Eddie's Therapy: Session 5

Since we missed one of our April therapy sessions, Julie came back yesterday for a make-up session. Since it had only been a week since she was here last, she didn't expect too much improvement. She was impressed once again by Eddie. Apparently once he is shown how to do a specific thing, he learns how to do it really quickly. Last week, we started standing him up next to furniture. In just a week, his hips have gotten so much stronger and because of that, he does a lot more kneeling than he used to. Kneeling is good because it is a step on the way to standing by himself.

Our new exercise this week is to get him from kneeling to standing. He will often crawl up to one of us and kneel next to us. So now, we just have to take his hands up over his head, shift his weight to one side, and he puts his foot on the floor. Then, we shift his weight the other way, and (ta-da!) he's standing. It makes him a little bit angry, but hopefully he'll come to like it as his muscles get used to the extra work.

With a little luck, he should be cruising the furniture in no time.

Nap Time

We have been working on weaning Eddie over the past week or so. That means I no longer nurse him before his naps. Here you can see the results of letting him get himself to sleep:

Just Being a Kid

Here are a few fun photos I've taken over the past week or so. Now that the weather is turning nice, we are spending lots of time outside. Eddie loves being outside, even if it is just going to get the mail. This last week, we got to go to the park twice -- once with Eddie's cousins and once with Eddie's friends Luca & Stella. I only took my camera the first day. Here is Eddie looking stylish in the park (I was happy to see his shirt turn blue and red, since it changes color in the sun... Normally, it's just black and white):


Now that Eddie is mobile, he gets into everything. But, I'm not complaining since we had ample time to prepare for it. Of course, once it really hit us that he could get around, we bought a gate. Here is Eddie trying to squeeze his face between the bars:


Eddie loves to explore. He especially loves to go over in the corner to his toy box and see what treasures he can find. However, it is not heavy enough to stay standing when he tries to use it to pull himself up, as you can see here:

At least he had Raggedy Andy there for moral support.

Eddie's Therapy: Session 4

We were enjoying a quiet evening at home last Friday night, playing a thrilling round of Trivial Pursuit, when we noticed Eddie. He was no longer where had set him down, but was shooting across the living room, making a break for the open movie cabinet. After a few moments of disbelief, we realized the horrible truth: Eddie had figured out how to crawl... forward. He's not very fast yet, but he gets where he wants to go, which is always where we don't want him to be. Dave put together the following clip that sums up our trepidation concerning this development. Make sure your sound is turned up.


Yesterday, we had Eddie's 4th physical therapy session. Julie is always impressed with Eddie's progress, but this time it was even better given his newfound mobility. After Eddie demonstrated his crawling technique for Julie, we got to work on the next step - standing. Our new exercise is to set something he wants up on the coffee table, then sit Ed on our knee with his feet flat on the floor. Then, when he reaches for the bait, he stands up on his legs. He did this several times while Julie was here. When I told Dave about the next thing Eddie will learn, he voiced my feelings when he said "AH!"

That's right... we're still not ready for it. But, it will happen whether we're ready or not. Once he starts standing up more, Eddie will probably have to get special inserts for his shoes to help him stand on his feet the right way. When he stands, he turns his toes out and rolls onto the insides of his feet. It looks really weird, and we don't want him to get in the habit of that.

Little Swimmer

Yesterday, I took Eddie to the swimming pool for the very first time. I wasn't sure what he would think of it. We went with my friends Heather and Ashley (and their little boys, Taylor and Colton) to the Murray Rec Center pool. I hadn't really thought about what a big ordeal it would be to get Eddie and I both ready for swimming (what with swim diapers, plastic pants, and such), but eventually, we made it into the pool. As soon as Eddie got in the water, he went crazy.

He loved it. For the first 30 minutes, he splashed constantly. He tried swimming away from me and kept putting his face in the water (on purpose). I spent my time trying not to get splashed in the eyes and trying to keep his face above water. He loved it when I laid him on his back. He'd kick his legs up in the air, throw his arms over his head and get a huge grin.

Eventually, he wore himself out and settled down. We managed to get a photo of the three boys before we left. Eddie was not happy to get changed back into regular clothes. So, we'll have to go again... and next time, I think I'll take an extra person and a video camera to capture the craziness.

