Crawling and Standing June 27, 2011

Layla is sort of working on a couple of developmental milestones, in her own reluctant way. 🙂  Last week she was on the floor and she seemed to be very deliberately trying to work out how to crawl.  She was on her hands and knees, and she would bring up one hand and bash it back down on the floor a little further out, then move her knee a little closer to her hands, etc.  I was surprised because she is such an efficient scooter I figured she would forgo crawling altogether.  And she very well might, because she hasn’t really explored crawling much since then.

 

We have been trying to work with her on standing.  Whenever we try to set her down so she is standing she just keeps her legs out in front of her so she is put down on her bottom.  She will stand when she can lean against something, such as the ottoman, but it doesn’t take long before she will start fussing or trying to sit back down because she doesn’t seem to like standing.  She has pulled herself up about 5 times in about the same number of days.  I’ve only seen it once (she was on the floor by the bathtub and pulled herself to a stand to try to reach the toys in the bath) because the other 4 times were at day care (she did it 4 times in a row there).  I made some wonderful (if I do say so myself!) chocolate chip cookies with the kitchen aid mixer I got for my birthday and our new convection oven, so maybe later today I will see if I can bribe her to a stand with pieces of cookie! 🙂  I seem to remember getting results practicing walking with Hayden using food.

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Booty Scoot (and Boogy) April 14, 2011

Layla is really getting around!  She is not really crawling, although she does crawl backwards sometimes.  But who needs crawling when you can get where you want to go while sitting upright?! She just sits on her bottom and bends her legs from side to side until she has wriggled herself to where she wants to be.  It’s so efficient and yet subtle that you will swear she didn’t move and yet she is easily 10 feet from where she started.

She is not showing much interest in standing yet.  Sometimes I will have her sitting in front of me and I will take her hands and pull her to a standing position.  She will be happy for a few seconds before she starts whining and moving her butt toward the floor.  Yesterday I put my laptop and phone on the couch (two things she simply can’t resist) and tried to use those to entice her to stay standing holding onto the couch, but even that didn’t really work.  She’s just not too fussed about being on her feet just yet – so be it!

A Whole Different Baby February 3, 2011

Layla has reached the age where she is very active, interactive, taking everything in, and learning every minute.  It seems like she was just born, so it’s funny to me to see what she is like now and think that she’s totally different now to the little baby who pretty much just used to sleep all the time.  Let me count the ways that she is “new”:

1. Her hair is coming in thick and fast.  It was just a few weeks ago that the sides and back of her hair had fallen out and most of her hair that was left was just on top.  Every day I can see she is getting more and more hair and it seems to be getting longer quickly.  When Hayden was her age his hair had fallen out but was coming back in very light blonde.  This does not seem to be happening to her; I don’t think she will ever be blonde.  I don’t think it will be long before she starts getting some baby curls. 🙂

2.  She is an eating pro.  She gets three meals a day, and she’s an eager eater.  My stepdad said it best: “She eats with her whole body!”  Her little hands and feet move in excited circles as she eats.  Cutest. Thing. Ever.  I guess I will have to qualify this by saying that she is a very eager eater as long as I have added some yogurt to whatever I’m giving her.  She will open her mouth like a little birdie when there’s yogurt mixed in, but otherwise she’s not as keen.  The last couple of meals I have forgone the yogurt and she has still eaten it, but in the past she wouldn’t even open her mouth if it didn’t have the good stuff in there!

3.  She is finally taking naps in her crib.  This has been a looooong time coming.  I only have myself to blame for her nearly hitting the 8 month mark before she would sleep in her bed during the day.  I didn’t push it because 1) when I work it was easier to let her fall asleep on her nursing pillow while I worked than try to get her to nap upstairs and then have to manage going up and down the stairs continuously with the real possibility of her never falling asleep.  I knew if I kept her with me she would definitely fall asleep and it would be, well, easy!  And 2) the times I did try to let her “cry it out” in her bed she would start getting in a habit of crying whenever I put her in her crib, even at night.  If I didn’t bother with it during the day, then the nighttime routine wasn’t negatively impacted.  Obviously this approach wouldn’t work for most families, but it was fine for us.  But now that she is taking naps in her bed it just feels like she is so grown up!

4.  She has been sitting up very steadily for a while now.  She’s not crawling, but she does kind of wiggle herself in the right direction when she is lying on her belly and wants something.  But no scooting or crawling or anything like that.

5.  She LOVES laughing at Hayden.  She is very interested in him.  He loves making her laugh, too.  He will shake his head back and forth which usually gets her laughing.  In fact, he was doing that this morning when we were taking him to preschool, but she hasn’t been feeling well and she was watching him but not laughing.  He was telling me that she needed to be laughing because he was doing that.  lol!  When she and I have been home on a workday and Hayden’s been at preschool, she gets visibly excited when I put her in her carseat when it’s time to go get him (and she doesn’t get excited when put in her carseat any other time).

Crawling June 25, 2008

My goodness, how things change!  I have heard people comment about this before, but you don’t appreciate it as much until it happens to you…. Hayden has started crawling, and we have entered a whole other world!  He has to be watched constantly!  Gone are the days where he could be set down next to me on the floor, happily playing with the toys or books within reach while I split my attention between him and the laptop.  He has figured out which things we do not want him to touch, and once he’s on the floor he heads straight for them!  The stereo is always the first thing he goes to, followed by the fireplace.  He also gets frustrated so easily now!  He wants to go where he wants to go, and if you try to redirect him or get in his way he does not take kindly to it.  However, he is very easily entertained when he is crawling around – you can just tell he feels he has an entire new, exciting world opened up to him.  But of course he moves so fast that I feel like I can’t do anything apart from watch him.  Even when I can see him he is still up to mischief – like yesterday I was putting on  my makeup and could see him in the mirror.  He was pinging this door stopper thing on the wall, and suddenly something seemed weird.  I got down next to him and saw that he had worked off the end of the door stopper and put it in his mouth!  And that was when he was within site!!