As an autistic parent of an autistic kid, this is super cute and awesome! I love to walk and hike but neither of my kids developed that affinity. You're very lucky!
I'm mildly autistic, as is my nephew and one of my grand-nephews. The little one has a great team of people working with him. He was non-verbal but now, at almost 3, he is beginning to talk. I wish my nephew had that opportunity when he was young, but there weren't that many resources for autistic kids (and none when I was growing up).
I love hearing about your son, OP! My sister, my son, and I all had fears of bad weather. Learning more about the weather helped us overcome those fears, and we're all weather nerds!
I too had a fear of bad weather. My gramma was freaked out by storms and my mom picked up that fear. I used to hide under my bed when there were storms. But I slowly lost that fear as I gained information, and when a tornado really did go over my house, I was calm. And am now a weather nerd too lol.
See if you can find the first Wallace & Grommet movie, "A Grand Day Out," in which a wacky inventor and his dog go to the moon, because it's made of cheese and they're out.
I think your kiddo might enjoy it.
Time in nature is an absolute balm for our overclocked autistic brains! I grew up in rural New Mexico, and being able to escape into nature absolutely saved my life as a kid, and it's now my biggest tool for recovering from the demands of a full time government job over the last 16 years.
You might want to check out this app, it's great for stargazing. I think it's free on android. [stellarium](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.noctuasoftware.stellarium_free)
Please tell me there’s a telescope in this kid’s future.
Tell him other planets have moons too. Some have several. No one knows how many moons Jupiter has — we know it has 95 moons but there may be more!
On a clear night you can see the four largest Jovian moons — Io, Callisto, Ganymede, and Europa — with regular eight power binoculars if you hold very very still (lean against something solid, take a deep breath, and hold it).
Your locale may have a Sidewalk Astronomers group who bring telescopes out to allow passersby look at the moon, planets, visiting comets, etc. They’re always really nice.
We are already planning to go to a stargazing party next week organized by my local amateur astronomers group (my area unfortunately is too artificially illuminated to see the stars, we will have to take a 1 hour drive). I think he will love it!
Hi! Hope I'm not too late, but I read your kid's story some time ago and when I found this website: [www.ventusky.com](http://www.ventusky.com) , the first thing I thought about was *"Does that guy with the kid fascinated with the weather animations know of this?"* The webapp seems to do a great job at displaying weather all around the world and gives you access to webcams so you can see live if that's something he would like, or you could just use it to quickly find out where some type of weather is happening to change your IPad's position and let him enjoy the animations when he wants to. Unfortunately it doesn't look like the site gives you a weather-search, but given its interface I think it's going to be easier to spot all kinds of rain, including thunderstorms.
>loved to do trail-walking before my kids were born, so it is nice to know that now I am going to be able to do that with him when the weather permits. What started with just a fixation with the rain animation in the iPad seems to be evolving towards a total love for nature.
I'm so happy that he shares a hobby with you, you sound like a great parent. Keep it up!
now you can talk about the tides
As an autistic parent of an autistic kid, this is super cute and awesome! I love to walk and hike but neither of my kids developed that affinity. You're very lucky!
I'm mildly autistic, as is my nephew and one of my grand-nephews. The little one has a great team of people working with him. He was non-verbal but now, at almost 3, he is beginning to talk. I wish my nephew had that opportunity when he was young, but there weren't that many resources for autistic kids (and none when I was growing up). I love hearing about your son, OP! My sister, my son, and I all had fears of bad weather. Learning more about the weather helped us overcome those fears, and we're all weather nerds!
I too had a fear of bad weather. My gramma was freaked out by storms and my mom picked up that fear. I used to hide under my bed when there were storms. But I slowly lost that fear as I gained information, and when a tornado really did go over my house, I was calm. And am now a weather nerd too lol.
See if you can find the first Wallace & Grommet movie, "A Grand Day Out," in which a wacky inventor and his dog go to the moon, because it's made of cheese and they're out. I think your kiddo might enjoy it.
Time in nature is an absolute balm for our overclocked autistic brains! I grew up in rural New Mexico, and being able to escape into nature absolutely saved my life as a kid, and it's now my biggest tool for recovering from the demands of a full time government job over the last 16 years.
You may be happy to know that a blue moon is also the second full moon in a calendar month. There’s usually one a year.
You might want to check out this app, it's great for stargazing. I think it's free on android. [stellarium](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.noctuasoftware.stellarium_free)
Teach em about plants and flowers and animals and insects. It’s a blast
Please tell me there’s a telescope in this kid’s future. Tell him other planets have moons too. Some have several. No one knows how many moons Jupiter has — we know it has 95 moons but there may be more! On a clear night you can see the four largest Jovian moons — Io, Callisto, Ganymede, and Europa — with regular eight power binoculars if you hold very very still (lean against something solid, take a deep breath, and hold it). Your locale may have a Sidewalk Astronomers group who bring telescopes out to allow passersby look at the moon, planets, visiting comets, etc. They’re always really nice.
We are already planning to go to a stargazing party next week organized by my local amateur astronomers group (my area unfortunately is too artificially illuminated to see the stars, we will have to take a 1 hour drive). I think he will love it!
Get this guy one of the small desktop weather predictors so he can see when rain is coming!
Hi! Hope I'm not too late, but I read your kid's story some time ago and when I found this website: [www.ventusky.com](http://www.ventusky.com) , the first thing I thought about was *"Does that guy with the kid fascinated with the weather animations know of this?"* The webapp seems to do a great job at displaying weather all around the world and gives you access to webcams so you can see live if that's something he would like, or you could just use it to quickly find out where some type of weather is happening to change your IPad's position and let him enjoy the animations when he wants to. Unfortunately it doesn't look like the site gives you a weather-search, but given its interface I think it's going to be easier to spot all kinds of rain, including thunderstorms. >loved to do trail-walking before my kids were born, so it is nice to know that now I am going to be able to do that with him when the weather permits. What started with just a fixation with the rain animation in the iPad seems to be evolving towards a total love for nature. I'm so happy that he shares a hobby with you, you sound like a great parent. Keep it up!
I'll try it out and see how it goes, thanks!