Stories for My Brilliant Grandsons This page is the safe harbor for the stories I create—stories inspired by and written for my two extraordinary grandsons, ages four and three. Both boys are non-verbal, and my eldest has been diagnosed with autism, but if you’ve ever doubted the power of a child's mind, let me assure you: brilliance shines in many forms. People often say that every grandmother believes her grandchildren are gifted. Perhaps that's true, but allow me a moment to share a window into the world of these two remarkable boys. Before even turning three, both of them could count to twenty, knew the alphabet, identify colors, and point out shapes with the confidence of little professors. My oldest grandson began to read at three—yes, read—and now his younger brother is following in his footsteps, eyes bright with recognition of letters and words. You might be wondering, “But how do you know they’re reading, if you don’t hear them speak?” The answer is simple and beautiful: observation. Let me tell you about my older grandson’s quiet love affair with books. He cannot tell me he wants a story, but he leads me by the hand to his bookshelf, scanning the spines with careful fingers. Sometimes he selects an old favorite, sometimes he chooses something new. He turns each page with deliberate gentleness, eyes darting across the text and illustrations. He lingers over familiar words—his finger tracing the letters, sometimes pausing, as if savoring the secret music only he can hear. One day, I watched as he pointed at the word “bear” in a storybook and then, unprompted, pointed at a picture of a bear on the next page. He matched the word “teacher” to the matching picture, and in the day his mother gave him a color wheel and asked him to point to “purple”, he pointed to the word rather than the color. Recently, I was babysitting so my son and daughter-in-law could go out. We had found a YouTube video on the creation story, and when it was over, I went on to another Bible story. He got up, grabbed his tablet, and found the video we had been watching and watched it from his tablet. He did this without any help; I don’t know how he did it. His speech teacher says that it is not uncommon for non-verbal children to teach themselves how to read. I once had a nonverbal 4-year-old who taught himself how to read. He had been in the preschool program at another school, so I was warned when he came to my EL class that he could not talk and that he did not even respond to his name. The student who came to my class was not silent. At some point, between registering for school and starting my class, this young boy started talking using complete sentences He kept bringing me ABC books and telling me the what the word under each picture said. In my naivete, I thought that someone had the same set of ABC books that I had and had worked very hard with him. One day, I brought in some new floor puzzles to class. and when he walked in, he immediately read “Animal Safari’ and “Number Train”. Needless to say, I let his classmates play while I wrote sentences for him to read to me. For Mother’s Day, my class colored pictures for their mothers while he read. Pushing the crayons and the paper towards him I asked if he would make a card for his mother. He grabbed a crayon and wrote “I Love You Mom.” I have many takeaways from working with this student. The main on is to remember that just because a child not currently talking, it doesn’t mean he will never talk. My grandsons go to Speech and are making great strides in learning how to communicate. From music class, to gymnastics, to grocery store runs, church and playdates their mother prvides many opportunities for my grandsons to interact with others. Both she and my son spend their evenings playing with and reading to the boys. They are learning not only how to play basketball and how to go down slides, but they both have a strong love for reading. This page is where I will park the stories I write for my grandsons, tailor-made for their way of experiencing the world—stories brimming with color, pattern, and meaning. Stories with pictures and words, crafted to celebrate their gifts and to be read not just with ears, but with eyes, fingers, and hearts. The questions I put in the stories are designed to elicit a verbal or physical response and the words I chose are words they need in their lexicon, Each story is a love letter—an invitation to a world where communication is boundless, and joy is measured not by words spoken, but by stories shared. I hope, if you read what I put here, you’ll see the world as my grandsons do: full of wonder, limitless possibility, and the quiet magic that comes from finding meaning in unexpected ways.