Aviva, as penguin and artist

Red glittery mailbox and recent pictures and Monterey

With Noah’s therapist, Matt, the kids made a cardboard mailbox. They used a book that
Nina and Judah gave us called The Cardboard Box Book. They used different pieces of
cardboard and two different kinds of tape and elmer’s glue and a brad, and with Josh, also
a nut and bolt and a drill for those. It took two days. They’re not done painting it, but they
were sure that it should be a red glittery mailbox with a purple flag and a blue back. They’re
going to put letters in it in envelopes, and hopefully this will transition to writing real letters.
We’ve been talking about writing a “get well soon” card to Ruth Bader Ginsberg about her
broken ribs.

We’ve been meeting regularly with a child psychologist who specializes in Autism.
Dr. Lopez has been giving us assignments and help with dealing with frustration and anger.
We’ve been practicing something kind of funny. Aviva will pretend to hit Noah (or hit him very
lightly) and Noah will try to make a mean face and yell, “Hey! I don’t like that! Mommy, can
you help me?” And then we all do high-fives and celebrate with M&M’s. It’s awesome that the
kids can react this way, instead of hitting back or yelling and yelling and yelling. We’re practicing
and practicing, and we’re going add some details. Next we’re going to try and irritate each other
in different ways and still we’ll react in the same way. Mean face included.

After we did this on Monday, when Josh returned from work at dinner time, the kids were
excited to tell him about it. They said, “Guess what! We practiced hitting each other and
yelling, and making mean faces, and then Mommy gave us high-fives and M&M’s! She’s
so proud of us!” Josh said, “What????????”

Also, in the waiting office, I was filling out a questionnaire. The appointment is for Noah,
so the questionnaire was about him. After I asked him, Aviva wanted me to ask her questions.
Some questions were about whether he's felt anger or frustration or nervousness in the last
week. He answered me and I recorded it on the paper. Then Aviva said that she sometmes
feels sad, and I should text her teachers to tell them that, right now.

This is a collage Noah made recently

We went to Monterey for the weekend to get away from the smoky air. The aquarium is a lot of fun.

The letter J -- Aviva is recognizing letters everywhere

Halloween and Dia De Los Muertos

For Halloween, Noah was a policeman. He wanted to be a policeman because he
saw (in the costume store) a set of handcuffs, and he really wanted those. So to go
along with those, he chose a policeman uniform. Aviva wanted to be a turtle, and
also a frog, and then she wanted to hold a pallet with paint and a paintbrush, so
she was also a painter. She made a turtle shell, she was going to wear green like
a frog and she was going to hold the paint. All that happened was the turtle shell,
but she still said she was also a frog and painter as well as the turtle.

The next weekend was Dia De Los Muertos, and we went to Oakland for a festival.

It was fun to see ofrendas and costumed people with face paint, and we also made

sugar skulls. We took the bus and BART to get there.