Winter Trip 2006-07

Jacob's winter trip has been dynamic. He had a great Christmas, where lots of people doted on him as smart, charming, and beautiful. He got gifts from a range of friends, but--as per our request--they were modest and mostly "heirloom" objects, rather than store-bought items.

He got to spend lots of time on the beach and he also got a special trip to Busch Gardens (a big zoo with a park inside), where he has a relative who manages the park. He got to go behind the scenes with a handler, where he got to see and interact with pygmy marmosets, a porcupine named Rosie, some rare giant birds, and two white tigers. He loved Rosie, and he got to feed her a grape and pet her.

He loves the beach and got to dig and roll in the sand. He even made sand angels. He was lucky that the weather was very warm, and he could swim in the ocean.

The friends with whom he was staying had a lagoon, a great big lap pool, and a boat. He got to go out on the boat to an island, where he caught crabs with his bare hands, tried to catch fish, and ran in the surf. He found coconuts that were beginning to sprout trees and planted them in the friends' front yard. He was very proud of this. He learned to swim half the length of the pool with a life jacket on and--by the end of the visit--may well complete a full pool length. He did this almost every day.

He is getting ready to go home, so his routine can come back, but he said he has loved his vacation.

He asked, on this trip, if his mommy could come over when he went to his daddy's. His mommy explained that, just like he got along really well with some people at his school (he said, "those are the people my personality works best with"), grown-ups tried to choose those people who have personalities that work well with theirs. People can be really wonderful, and not have personalities that work well together. His mommy told him that both his parents loved him very much, and that he was lucky he'd have such a very big family to love him his whole life. He thought that sounded pretty good.

One time on the trip, he got angry and threw orange juice on a computer. He spent a half hour thinking quietly about that and said he was very sorry. He also, for the third time, put chewing gum on a seat belt in the car. We decided that a good consequence would be no gum until his birthday. It would be great for Jacob, if we could all support his decision on this consequence, so he can learn this one.

Soon, he's going home. He misses Muggy, and he misses a couple of his friends from school. He will be glad to see his daddy.