Abilities

You all know I have two children with Down Syndrome, but some of you may not know that I also work with adults with disabilities. I work for a good size organization that provides support to people with developmental disabilities. I supervise a medically fragile home with three individuals. I occasionally do a crafts class for my organizations day program. I have to look for a craft that can be done by people with different abilities. We often hear about disabilities, but it is important to look for a persons abilities. Everyone has abilities, and that is what I try to focus on.

Christie over at the Pretty Paper Blog always has cute idea's for projects. She had a post about a bucket she had fixed up for a gift and I borrowed her creativity to do crafts with the individual's I work with. Christie was so great and answered my emails to what kinds of supplies I needed such as Modpodge! OMgosh, how could I have never used this before. I have since bought over 3 big bottles of it. Anywho, at work we had a family luncheon and they needed a craft project to use as table settings. I knew this was the perfect craft. I had two individuals whom couldn't use scissors because their hands would be unable to manipulate them, but they were able to tear scrap pages for what we needed. Everyone had fun using ink to stamp and antique the paper. But Modpodge was the favorite part for most. This bucket was made by a man whom was bedridden at the time and he was so happy to be able to put this together. I so wish that it wouldn't be a violation to show you a picture of how big of smile he had, making this. For most of our buckets we put a wire handle that looked like a twig, with a ribbon on it (none of these were photographed because I forgot to take pictures before they were given away). For the table setting's, plants were placed in the buckets, but I killed the one that had been in this:(



This bucket was made yesterday by an individual I work with, for another individual whom is in the hospital. She also picked out a cheap dollar frame and put a stamped message in it, to replace giving a card. I think it turned out great.



Yesterday I went to a BBQ that was put on by another organization that serves people with disabilities, one that my girls receive services from. There were people with a wide abundance of different abilities. I was having a conversation with a man named Will (I changed his name.) Will has CP and uses an electric wheelchair to get around town (I say town, cause I see him all over the place). Will has slurred speech due to his CP and can be hard to understand at times. A mistake many people make is that they treat individuals such as Will, as a child. Will is not a child and should not be treated as one. If you have trouble understanding someone with a disability, don't be afraid to say "I'm sorry, could you repeat that, I didn't quite understand." Because many people (including me at one time) make the mistake of pretending they understand a person and totally ignore what the person is trying to say. Will asked me a question and I had to have him repeat it several times before I understood. He asked me what led me to work in the field of disabilities. I told him I had two children with disabilities. He shook his head "yes", thinking he understood. But I told him that even if I didn't have my children, I think I still would of been led to this field of work. I think I always had a calling for it. Will asked me if I thought I would always work in this field. I said "Well no, if I win the lottery , I'm going to sit on my butt, watch TV and eat chocolate." We enjoyed a good laugh over that fantasy. Will has the ability to make good conversation, only most people don't give him the chance. Remember...... see people for their abilities, not their disabilities.

Abilities

http://wheresmyangels.blogspot.com/2008/09/abilities.html