First Words!

This will be a quickie post because I'm in Evanston preparing for a presentation for the department, but I wanted to be sure to let everyone know: Liam said his first word!

Sunday night it started with him imitating the "woof woof" sound in his Boynton "Puppies barking and counting" board book. Every time I got to "five dogs woof woof" he would say very quietly "woof" and when we got to "9 dogs in the moonlight aahhhhooooo" he would say "aooo" We were thrilled that he was imitating sounds he heard. And we didnt have to wait long.

The next morning there was an orange on the floor in the kitchen that I had been letting him play with. He saw it, and the entire time he was crawling towards it, he said "bah, bah bah" and when he picked it up he proudly said "bah!" and held it out to me. We put him through the paces, putting several different things on the table in front of him and saying "Liam, which one is the ball?" and each time he would pick up the ball, hold it out and say "Bah!"

This morning while feeding him breakfast before we headed to the airport I could swear he started to say "more" as well. We do the baby signs religiously at every meal, so he signs for "eat" and then "more" when he wants more. I asked him "more?" and he made the sign and said "mah." Each time he repeated the sign, he said "mah."

What an awesome little baby. No video yet though. He is too enamored of the camera so when he sees it he stops what he's doing. Will keep trying.


side note, in case you are wondering: I'm glad for the help the early intervention teacher gave us to really get signing and language practice going for him. And even if this would have happened on its own without any help from us, I'd still rather be wrong (about him needing help) than too stubborn or proud to get him help he may have needed. My understanding is that we continue with the Early Intervention teacher once a week for at least 6 months when he will be re-evaluated, and that if at any time we want to quit the program before then we may.

Quick Development Update: Open cups, pointing, and almost walking

Just a few quick updates (especially since he's hanging around right here trying to help type).

This morning I was motivated by the Montessori in the Home (0-3) book I've been reading, so I started teaching Liam to drink from a regular open cup. The book recommends that a shot glass is a good size for small hands, so I used the plastic shot glasses that we have, and I poured a little bit at a time, and much to my surprise he was great! He picked it up with two hands, and took a big gulp. The only problem is that he's like a little Ghanaian. When Ghanaians perform a ceremony honoring their ancestors, they drink from a common cup and then the last person pours the rest out on the ground as a "libation" to the ancestors. You get the picture already. Liam drinks about half of the water and then like a Ghanaian pouring libation, he tips the cup upside down and pours the rest out on the tray of his high chair.

We also seem to be very very close to walking. There are a couple times when I have caught him taking a step or two between the couch and coffee table. But no amount of excited persuading will get him to walk between me and terry. The minute he isnt holding onto one of us he looks at the distance, judges it too great, and carefully gets down onto his knees to crawl. But he has gotten progressively steadier when walking with assistance (using his push cart) and can now walk well just holding one of our hands at his side.

The other thing we've been working on is intentional pointing. Part of getting his communication skills going is him giving intentional indications of what he wants. Even if he isnt doing the official signs, pointing will get going. So today I started a game of excitedly pointing at the Cheerios box during snack time. I made super enthusiastic faces and said "Cheerios? Cheerios?!" and pointed at the box repeatedly. First he just laughed at me, but as soon as he pointed to the box, I rewarded him with cheerios. We did it three times and each time he eventually pointed at the box. I'm hoping with consistent practice he'll become a pointer, and we can use that to start to make sense in his head that he can use sounds and gestures to communicate his desires to other people.

Crawling

As I have mentioned before, Liam seems to live to prove me wrong. Just like last time he went to his doctor's appointment and then rolled front to back for the first time on the doctor's table. This time at least he waited until we got home. After telling the doctor no, no he didn't crawl at his nine month well visit, we took him home. I put him down on the ground and he very competently crawled four "steps" in the upright standard crawl position, grabbed a toy, sat down and played with it.

And did I mention that the same day he first crawled he also cut his first tooth and started pulling up on furniture into a standing position by himself? Crazy kid.

Over the next couple of days I went nuts trying to capture him on camera crawling. I finally got him the next day, but I could only get him to do a military (belly) crawl.




And then four days later...as you can see he went from crawling to officially being "a crawler." He was zooming laps around the room like he'd been doing it forever.

I had the hardest time getting him to crawl on camera. I finally had to bribe him. You will see he looks super enthusiastic and is practically panting with joy as he crawls toward me. You will also see that I am not the target of all that baby excitement...