Fourth of July - Carpentersville, IL

The fireworks display held by the Village of Carpentersville was located on the big patch of grass across the street from the police station.  They had a band playing and some people walking around selling glow toys.  We brought chairs and a blanket and Aiden bought a light up sword.  It was a good show and we had a good view.  Aiden enjoyed it.  He didn’t have a difficult time with the loud noises like in years past so that was great.  I know he really did appreciate moments of the display but I also caught him paying more attention to his light up sword from time to time.  Was the sword more interesting or were the fireworks becoming too much? I don’t know.

Hip Hop Dance Class - NISRA

I signed Aiden up for this dance class because he loves to move! He loves being very physically active and when the music’s good, and loud, he likes to dance.  This class wasn’t as physically active as I thought it would be but that was because learning choreography is difficult so it takes a lot of time and a slower pace.  Also, the kids in this class were all on different levels so there was a lot of waiting for those that needed to catch up. Still, in the end, Aiden did enjoy it.  And the dance recital was very cute.  He did very well remembering all the moves.  I was so proud of him and the rest of the class.

Tri-Cities Little League - Challenger Division

I learned about this little league from one of Aiden’s teachers. The Challenger Division is just for kids with special needs.  The goal of this division is to give everyone a chance to play.  Each player is assigned a buddy who stays by their side throughout the game and helps them with every aspect of the game.  The kids are assigned teams, get uniforms, and play on regulation baseball fields.  There are no strikes, outs or points.  Every batter swings until they hit the ball.  Sometimes this means using a batting tee or getting help from their buddy, but one way or another everyone gets to hit the ball.  Every year Aiden gets better and better.  Hitting the ball, running to the bases, catching and throwing, in every aspect of the game he keeps improving.  At the end of each year they have a jamboree.  They play a game and then afterwards there are different activities to do. There are prize games to play, craft areas, face painting, a raffle, hayrides, petting zoo, food, basically just an overall good time.  Aiden loves it and we do too.  There’s no feeling like an outsider here.  Everyone can just comfortably be themselves.

Superbounce - Spring Hill Mall

We used to take Aiden here a lot when he was younger.  He’s always been very active and loves jumping!  This place is nice. It has 2 rooms and I think about 5 or 6 bounce houses total.  We hadn’t been there for a really long time until about a month ago and although he had a good time, I could see that he had clearly outgrown this place.  I had never realized how small those bounce houses actually were.  I guess that’s because he used to be half my height.

Blue Man Group - Chicago, IL

Blue Man Group is performance art set to music.  I had seen this show 2 or 3 times before without Aiden so I knew what to expect and thought he would probably enjoy it because of the cool effects, the music, and the fact that the blue men don’t don’t speak any particular language or have complex facial expressions to figure out.  I think it was a good choice.  He seemed to enjoy it but we should have brought headphones for him because sometimes it was just way too loud for him.  I think a couple times it may have been a bit overstimulating for him but not enough to ruin it.  It was fun and funny and he seemed to get a kick out of it.

Karate - NISRA

Aiden used to take karate classes at Focus Martial Arts in Lake In The Hills, but the program was run by NISRA. I think he was here for 2 or 3 seasons.  The purpose of this class was to gain strength, coordination, self-confidence, respect, focus and control while learning self-defense.  Aiden enjoyed this class because he enjoyed any opportunity to be physically active and to be around other kids. This was a huge group! Infact, I felt it was just too big. There just wasn’t enough assistants to really help all the children learn the moves.  Everyone was on different levels and different belts.  If the class had been smaller or they had more help available then I would’ve been more motivated to stay. Maybe he’ll be back one day..

Metra & 2 Toots

I try to introduce new things to Aiden as much as possible.  Especially when he shows even the least bit of interest in something, or just familiarity.  That why I decided that we should take him on the Metra train.  I didn’t want to do a big thing like go all the way to downtown Chicago so I found a restaurant in Bartlett that went along with our train theme for the day and decided to make that our point of destination.

The restaurant is called 2 Toots Train Whistle Grill.  It’s a little place right across from the train station and its different because when your order is ready it is delivered to you via train. The food is placed in a basket train car and the train travels on a track that runs throughout the restaurant eating area. We got a kick out of it.  I also liked this place because their menu also offers gluten free options and grass fed hot dogs.  We had driven alongside trains plenty of times and Aiden had seen them plenty in movies so I thought he should get to experience it for himself.  It was a good day.