Making a weighted blanket

My daughter is raising two autistic children. She has a weighted blanket
for her daughter. I've forwarded your message to her to see what it's made
of. I'll post it as soon as she answers. I'm so glad Ash is doing so well,
it says a lot for you as a parent! God bless.
Michelle G.

Have you considered doing the blanket with a duvet cover over the
vinyl? That way you could make it out of anything and just make a
"pillowcase" cover that could be washed as needed. It could be cushy
if necessary out of flannel or anything else you like.

Mom used to use doubleknit fabric and made quilts that wore like cast
iron and weighed about that much! That was hard on a washing machine
though. Denim is about the same way. We also had an old crazy quilt
that included lots of corduroy and it weighed a ton. Good luck with
this worthy project! Moni

On Wed, 22 Sep 2010 10:58:00 +0100, Jack Campin - bogus address wrote:

Now here is the tricky bit and the part I need help with. What do I
fill it with?

Water? Would a partly water-filled airbed do it?

Now see there you go speaking greek again!

The only thing I can equate what you are suggesting to is an air mattress
partly filled with water. That suggestion inspires FEAR in the heart of
any parent of a kid with oral stim issues! Plus I figure it would take
him perhaps as long as two seconds to find the valve and start messing
with it to see what it does.
Lessee, since a pint's a pound the world around, that would be ten pints
of water which equals 1 gallon leave off the quart to make up for the
vinyl. One gallon of water equals either a whole lot of clean up or a
new mattress, and then there would be my funeral expenses to consider....

I think it would be far to expensive to seriously contemplate.

NightMist

--
I'm raising a developmentally disabled child. What's your superpower?

since a pint's a pound the world around,

That's an American pint, then. In UK the rhyme goes, "A pint of pure
water weighs a pound and a quarter". (So an eight pint gallon weighs
10 pounds)

On the idea of weighted blanket, I am presuming the whole blanket
needs to be weighted, rather than just weighed down at the edges.

Had a look about and came up with this: http://www.ot-innovations.com/content/view/33/63/
Look down the bottom for patterns and pdf files.

The idea of a weighted bear that could be used as an incentive/reward
seemed a good one. But I don't know Ash, it may not be suitable.

But he's doing a good job, and so are you. Be proud.

Nel
(GQ)

What about shot? It's made of steel now not lead. You can buy it at
the shops that sell reloading supplies to the folks who reload their
own shot gun shells. My neighbor is a competitive shooter, clay
pigeons not live ones.



On Wed, 22 Sep 2010 11:25:17 +0100, Kate XXXXXX
wrote:

On 21/09/2010 12:43, NightMist wrote:

I have contemplated weighted blankets for a while.
They are usually highly recommended for developmentally disabled children
and adults, or people of any age that engage in what appear to be
restless repetitive behaviors. Look up pressure therapy for more info.

We have been getting by with weighted balls, and manually squishing Ash
with a pillow. He loves it, and it really does calm him. Then on a trip
to the dentist recently he got a bit over the top. He is a self biter
and has pica, so it is easy to see how a trip to the dentist would
overstimulate him. In the course of this frustrating visit, and not
knowing what else to do, I asked the dentist's aide to fetch an adult
size x-ray apron. We laid it over him in the chair and I said
"Squish!". Ash repeated "Squish!", and giggled a bit. It calmed him
down instantly. kiri decided we need to get us one of those aprons, and
I chimed in with "without the lead!".

For us a boughten weighted blanket is prohibitively expensive. They can
easily run over a hundred dollars for a smaller than twin size.
I figured out how to make one easily enough. I have made a feather bed,
I have mass produced sachet size bags, most of what I learned doing those
things will stand me well with this project. Here is a website that does
it pretty much as I figured, notice they also discovered the joys of the
x-ray apron (G):

http://craftnectar.com/2009/09/03/ca...with-weighted-
blankets/

Now here is the tricky bit and the part I need help with. What do I fill
it with?

The blanket absolutely must be washable. That lets out things like corn
bran, buckwheat hulls, rice, or other organics. I fear that things like
fish gravel or sand would be too hard on the fabric. On other websites I
have found suggestions such as make one of plasticized canvas, fill it
with sand, and then make what amounts to a duvet cover for it. Yeah, Ash
cannot stand to leave the dust jacket on a book, I don't think a duvet
cover would last ten minutes with him.

