bedtime, so she just hung on until then, and I managed to live through the day. :) Today I went to school, so it should be a better day--maybe.

Mom can't wait for my friend

I'm going to put a disclaimer on this post so there is no confusion. Mom is not expecting Bond to "fix" me or prevent me from all of the destruction I have planned; however, Mom IS looking forward to the possibility of less mess! So here is how the last few days have played out: I have been sick with a cold, so last week was a rough week for all of us. I have been known to throw little temper tantrums every once in a while, but this past week I have thrown some of the worst tantrums my parents, therapist and school has ever seen. It has been really hard on Mom and Dad this week, and they are kind of at a loss of what to do. So in addition to that going on, I have been enjoying getting into a little more trouble. Other than my usual shampoo dumping (which I have moved to the toilet) here is a story. Sunday turned into a particularly not-so-good-day with my mom. The day started out fairly nice. Mom and I went to Target and Costco to do a little shopping. She bought me a piece of pizza and we had lunch together before we did our shopping. Once we were done with Costco, Mom put me in the car and started unloading the groceries from the cart into the trunk. At this point I found a cup of water, went to the back seat, and dumped it all over the seat. I looked her right in the eye as I did it too! (She said "no" before I dumped it, but I didn't listen). She gently and nicely told me to sit down in my seat, so I did--I knew I was in trouble! She finished unloading the groceries, closed the door and took the cart back. She got in the car and started driving off when she smelled something....and decided to look back at me. Well, while she was gone putting the cart away (literally 10 seconds away), I decided to get into the two cans of shaving cream that were in a bag. I thought the inside of the car would look so much nicer with shaving cream all over it--oh and myself. It was a big mess, and at that point I'm pretty lucky I'm alive. She cleaned me up the best she could and drove on home. (Ironically Mom had to buy new shaving cream because I had emptied the last one). So by this time Mom had had it, but the day was young (only 1:30)....fast forward to the evening... Mom looked at the computer I use because it was turned off only to find it sitting in a pool of water. Yes, my computer is now fried. No more computer for me. :( I am very sad, and Mom is trying to have sympathy, but at the same time she is mourning the loss of a computer at my hands. So, I'm not sure what I'm going to do now. She won't let me near her computer (I'm not sure why), so I'm kind of on self-inflicted computer restriction. So if you have a magic trick to resurrect a computer, please please please let her know. :)

Well I'm tired thinking about all the trouble I got into this weekend!!! Mom thought I was having a fairly good evening until I got into the shampoo.....oh well. It's bedtime now, so it should be trouble-free around here for a few hours anyway. Nighty night!

Pictures of trouble and fun

No one knows how I fit in here, but I do...

At least this time I didn't have any shampoo

Me playing on the computer that WAS

This picture was taken by my Auntie Noel. We were supposed to be doing family pictures, and I was done for at this point. So I just kept walking away and then walking back again. This picture has come to symbolize what it's like to live in a family with autism. There's my family, waiting for me to come and join them.