happy 21st birthday jeran!!

to my baby cousin jeran!

wishing you an awesome 21st today and the most fantastic year ahead!

we hope you have had a magical day especially being together with your folks , kej and denise!

we are so proud of how far you have come and all your excellent achievements! we are so proud of how hard you are working in hotel school in switzerland! cant wait to sample your food when you get home!

may our lord give you an incredible year ahead full of adventure, memories and experience!

stay the gentle loving caring thoughtful giant you are!

we love you miss you and wish you the most awesome of birthdays

god bless all our love

mark samm deqlan logan

happy easter sunday!

happy and blessed easter to you all from a glorious day in the mountains€!

rejoicing in our risen lord and all he has conquered for us!

welcome to the world kyla carr

huge congrats to nix darryl and joshie on the arrival of precious kyla carr 21 april

enjoy every moment of your beautiful easter gift!

cant wait to meet you precious girl

enjoy being a big brother joshie!

god bless all our love

mark samm deqlan logan

"we going to the mountains"

xx toas i type we are finally on our way to the midlands in kwazulu natal!

deqlan has been so excited saying "we going to the mountains" with a massive smile on his face! weve been counting down the sleeps and he couldnt believe when we got in the car that i told him no more sleeps we actually on our way!

the road is very very busy as mark reminded me this year there will be alot more people travelling due to so many public holidays over the next two weeks-its a solid stream of cars ahead of us but we not in a rush safely and slowly and surely please lord

its a gorgeous sunny day hoping for continued beautiful weather

we got a full house to look forward to, nanna and grandpa,con meggie keaton and khloe-mark deqlan logan and me , what a blessing to all be together

chat to you from the mountains!

safe travels and wishing you all a blessed meaningful easter as we pause and remember what our savior had to endure so that we may be forgiven and born to eternal life

god bless all our love

mark samm deqlan loganxxxx

for god so loved the world he gave his only son

special prayer request for Nick

morning deqlans prayer army

plse join us in asking for special prayers for nick franca www.carinbridge.org/visit/francafamily

thank you all god bless

Easter Basket

Dada and Deqlan on the first real cold day of Autumn, the first day Deqlan wore shoes this year!

Some of Deqlans art work from term 1

Logan has become quite the little golfer - she absolutely loves hitting golf balls and is really getting good at it!

Deqlan thought it was cool to and gave it a good go!

Khloe on her 11 month birthday :)

Now you know its cold when the dogs want to snuggle!

Hello Keatie!

Celebrating world Autism awareness day with a braai!

Best buddies

Deqlan absolutely loved this slide at a new play park close to us, it is so high, but after we talked him through the first go, he couldnt get enough and went at least another ten times

Hello Henry

Happy family Yolandie, Armando and Henry

Aunty Samm enjoying Henry

Aunty Meggie 's turn

Beautiful Henry - i see lots of Ruan in you! He is your very own guardian angek you know!

Tanie Bev getting beautiful smiles from Henry

We had the honor today of meeting precious Henry Shields today !

He is asbolutely beautiful and gorgeous and perfect in every way!

Huge congrats to you my dearest friend Yolandie, on this precious gift! I couldnt be happier for you! Huge congrats to you Armando and thank you for taking such good care of my friend!

Ruan, we know we are such a proud big brother and that you are going to watch over your little brother every moment of every day! I see lots of you in him, cute and gorgeous!!! We miss you little gogga but know you are so happy with Jesus!