Thus far the idea I have found most intriguing is to use multiple layers
of upholstery vinyl as you would quilt batting. My Pfaff, and maybe my
Imperial could handle the sewing of it. I would have to quilt it fairly
closely to eliminate the play of the fabric, there is no way Ash would be
able to leave slidey fabric alone. I do not know how I could calculate
the weight of the finished project with any accuracy though. Perfect
would be in the realm of ten pounds or so. Yep our lad is _eleven_ now!
and weighs near enough to a hundred pounds. One tenth body weight is the
recommended for such things. Another thing that concerns me about this
method is that while the vinyl would be washable, would it be practical
to do so? Is it going to be flexible and durable enough to go through
the washing machine? would I have to take it to a laundramat and put it
through one of the big machines? would the only truly sensible thing be
to take it to the cleaners? You really do not want anything that sees
common use with an 11 year old boy to be dry clean only! You really
really want kid stuff to be something you can chuck into the washer at
the drop of a hat.

Give me some ideas people!

BTW we just had Ash's fall IEP meeting. He is doing stunningly well.
His vocabulary has literally increased by 1000%, he interacts with his
classmates even to calling them by name. His demonstrated reading
vocabulary and associating what he reads with things and concepts has
really taken off, to the point that when it is something he cannot say
clearly he sometimes is able to write it down and show it to you. He is
willingly participating in classroom activities. He has not attempted a
jailbreak even once. He is way ahead of his class in pool, and enjoys
swimming (yes actually swimming!) laps. The pool instructor says he is
one of those kids that is part fish (G) They still have not been able to
hire a permanent speech therapist, so the local district has to send one
over. The district is not begrudging this as Ash is doing so very well,
and I assume Ash doing well is going to look good on their state
reports. The district rep even openly admitted that sending Ash to BOCES
was indeed the best decision. Considering had he stayed in district that
they were planning on building a time out room in the classroom he would
have gone to just for him, I could not agree more! BTW that just
horrified his current teacher. She cannot imagine Ash being a problem in
the classroom. He is very well liked by both his classmates and his
teachers.braggingOne of the recent class assignments for those who
were able, was to write a couple of paragraphs about someone that you
admire. One of the other boys chose Ash.bragging

NightMist


What about pockets of artificial lead pellets, as used for fishing
weights? Can you still get those? Look like lead, weigh like lead,
cheap as chips (or rhey were when my dad was alive and fishing!), and
made of some other substance. Worked well for fly and coarse fishing...
You could buy them by the pound from the fishing shops and the pellets
came in different sizes.

I am so pleased that Ash is making such lovely progress. He sounds like
a right charmer! Got any recent pix to share?

Sorry it took so long to get to this. I'm up to me oxters in wedding
stuff. Am I allowed to say I can really see why folk HATE making net
petticoats?

There was a thread a few years ago about making a weighted vest for an
autistic child. Maybe you could find some helpful information the
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.s...03a965d11b bb

Jane

"

On Fri, 24 Sep 2010 13:00:31 +0100, Jack Campin - bogus address wrote:


The only thing I can equate
what you are suggesting to is an air mattress partly filled with water.
That suggestion inspires FEAR in the heart of any parent of a kid with
oral stim issues! Plus I figure it would take him perhaps as long as
two seconds to find the valve and start messing with it to see what it
does.

Most of the autistic kids I've met would have gone a lot further than
that, attempting to eat the airbed as an appetizer for sinking their
teeth into the bedframe and their own hands. (My experience has mostly
been with really extreme cases).

I know not all are like that, and I didn't know where on the spectrum
Ash was. Some would be okay with it if you glued the valve shut.

He is not as bad as some, yet worse than others. He does have the oral
stim thing going on. The heel of his left hand is heavily callused, and
his cuticles and nails are bitten to nubbins. You will hear "Ash! Don't
eat your feet!" if you spend a day at our house.
I think I am going to try chewelry again now that he is spending the
school day in an environment where they might actually consistently
encourage him to use it. They have expressed concern about him biting
his hand and have fished for ways to at least protect the bite zone.

Yeah gluing things shut just doesn't fly with him. If he knows it is
supposed to open then he will fix it until it does. He is still trying
to work out how to get the lower cabinet doors open on the entertainment
center. We screwed them shut because he kept slamming them. He knows it
is the screws, but he hasn't managed to work them loose with his fingers
yet.

NightMist



--
I'm raising a developmentally disabled child. What's your superpower?