Milestones Galore

Time for a happy post.  Especially since our life is a pretty happy life!  Dylan is hitting milestones left and right these days.  He's right on track for his adjusted age of 8 1/2 months.

First up: CRAWLING!!

I keep saying to myself that each stage is even more fun than the last.  And it just keeps happening!  It took Dylan a really long time to be able to roll from his back to his tummy.  I think he finally got it around 6 1/2 months, but it was still occasional.  I helped him "practice" crawling by getting his knees under him and rocking him back and forth.  And that's where he stayed for quite a while.  Oh and he was really good at pushing himself backward and boy did that frustrate him!

A couple of weeks ago, he started rolling more frequently and actually using it to move his position.  Then about a week ago, he began pushing himself into a plank or downward dog-type position.  And I got the awesome picture below!  I titled it "the bear in his natural habitat."  (If you haven't ever done bear crawls as a team sport punishment, you're missing out.)

He was also doing occasional one pull army crawls mixed with rolling to get himself around.

Then on Thursday, MrGG and I both saw him take one real crawl.  He didn't continue, but we saw that he knew what to do.

On Friday my Dad watched Dylan and he's the kind of dad that really likes to be the first to see things.  It's a little annoying, but doesn't bother me that much.  So when I got home, he showed me a video of Dylan really crawling.  Now he's off!

He's not going too quickly, but he's fully mobile.  He's even sitting up on his knees, checking out the stairs and pulling to stand occasionally.

Although I'm slightly scared of his new independence, it's so much fun to see his excitement! He was getting really frustrated the last couple of weeks.

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Milestone 2: Clapping!

Dylan still goes to OT twice a month and she's been mentioning for awhile that she'd like to see him bang two one-inch blocks together.  He has never showed the slightest interest.

Then on Saturday, he started playing with his hands together, almost in a hand-washing kind of motion.  I helped him "clap" a few times and then we clapped while he was doing the thing with his hands and by yesterday, he was clapping on his own!  Not exactly a real clap - no noise - but very close.

Here he is clapping for a Chargers' touchdown!  (Well...he didn't really know they scored, but the timing was pretty close.)

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And the teeth keep breaking through...  The first two appeared within a week of each other at 6 months.  Now finally a third appeared on the top next to center last week.

Times they are a changing!

He turns 1 in exactly a week so I am in full party-planning mode.  The grandparents only party that I wanted has turned into a party of nearly 50, kids included.  I'm trying to keep it simple, but at the same time I want my house to be perfect.  And I feel like I should probably finish the nursery. You know, since he'll be ONE.  Wish me luck!