My Multitasker

Two years ago, for Christmas, Tessie received a play kitchen and a lot of play food to go with it.  She has enjoyed playing with it, and it has always lived in her room.  Several months ago, Christian discovered the kitchen, and has become more and more enthralled ever since.

At first, it was a problem when Christian wanted to play in the kitchen because we had to stand behind him and hold him up.  He got frustrated and mad when he couldn't reach all the shelves, or when he dropped food.  But still, he continued to ask to play in the kitchen.  Finally, we had a stroke of genius.  We attached a small booster seat we had, to one of Tessie's little chairs.  All of a sudden it was a whole new ball game.  Christian could sit at the kitchen and "cook" to his heart's content.

Lately, he has been asking to cook more and more, and will sit at his kitchen for ages, happily making lunch for everyone.  It has started to aide in his therapy as well.  We place a basket full of kitchen items to one side, so he has to bend over to pick something from the basket, then sit back up tall.  Then he will reach to open a cabinet or the toy microwave.  His reach and core strength is improving every day.

Today Christian told me he wanted to cook, like usual.  I got him in his chair, and set up his area.  He was happily playing for quite sometime, when I heard him start to struggle.  I walked into the bedroom just in time to see him reaching with all his might, trying to get something at the bottom of his kitchen basket.  I was just about to offer to help, when he started to right himself.  When he was finally sitting straight and tall, he had a huge smile, a spoon in one hand, a pear in the other, and an onion ring in his mouth.  He was so proud of himself for solving the problem of how to pull out multiple items, that he didn't stop smiling for hours.  Not only is the kitchen helping Christian get stronger every day, it has turned him into a beautiful little multitasker.