I like to immerse myself in what I am interested in…right now pediatric OT is my entire life…and our private clinic has lots of great stuff but I'm always wanting more…but don't need or want to spend money so I'm trying to think of ways to be creative. Like I had an empty kleenex box and I was like oooh perfect to hide things in and have kids reach in for tactile discrimination (like putting a circle and square in there and having kid pick out circle without looking). Plus when I finish up my translucent apple sauce canisters I'm like hmmm…good thing to put little doodlebobbiiezoozads in there…or yogurt canisters…maybe making a slit in the lid and pushing foam balls through it….etc. Those of you who have empty plastic jars, empty applesauce bowls, empty shoeboxes, tins, even scratch paper, extra scissors, pens…….I'd be grateful to you if you would keep them and let me have them. Basically anything small and bizarre would be potentially useful as well…so keep your mind open please.

Also, we have a lot of Medicaid parents or parents living in projects who could use baby toys…or exer-saucers, or sterilized bottles, etc…many of these parents have NO TOYS at all for their kids. So blocks, etc…are awesome. Also the small $1 items in the bins at the front of Target are often great – like right now they have these tiny little pouches of plastic animals and I should really go buy some more because they can be used for so many things – basically those of you who read this that are occasionally in the Memphis area, please consider saving or collecting baby toys that can be donated….or even normal toys…

I've had a lot of dreams about OT things…like I dreamt about putting the belly-dancing finger cymbals (“zils”) on a child the other day…and I dreamt about buying this family a bunch of clothes at a Goodwill although this one aardvark t-shirt was so awesome I wanted it for myself…just a lot of dreams where I am wanting to get stuff for people….it's so hard to see people who have nothing…and to want to just empty my bank account and buy them the world…but it's a slippery slope. Ugh. Anyway, keep your eyes peeled for creative ways and things to do…it all helps, every little bit.