DIY Autism Therapy: Autism Chewy

 As anyone who has read this blog for any length of time can tell you, or heck anyone who is around my son for more than five seconds can tell you...my son has oral motor issues.  He sticks everything in his mouth, chews cardboard like it's bubble gum (and he'll find paper if he can't find cardboard...our poor books can attest to that), eats dirt (which still makes me shudder when I can't catch him in time), etc.  So, it seems like we're constantly coming up with new chewy ideas for him. 

Here's one we came up with that was inspired by his old OT at school.  Laurie was a great OT (she moved out of state at the end of last school year) and she came up with all kinds of different home made chewy ideas to try.  This one works pretty well, but it's definitely one that I'd try and keep at home as it's ends up being pretty large, although with the varying textures on it, it does keep my son busy for quite a while, so I thought I'd pass it along.

Enjoy!

DIY Autism Chewy

You Will Need:

• 1 length of refrigerator water tubing sized so it'll easily slip over your kiddos head (get this at Home Depot, Lowes, or you can find it at A.I.H. locally in Alaska as well.  It's inexpensive and has to be food rated for you to be able to drink water that's gone through it)
• 1 Nylon dish scrubby (I've found these in packs of two at our local Kroger affiliate super cheap).  Be sure to find the ones that are made in a circle with a hole in the middle.  You'll need it).
• 1 Plastic Shower Curtain Ring (your shower curtain won't miss it anyway.  Kidding you can get packs of these cheap if you don't want to raid your shower curtain for one).

To assemble:

Take the shower curtain ring and thread it through the middle of the nylon scrubby.  If you picked up the ones that have the hole in the middle like I told you to this will take two minutes tops while if you picked up another type...you're on your own *laugh*.  Lock the shower curtain ring once you have it all threaded through the scrubby.

Take the refrigerator tubing and thread through your new "pendant" and then tie a knot in the tubing so it'll easily fit over your kiddos head.  You can also, if you're feeling crafty, go down to your local crafting store and get a length of cord and some lanyard ends and thread the cord through the refrigerator tubing, attach your lanyard ends and you have a more traditional looking necklace (and if you remove the scrubby when you leave the house you now have your own home made Chewlery...beat that ;).

Enjoy!