~The O'Neill Boys~

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Colin and his gang.

We had a successful field trip to Carnes Arena with the 5th grade! Of course, it took us longer than we predicted to get out of here but it was just as well because we had plenty of time to watch his classmates and FREEZE while we waited for Colin's turn on the ice.

I had never been to Carnes before but it's a really cool (pun intended) place. The kids were all on the rink and skating away when we arrived. I imagine it was chaos when they were all getting their skates on so I'm glad we avoided that part.

It was fun to watch the kids on the ice. Some of the kids were evidently very comfortable skating and some were new at it and it was fun to see their antics. Aunt Chris came to watch, too.

We went into the warm up room and readied ourselves for Colin's ice time. At about 11:15 we made our way to the smaller rink and got Colin from his kart into the sled and settled onto the beanbag with his pillows and blankets. Priscilla even brought a hot water bottle which she put under his legs and near his feet. AHHHH! A bunch of kids came to the rink to skate as well. Initially, there were to be only a handful of kids but it ended up being a couple of handfuls :) Mr Phillips and Mrs. TC were there as well.

So, Colin was very nervous, at first, but he bravely let us slide him onto the ice and Mrs. TC took off with him! Nurse Lauren is a skater so she was out there on the ice watching over him and taking some pictures and video. He went around a couple of times and said he was done, but we convinced him to go around a couple of more times. Very proud of Colin for trying something new and something he was so unsure of! He is a trooper!

Colin was supposed to be home by 2:00 to meet with Christina the PT from school to try out some different Hoyer slings but since it was still early Aunt Chris asked us to go out to Friendly's for lunch. Sounded good to me! We asked Priscilla, too.

Went to the Friendly's on Dorset Street. Colin liked it! He even said it was his favorite part of the day--weird kid. I think he liked that Lauren kept him entertained with games and YouTube videos on her phone while we had our lunch and dessert.

Made it home a little after 2:00...the weather started getting yucky--kind of icy/rainy. Christina had a sling that was another kid's that we really liked. She took the green one that we don't like (the one that is hard to get underneath Colin because of the stiffness and weird stays that it has. If it works for the other child, we'll get to keep this one instead of the school having to order a new one. Yay!

Casey stayed at home with Gene and Aunt Julia. Mel came for a couple of hours and they did some school work and he was cooperative.