News Round Up

• Wall Street Journal, New York, NY: Erasing a Hurtful Label From the Books
• Chicago Tribune, Chicago, IL: You never age out of Our Place
• Chapel Hill News, Chapel Hill, NC: Where abilities come in many guises

Talent, patience & origami

Talent can be a beautiful thing -- especially when that talent comes in the form of art.

Meet Mike.  By day, he is a member of the agency's MacoBag crew.  By night, he uses his creative talents to work and makes beautiful paper origami pieces called Japanese kusudama, also known as origami medicine balls.

Mike has a variety of colorful papers he uses to make these beautiful flower balls.  A small one -- like the one I purchased on the left at the agency's annual craft fair -- takes about three and half hours to put together.  I can't even imagine the time behind a medium or large one.  Not only is Mike talented, he also has more patience that anyone I know.

His table was one of the most crowded at the craft fair.  Looking at the picture above, you'll notice the small flower balls attached to his table.  By the time I left, only three or four of those were left.  Many were snagging them up to give away as holiday gifts. 

Congrats to Mike for his success at today's craft fair!

News Round Up

• Daily Messenger, Canandaigua, NY:  Report: NY cancels 2011 Empire State Games
  Please note: Reader interested in contacting N.Y. government regarding issues in this story can visit Governor Paterson's Web site through the "Resources" section on the right hand side of the screen.
• Fox 11 WLUK-TV, Green Bay, WI: Girls with physical and developmental disabilities take part in unique competitive cheer squad 
•  NBC 11 KARE-TV, Minneapolis-St.Paul, MN: Pilot curriculum teaches kids about disabilities

Finger Lakes Daily News

Finger Lakes Daily News

FLCC College Experience

FLCC College Student, Laura Day was a guest speaker in our room to talk about her life experiences dealing with Spinal Bifida and using a wheelchair. Laura graduated from high school and was undecided on what to do with the rest of her life so she decided to try college. Laura will graduate this December from FLCC with a degree in Communications. Laura also spoke about her accomplishments of getting her driving license and her first car.
The most amazing thing we learned about Laura is she participates in wheel chair sports. Laura is on a track and field team out of Rochester called the Rochester Rookies. She competes in National and Regional events throughout the summer and is a Nationals record holder in Discus and the Javelin. The best advice she said she could give us was to, “Never be afraid to ask for help”.

Festival of Trees

The Community Experience recently donated a country themed christmas tree to the Granger Homestead's Festival of Trees. The Granger Homestead has held the Festival of Trees for the past 14 years and people through out the community attend and vote on their favorite tree. Viewing will be from November 12th through December 5th. The individuals in the Community Experience decorated a 2 foot pre-lit tree with home-made ornaments. The individuals made cinnamon decorations using only applesauce and cinnamon, mixing to a dough consistency and used cookie cutters in the shapes of stars, bells and hearts. The ornaments were air dried and made the room smell wonderful. They also strung cranberries on string and made stockings out of cloth. The tree was topped with a wooden star. Stop in and vote for your favorite tree at The Granger Homestead.

NY Times: "IPad a Therapeutic Marvel for Disabled People"

The IPad has been mentioned in tons of stories recently for its ability to engage people with autism and help individuals with disabilities. I've noted a few in the blog's weekly "News Round Up," which features stories about people with developmental disabilities and other issues. Below is a video from the NY Times that chronicles the story of Owen -- a seven year old boy living in New York with spinal muscular atrophy, type 1 -- and how the IPad has changed his life.

Brrrrr it's cold outside!

The HWS College Experience group along with some HWS students wanted to come up with a project that they could work on together. Everyone agreed on making winter fleece hats for the Sit-A-Spell and Geneva Senior CLCs.

The group bought different patterns of fleece, some appropriate for the ladies others for the gentlemen. Everyone worked very carefully on cutting the patterns and then staff helped with sewing them together.

In all there were 32 hats made. As you can see by the pictures, everyone was glad to have their new hats!

The challenges for families and individuals

Every once in a while, I flip on NPR for my drive home to catch All Things Considered.  And while to some people, this might make me a dork -- I actually really enjoy listening to the news and hearing about stories that you don't typically hear or see on your usual newscasts.  When I changed to the station yesterday, this is what I heard:

You've probably never seen a person hooked up to so many plastic tubes as Olivia Welter. There's a ventilator tube that keeps her breathing. There's a feeding tube that's also the tube for her dozen or so medicines. There are the tubes to the vibrating vest that loosens the mucus in her lungs. Another tube to help her cough. The tube that her nurse uses a couple times an hour to suction the mucus out of her mouth.

It was just the beginning of Olivia's -- a 20-year-old woman living in Illinois -- story, the stories of other individuals with disabilities and their daily challenges.  It also chronicles the fight of Olivia's family to keep her at home and continue to receive the level of care she needs.

click to read / hear story

News Round Up

• TriValleyCentral.com, serving Pinal County, AZ: Bringing them up to speed
• Arizona Daily Star, serving Tucson, AZ: Special-ed grads to get new path at UA
• The Daily News, serving Genesee, Wyoming, and Orlean counties in NY: Batavia woman earns state excellence award

News Round Up

• NYSARC, Inc.: NYSARC, Inc. elects Schuppenhauer president
• Morning Sentinel, Waterville, ME: Woman inspired to begin support group
• News 8 WTHN, CT: App helps those with special needs communicate