Congrats to you all, may God continue to bless you all, guide you, love you and keep you safe from all harm

All our Love

Mark Samm Deqlan Logan

Conrad Megs Keaton Khloe

Tanie Bev and Uncle Derek

and.....

witand, it went very well! deqlan had a nap, he played with the kids and was happy doing it at his first full day at school

ayline lay with deqlan reading a story- deqlan aske ayline "are you cold?" bless him

5 minutes into nap time he lifted his head and proudly said " now its time to rise and shime" ha ha , not quite yet my boy!

after and hour or so of napping deqlan was woken up (eeekk!) and then he went with ayline to play with the main stream school kids next door

ayline facilitated deqlan saying hello and how are you or whats your name - he wasnt to comfortable " chatting" to so many kids but he did it!

when i arrived i found him in the sand pit surrounded by 6 buddies all playing in the sand!

for his very first full day, we are all very impressed!

tommorow will be his first lesson - solo- so we will see how that goes, really hoping he enjoys it and the kids to!

deqlan got his first "detention" yesterday!

he was sitting on the carpet outside that is ful of toys for the kids to play with. deqlan was very unhappy when any of the kids approached the carpet , tried to sit on it or play with the toys! he was so very upset crying that ash had to put him with her sitting in her office. we now agree that this was actually not what we should do in future as it takes hgim out the situation instead of helping him solve it and get through it and learn that its ok to share and for others to look!

ash actually suggested we do another full day on wednesdays to get him with the mainstream kids more, so we will see what we decide on!

have a great evening thanks for popping past

god bless love ( so irriatated i cant do capitals when doing blog on my blackberry!)

us 4

be still and know that i am god

A sterling report

Cant believe how quickly these school holidays have gone and that Deqlan and Logan both go back to school tomorow for term 2!!!! Tommorow is another big day for Deqlan cause it will be the first full day that Deqlan will spend at Little Leaps! Every Monday, Deqlan will be full day so that he can spend the entire afternoon playing and socialising and learning from the kids at Little Christian Village, the neuro typical nursery school next door ! He will also get to have an entire lesson on Thursdays with a neuro typical class - Music! With no Ayline or Florie - they will drop him for the lesson and fetch him afterwards! Its a HUGE step to trying to "main stream" Deqlan, but we need to get him around neuro typical kids so he can learn with them and learn how to cope in the situations that arise!! If it doesnt work we will definitely not push or force the issue, and maybe try again next term, but like everything, we got to start somewhere! Please pray with us that Deqlan will be very happy and learn lots and be happy , most important of all! Will keep you posted Deqlan got a beautiful report for term 1, we were delighted with this progress ! Some lovely remarks wanted to share with you GROSS MOTOR DEVELOPMENT * great improvement in hopping/ hopscotch/ running/ jumping * can balance on beams and chairs very well and very fast * scared to do firemans pole on his own BODY AWARENESS * can point and identify all parts of the body FINE MOTOR DEVELOPMENT * he can now manipulate a pencil/crayon appropriately * still punch grips brush * doesnt enjoy scissor skills * good improvement in colouring in and free drawing , he doesnt enjoy this activity but will colour the whole page and draw within the lines * deqlan enjoys art/messy activities provided that he doesn not have to touch wet and unknown textures VISUAL PERCEPTION *knows all colours and shapes and can verbalise them * can do 48 piece puzzles * memory game - amazing! Deqlan has an extraordinary long and short memory capacity . It is far above the average * understands spactial orientation when used repeatedly and in context * Deqlan recently started drawing the "headfoot man" AUDITORY PERCEPTION * Deqlan struggles to sing simultaneously with other people, however he knows all the songs and will happily sing them on his own. He doesnt like to do the actions but will dot so if prompted COMPUTERS * Deqlan is now a compuater whiz kid! We are using his "gift" with computers as a constructive and educational tool. * can type name and any known word! COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT * Counts to 20 at school but can count to 100 at home SHAPES & COLOURS * matching/sorting and patterns = very good LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION * great! Deqlan is now forming full sentences! he is also speaking more appropriately and has a greater understanding of what is being said to hinm CONCENTRATION AND ATTENTION SPAN * Good concentration during class time and good ability to listen effectively EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT * great improvement , Deqlan has become and independant litle boy! BEHAVIOUR * Deqlan is not socially integrated therefore we will be concentrating on socializing him the rest of this year SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT * very comfortable with adults, enjoys jokes , tickles and reading stories * he is much more aware of his peers and is no longer bothered by them. He has gone towards children on is own on a few occasions. we will concentrate on socializing Deqlan with mainstream children in the second term. * he isnt bothered whether he is first or last. he will now come towards me if another child takes his toys and less often cries in such a situation LIFE SKILLS * great improvement in toilet training. Deqlan is now able to go to the toilet and ask for it. He no longer has accidents at school unless he is having candida issues * skills such us dressing and taking off clothing, buttons , zips and laces are done hand-guided-and . He needs daily practise * saying please, thank you , hello, good bye = very good GENERAL COMMENTS Deqlan has done so well this term! He thoroughly enjoys his school day and always tries his best during class activities. His vocab has grown in leaps and bounds and he forms sentences appropriately. He also executes instructions very well. He is less prone to excessive crying ( except when dealing with candida) when he does not get what he wants and will now communicate with the adults when he is upset. The main concern at the moment remains the fact that he is not socially on par with his neurotypical counterpart ( which is not expected). We will be cocentrating on socializing him with mainstream children. So far he is responding well to it Deqlan is an adorable little boy who has come a long way. He is " one of a kind" and sure entertains the staff at Little Leaps! Well done Deqlan, I am so proud of you! So as you can imagine, we are absolutely thrilled with Deqlans continued progress. We are delighted that he continues to be so happy at school and very blessed that God has blessed Deqlan with the most amazing, caring, kind, loving, patient, nuturing teacher in Ayline! She to is one of a kind, and we are so grateful to have her guiding and teaching our precious Deqlan, thank you Ayline, we are so very blessed for all you do for Deqlan and for us, thank you! Here's to another wonderful, memorable , enjoyable term 2 ! We so proud of you Deqlan, we love you to infinity and beyond and back again, thank You Lord for answering our prayers , for looking after our precious Deqlan.

