I. Want. Cereal. Please.

3/18/11 School Report - Speech: "Hi" to people in office. Pictures "is this ___?" Good NO - labels person/object. When YES, Trying to get "Yes." Imitated a few "yes." Worked on turn taking & requesting.

Sorry, am a few days behind. On Saturday night, Denis took me to see Lea Salonga in concert. My parents came over to play w/the kids, give them dinner, then put them to bed. I am deeply indebted to them for their time. My mom missed my kiddos so she enjoyed the interaction, and the kids missed seeing them as well. I texted with Mom throughout the night and found out that Nikko fell asleep for a nap around 6p. This caused him to stay up late. When I walked into the door at 11:30p Nikko came running from the living room to greet me. He seemed energetic and not tired at all. After my parents left I put him to bed and he went willingly. He only slept until 7:30a the next morning [today] and didn't nap all day so I wonder if his sleep tonight will be extremely deep or if he'll wake up late tomorrow morning. This didn't affect his mood all day, surprisingly. I was crabby myself because the concert was at The Venue at The Horseshoe Casino in Hammond, Indiana (right over the Illinois border) and when we walked into the place, I was immediately hit in the face with waves of cigarette smoke. Smoking is banned from many public places in Illinois, but Indiana doesn't have that luxury. By the end of the night my eyes were burning, we both had headaches and I reeked of smoke. My morning started with really dry eyes and a sluggishness that demanded a nap wherever I could fit one in.

Today, Nikko took an interest in sitting at the kitchen table to play Fruit Ninja on the iPod Touch. Ronin has mainly been the iPod hog as of late, showing his mastery of the finger-swiping game as well as others, while Nikko has played Skee Ball from time to time. I watched Nikko use one finger to swipe at the fruit with slow strokes. I took his hand and tried to guide him for a few games but then left him to his own devices. When I checked back with Nikko a few minutes later, I saw that Nikko had modified his playing style and maximized the number of fruit being swiped by using the fingers on both hands to make bear-claw swipes at the fruit. How clever! The only problem is that there are also bombs launched in the air amongst the fruit and the bear-claw swipe doesn't discriminate. Nikko hit a few and lost, but he was generally entertained for a long time with Fruit Ninja.

Backtracking again to Saturday... In the morning during breakfast, Nikko had a small bowl of Yogurt-covered strawberry Cheerios, a new flavor that I love, in addition to Nikko and Audrey. Nikko wanted more cereal and said, "Cereal." Or he'd say "Strawberry cereal." But today [Saturday] I wanted him to say either "I want cereal [please]" or "Want cereal." And so I began the task of modelling the words for him. Nikko caught on that I wanted something from him and he started whining. He chanted "cereal" and got agitated that I didn't give it to him when he said it. I signed "I. Want. Cereal. Please." and verbally prompted him. He didn't want to say WANT. I have no idea why, no idea why he didn't want to repeat a word I was requesting him to say. It irritated me a little bit because I feel that I have become complacent in requiring Nikko to properly request something. I think what motivated me to demand the WANT was the thought that in Kindergarten next year, he will need to ask for things appropriately. I need to require this from Nikko NOW. And so the minutes dragged on with Nikko protesting, demanding CEREAL that I wouldn't give to him without saying WANT or I WANT. We had reached and passed that familiar point of no return where if I gave in to him, my persistence and determination to get the WANT would have been in vain. I couldn't back down.

And finally, he shrieked "WAAAANT!!!"

I praised him for it, asking him to repeat it or a derivation of it again, but I made it clear that I was happy he said what I asked of him. He got his refill of cereal. I wondered how long it would take for him to say it again when the bowl was empty. And so when he finished his bowl, he got up and asked me for cereal.

"I want cereal, please," I said, and began to prompt, "I..."

Nikko quickly and quietly said, "Want...[and then loudly] CEREAL PLEASE!"

That took maybe fifteen seconds instead of fifteen minutes. Good job, Nikko.