"It's Thomas!"

This is a phrase you will commonly hear in our house these days: sometimes on the tv, sometimes from Matt or myself, but most often from Shauny himself. Since my last entry-oh so long ago- his train addiction has become more intense- more specifically, his Thomas the Tank Engine addiction. It seems he has a radar for these things. Put him down in the store (following closely of course), and he WILL find their train section if they have it. A few weeks back we took him to Toys R Us and the crazy boy cut through the dolls, past the action figures, right to the trains...cutting right through the store, I will never know how he knew that's where they were, but he did! We took him to the used children's store and he walked in saying "Clairabel?" And once he finds the Thomas goods, he ever so politely hands them to mommy or daddy saying "thank you" and moving on to check it all out. Such a silly kid...and spoiled rotten too. This obsession can have its negative points- he gets very upset if he has to leave with nothing, etc...but it's been very positive for him as well. As all reading this probably know, Shaun's speech is very behind, but for a boy with little communication, he knows trains. He can name most of the Thomas trains, knows what a tender is and uses several train/Thomas phrases on a regular basis: "Oh Dear", "All aboard", etc. He has also gotten into Thomas books- he would never look at books before so that's huge. He will sometimes even sit and let me read a whole book to him! Amazing! He will look through his books and name the characters on each page, mimic their faces...he has even learned that a cow says 'moo' from one of his books. Except he thinks cows are called moo but he's close! So that's our life these days...choo choos and therapy!