rio!

our amazing mom and nanna took us all to the movies today!

we had chatted about it for quite some time but i wasnt sure how deqlan would enjoy being made to sit for such a long time in a dark room that was very noisy!

but of course we willing to give anything a try!

such a grown up boy walking amongst the other kids into the theatre . such a grown up boy sitting in his own seat holding a box of popcorn. my eyes filled with tears of joy and thanks to witness another milestone for deqlan!

his eyes were as big as saucers watching the forthcoming attractions and then filled with delight when the movie started! rio! he has enjoyed watching the little clips on tv about it and the pictures and ads in the magazines so was happy to recognise the movie!

deqlan asked for my car and i took him for a little walk to the cd shop to still try and get him back into the movies which he did ten or so minutes later.

deqlan thoroughly enjoyed running up and down the front row and up and down the stairs with keaton while the music was playing:) it was a joy to watch!

thank you nanna, meggie and keaton for taking deqlan, logs and i to the movies! it was fantastic and i cant wait to go again ;)

deqlan hasnt stopped talking and singing€" rio rio rio" he really loved it! we were delighted to see that mcds current happy meal toy is the characters from rio! deqlan is delighted that he now has a blu and nigel to start his new favourite collection!

thank you lord for another beautiful day

rejoice in the lord always and again i say rejoice

Congrats Robert and Eliz Mari

Kaiden looked so damn cute in his little outfit

"date night"

ag his soooo cute!

Autism South Africa Walk!

all the fresh air and running and walking and climbing around made our little guy tired! Deqlan LOVED this awesome jungle gym at zoo lake, really cool! cooling Dada down

the course was very muddy cause it had rained the night before!

Deqlan gave Dada a real good work out

they had sign boards around the course with different red flags for autism

this family made a beautiful poster in honour of their son!

awesome turn out, there were hundreds of people!

Deqlan loved all the space to run!

The Awesome Nanna, still continuing to walk every step of the way with us~ we love you and appreciate you so much Mom! We are so blessed to have you as our earth angel!

Els for Autism stand

Isnt he gorgeous?

And over the start line we go! They had chariots of fire playing!

The awesome puppets were welcoming everyone and lead the walk