In Their Own Time

By definition, half the population will fall below the average for anything you care of measure. When it comes to infants, they are just all over the place!

Ada turns eight months old today, Monday the 23rd. She still isn't crawling, though she does scoot around the room sometimes, moving backwards by pushing with her arms. One of her friends at Family Place on Saturday mornings is older than her by a single day, but has been crawling since she was a bit more than six and a half months!

Claire has sometimes asked if we should be worried about any of Ada's developments, or lack thereof. I constantly reassure her that the longer it takes Ada to crawl, the better. At least for now, we can put her down with her toys, go make a hot cup of tea and come back to find her in roughly the same place we left her.

On the other hand, Ada is able to hold her own weight, standing for a few minutes at a time, leaning on the back of the couch, or against our legs. She's been a fan of tummy time since the week we brought her home, and her arm and neck strength is fantastic! She's been able to roll over since she was four months old.

Her dexterity is pretty good too. She can turn her stuffed toys and blankets around until she finds the tag, or move objects from hand to hand if we're changing her clothes. When I put here down on her change mat, she learned a long time ago that there's a marker by her head, and with a bit of stretching she can get at it. At first, she was only able to touch it with her fingers, but after a few attempts, she gained the dexterity needed to lift it out with her index and middle fingers. Since then, putting her on the change mat usuaally results in an immediate stretch, grab and play with the marker.

One of the things that every baby does is reach out their arms to be picked up when you offer. Every baby, that is, except Ada. Any time I offered to pick her up, she'd smile, but not raise her arms. She understands the sign for up, and has even signed it quickly when I sign it to her[1] but still won't raise her arms to me. I work with babies who reach out to me as soon as I walk into the room, but my own daughter expects mee to do all the work for her.

Until this last few days. Ada has just started to put her arms up when she want to be picked up. Today, in particular, she definitely rreached up to me to be picked up, and my heart soared.

Every kid develops in their own time. Every new milestone or phase is unique to every child. So when you see someone else's baby doing something yours isn't doing yet, I can guarantee you that kids parent is seeing the same thing in yours.

[1] The sign for up is, as you could probably guess, pointing up with your index finger. We've been signing lots with Ada, and she understands a few now, especially up and milk, but when I do up, her index finger will sometimes flicck out and point briefly. It's cute to see, and interesting to watch her learning that she can sign back at us.