She enjoys reading, music, playing with friends (Samantha and Karson are pictured with her below).

We are so pleased with her education at RE Bennett, where she attends a Special Needs classroom with 11 other students of similar degrees of learning disabilities. She is thriving so much that each day we notice more and more. Although her speech is limited, she gets across her communication pretty clearly. Below is a little story about how her days go at school.

Wake up

A typical day for Amber-Dawn starts with an early bus ride at 6:45 am to school. When she arrives off the bus, she has a routine to take off her coat and hang it up and put her backpack there also. Amber loves routines and has showed much progress in remembering her routine, with little or no prompting from the teacher or teacher’s aid.

Roll Play

Since the other students are not at school yet, she and her friend, Samantha roll play with a fisher price doll house. Waking up “mommy” and taking her “downstairs” to get breakfast ready and then “waking up baby” to take care of her. The doll house is put away when the other students arrive.

Music – Reading – Circle Time 

They start off with circle time – many of the children need one-on-one teacher’s aids, which Amber does have too. The students work with their calendar, days, numbers, weather – very adaptive for kids learning levels.

Music is Wonderful!!!

If it’s a music day (I think there is 3 a week) they listen to music next – this has to be Amber-Dawn’s absolute favorite time – especially now that she can hear better! They do some class room reading together – some of the kids listen better than others. Then it’s off to do some school work. At this time, she’s learning sorting colored blocks into containers and doing very well!

Art Projects Daily

The kids move on to their daily Art Project – a lot of it is hand-over-hand but even Amber-Dawn is showing signs of helping more with her art project – we even have a few pages that she actually “colored” by herself or little hand-over-hand. It’s a start!

Let’s Get Active – PE

There is daily activities with physical therapy – at this time she is having a blast with the hula hoops and balls. She don’t quite get passing the ball – but I think she can learn it. The scouter with rolling wheels on them are not quite her thing either – hanging on to them and scouting is difficult so far.

Lunch Time

The school cafeteria is across the building, so off they go on a hike through the gym, hallways and many stairs. Once they reach their goal – the lunch room – Amber sits with other students and has a helping hand with lunch. This can sometimes be a challenge to sit still long enough – she has so much energy and wants to play and interact with other students. As a side note, she is learning to give “high-five’s” as a new way of expressing herself or saying hi to friends.

Recess (Outdoor or Indoor)

After lunch they play outside on the playground where she loves to wander in the sunshine – if the day is rainy they play in the gym which is right next to their classroom.

Routines

As the time ticks into the afternoon for her bus to pick her up – she gathers up her coat, has help getting it on, grabs her backpack (she literally does pick it up because she knows she can’t leave with out it) and then heads for the door where she turns to wait for her Teacher’s aid to walk her to the bus. She is learning to walk next to her aid with out holding hands when it’s safe – and she walks up the bus stairs by herself with just the driver at the top of the stairs and the aid behind her.

Bus Ride Home

On her ride home the bus driver, Miss Lynn, and her listen to music or talk. Amber is always so happy on the bus home and wants to talk, but as soon as she recognizes her street and house she is the most excited girl saying loudly “Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!!!!”

Happy 88th Birthday to my Grandma Marie!

I had a nice visit talking to Grandma Marie today – she was regaling me with stories about her adventure as she became 1957 Mrs. Lewis County in a contest, and then on to compete for the title of Mrs. Washington State in Tacoma and Seattle.

Here’s her memories…

When my Grandma Marie was 34 years old, she entered the Mrs. Lewis County contest after encouragement from her two sons (the youngest is my dad) and won the title. My dad, Carl, [age 8] and his brother, Cary [age 10], told their mom that she can bake a good cake so she should enter. From what my grandma remembers this was the only thing she did to win the title of Mrs. Lewis County.

Taking the Train to Tacoma WA

The next leg of her journey took her to Tacoma WA by rail – she was even able to bring my dad and his brother on the train ride to Tacoma. At this point, the 10 regional finalists participated in a few events, including cooking a meal, ironing a white shirt and sewing an apron.

My grandma cooked her favorite Salmon loaf recipe and an apple pie.

Final 4 Head to Seattle WA

After making one of the 4 finalists in this round, she traveled to Seattle next for the crowning of Mrs. Washington State. While in Seattle, she flew on a plane over the Olympic Mountains and Mt. Rainier for an excursion afternoon. This part of the judging was on character, poise and personality – now that the homemaking abilities have been done in Tacoma. Although my grandma did not win the title of Mrs. Washington State, she recalls the receiving a post card from the winner when she was in Florida competing for Mrs. America.

Back to our family website for some more stories and NICHOLS – PARNELL Genealogy.

My good part of the day: I finished up another new website for Cowlitz Timber Trails. It’s for a private gated campground community in Lewis County Washington. There are many membership lots for sale to check out with pictures. Image of fisherman on the Cowlitz River from the campgrounds boat launch area.

Bad part of the day: Car broke down on hubby’s way to work late last night – so we had to tow it home around midnight.