Earlier in the week we decided to take the while family to the movie theater to see "The Croods". Normally we would not have even entertained the thought but there was a screening for people with special needs and their family & friends so we thought we'd give it a try. It's Saturday and off we go to the movies, minus Steven but plus Abbey & Andrew. The ticket price included popcorn but we didn't think we needed 7 so we settled for 5 and took our seats, filling up the 2nd to top row.
Mitchell immediately started squirming and Steve brought him to the potty, returning as the movies started promptly at 10am. No previews is part of the "sensory considerate" screening - AWESOME!
Up, Down, spinning around. the time was not passing fast enough. The popcorn was not a good enough distraction and I guess the move just did not grab his attention. The boy in front of us was watching The Wiggles on his iPad and didn't seem to care Mitchell was kicking his seat as he was in turn kicking the seat in front of him. It was quite a sight to see (and hear) what was going on the movie theater this morning.
About 20 minutes into the movie Mitchell launched his juice cup about 5 rows up and wacked a lady in the back of the head. Steve went to see if she was OK and retrieve the cup and the lady said she was fine but it scared the S-H-I-T out of her. She was there with her own special needs person and was not judging us at all. It's so nice to be on equal footing at times and be OK with it all. Steve had Mitchell on his lap, then on the floor playing my phone> we caught a glimpse of something being tossed over the seat and we're like "What the heck?". His shoe, of course, lands on the floor in front of the kid with the iPad - he doesn't notice at all. I'm pretty much done by now so I decide to cut my losses and let Steve enjoy the rest of the move with the other kids.
As I grab Mitchell, my purse, his juice cup, his coat and 1 bag of popcorn and step into the aisle the bottom of the popcorn bag busts open and kernels spill all over the ground. I laugh (deliriously) and fold over the bag, heading for the exit. While we were stopped by the outside doors putting on Mitchell's coat a worker graciously offers me a refund and tells me to wait as he retrieves $13 from the register. I said it wasn't necessary but took it none the less.
I drove to McDonalds for fries but they weren't serving them until 11. We got drinks and went to a park to play until the movie was over. It ended up being just a fine morning for Mitchell, he was happy in the end. He was not put off by the frustration at the theater at all and we will out it down as one more thing we had to try to see that it wasn't going to work for us right now.
