Ewan At Irish Fest

This past weekend we packed the kids in the car and drove to Indianapolis for Irish Fest. We weren’t quite sure what to expect, we hadn’t been to the one in Indy before and certainly Ewan hadn’t gone to any festival style event since the last 4^th of July debacle. Ewan sometimes has a hard time with big crowds, loud noises, and the chaos that goes into a festival (I’m sure you’re thinking, duh). The last one we went to was in our hometown and just a little Fourth of July celebration that had live bands, inflatable bouncers for kids to play on, and games for kids to play. Lots of people everywhere, music playing, and kids running everywhere—I’m sure you get the picture. We thought Ewan would have a good time because he likes to run and play so much but it didn’t turn out quite so well. It all started with the inflatable bouncer and the fact that you had to be able to understand directions from the people operating it as to when to go and when to stop as the children ran through the inflatable course. We thought Ewan’s older sister would be able to go through with him but he had to go it alone and I think misunderstood some of the directions and ended up stuck in the middle and very, very upset.

So we had some reservations about taking him to Irish Fest but in the end we wanted him to experience just a tiny portion of his cultural heritage and we all went. I didn’t have any pictures of the event, any stories lined up, or any sound effects to prepare him for the event, so we just kind of winged it and told him we were going to a party. We didn’t take his device to the event because it was so sunny out I knew he’d have a hard time seeing the screen and it would also be hard to hear the voice while we were there. So we thought we would go with some sign language and lots of prompts and cues and see what happened.

Ewan asked lots of questions as we walked up to the event, ‘where are we going’, ‘what’s that sound’, ‘who’s that’ and he asked them repetitively. I answered his questions every time, turned around and asked him some of the same questions, and just tried to explain that we were going to a party. As soon as we walked in the gate, he somehow surveyed the entire lay of the land and found the inflatable bouncer across the way. I swear this kid has the eyes of an eagle! So he was a little agitated that we actually had to take the time to use the ATM, pay for our tickets, and look around before just heading straight to the inflatable bouncers! There was a tent right as we walked in that had all kinds of shirts, blankets, and trinkets and, of course, we wanted to walk through it all. But Ewan was a little wary of the tent, I think sometimes he sees something as innocent as a tent as something much scarier. I finally coaxed him in to look around and he managed to find the one toy car in the entire place right away! Again, those great eagle eyes coming into play.

We were all kind of hungry and when Ewan’s cousin stopped to get something to eat, he never skipped a beat and kept on truckin to the inflatable bouncers. So we all kind of split up then, I took Ewan, his sister, and his other cousin to the play area and they bounced like a bunch of rubber balls around the place while the others went to eat. He followed his sister and cousin Brody around the game area and played what they played for the most part. I think it helped Ewan to get some of that bouncing out of his system. But he was still a little upset as we tried to do some other games and then decided it was time to eat.

This was where our biggest problem came into play—communication. Sometimes there is just no ‘good’ way to communicate no matter how prepared one is. As I said before we left the device and we didn’t really have any pictures of the event to use as to where we wanted to go next so we relied on cues, prompts, and signs. It just felt like it wasn’t enough. Of course, I had my arms full of toys they had won at the games, carrying big things of candy the kids had, and trying to sign to Ewan while holding all this was a little difficult to say the least. We got him something to drink, although again it was very difficult for my husband to figure out what he wanted, not because he couldn’t say Sprite or Juice, but because I think Ewan couldn’t decide himself. I think he was a little too overwhelmed at this point to really eat or drink too much. We tried walking around again and to go in a few more tents, but Ewan just wasn’t ready to going inside what he considered a death trap! So we walked around the perimeter of the tents a lot.

Finally, we found something Ewan could connect with—music. My husband and I took the kids over to where the bands were playing and sat in the back. Ewan immediately started humming along and tapping his feet in time with the beat. He’s actually pretty good at getting both the rhythm and the melody right away. Both the boys’ kind of ‘vegged’ out in their seats as the music played. Ewan clapped and yelled out with everyone else as we cheered between each song. After that, he was able to drink a little more and eat some ice cream and he seemed much calmer. When it was time to leave, the only meltdown he had was when it was time to figure out what car Ewan was going in. He came into the parking lot in my sister’s truck and he had to leave in our car. This did not go over well. He lost it a little bit but by the time we got back to my mother’s house, he was OK and back on track.

We kind of wondered just how much fun Ewan really had at Irish Fest? Sometimes things seem so hectic and chaotic at an event like that, constantly worrying about communication, behaviors, and everything else, that we wonder what Ewan really thinks of all this stuff and would he rather have stayed at home. It wasn’t until we got home that night and we were putting Ewan to bed that he said to me, “The party was fun today. There were bouncers and balloons and music. I like the music and the dancing.” Well, there you go; he did have a good time. Next year, we’ll be thinking of better ways to communicate, to prepare, and to transition between eating, playing, walking around, and listening to music. Of course, we’ll also be able to use all the photos we took this time to make a photo book about where we’re going and what’s going to happen for him. Overall, it was a great time and I’m glad the kids got to experience something a little out of the ordinary.

September.19.2006. - Mommy Blog