Eddie, Colton, and Taylor

Easter 2009

We drove up to Logan for the weekend to pay an overdue visit to my parents, as well as my brother Rob and his family. After Kristen's previous post, everyone wanted to hear him say "Batman." Of course, he responded like a deer in headlights.

On Saturday, we went for a little walk around the USU Campus to help Eddie discover his inner Aggie.

Ever the ladies man, Eddie has already been practicing his True Aggie technique on little Madeleine Wilcox in Gospel Doctrine of all places.

Eddie also got his first taste of Aggie Ice Cream. He ended up eating most of his cousin Josh's cone while he was busy playing with some other kids. You snooze, you lose, right Josh?

On Sunday night, we went over to my sister Cheryl's house in Draper. After dinner, we had a traditional egg hunt for the kids in the backyard. Eddie's participation in this event consisted of knocking a few eggs off this swing and into (or pretty close to) his basket.

After all the "egg-citement" (Vincent Price, eat your heart out), we put Eddie in the baby swing. The seat was a little big for him, but he wouldn't sit back. Does it look like he is having fun or what?

Ed's First Real Word

I have been wondering for weeks now what Eddie's first word would be, or if he's already saying words and I just don't realize it. He says "dada" and "mama" and I suspect he might even say "ball." Just last week, he started saying "no no," prompted by my attempts to convince him not to pull all our CDs off the shelf. He mostly just repeats what we say, so I'm not sure if these count as real words or not.

This week, however, Eddie said his first word that is two syllables - not just one sound repeated like with "dada." And the word is... "Batman." Truly he is his father's son. I'll try to see if I can get it on video for those of you who can't hear it in person.

On a side note, I would like to inform you loyal readers that there are more posts coming. Currently, Eddie is sick, so we haven't been doing much or taking many photos. Also, this illness led to physical therapy being cancelled this week, so there are no new updates there.

Eddie and his trusty sidekick, Cecil the seahorse.

Eleven Months Old

You heard right, folks... Eddie is 11 months old tomorrow!

Eddie is definitely becoming his own person. He likes to show Dave and I who is boss by refusing to eat things we offer him, playing with things we tell him not to, and clawing our faces if we get too close. He's also turning into quite the little sweetheart. He's getting more snuggly, which I love. He also gives great kisses and now gives them to other people besides just me. He even kissed (and licked) the neighbor girl in church the other week.

Eddie now has four teeth, two on top and two on bottom. He's getting better at eating solid food without gagging on it. He is still working on the concept of feeding himself, though. If we put cheerios on his tray, he eventually throws them all on the floor.

Eddie is also getting around a lot these days. Because of this new mobility, we have big plans to lower the crib mattress this weekend. He still isn't crawling forward, but sort of crawls backwards. This isn't the best method because he can't see where he's going and ends up getting stuck under things like the couch or the table. Or, he'll see something he wants in front of him, but out of reach, so he'll move around trying to get it and will only end up further away. This isn't a big problem because no matter where he backs up to, he usually finds something he wants to play with.

In addition to teaching him to move forward, we're also working on teaching him the meaning of the word "no." He gets into so many things these days that I find myself saying "no" more and more. Usually my reaction distracts him long enough that he forgets what he was doing in the first place and moves on to something else for a while.

In other news, we spent this afternoon at the zoo with Cheryl, Christie, and kids. You loyal readers will know that this is Eddie's second trip to the zoo (we went last October). This time, he seemed to enjoy it much more (and so did I). I was excited to see if he would notice and/or care about the animals at all. He did notice some of them, but not very many, and he seemed more concerned than anything.

The first animals that he really noticed were the giraffes. I think this is because giraffes are huge and one was bending over right by us. Ed was quite alarmed by it at first and made sure to keep an eye on them while we were there. He noticed other animals that moved around and weren't too far away, like the little swimming turtles and the marmosets. I thought he would really like the monkeys, but he didn't seem too interested.

My favorite animal of all was the orangutan. Since it was kind of cold, the orangutans were inside, so we just got to see them through the windows. The big male was right next to the window, so we saw him up close. He even looked at me when I took a photo of him. Unfortunately, in the photo with Eddie, you can't really see the orangutan very well.

Eddie's Therapy: Session 3

Eddie had his third physical therapy session this week. Julie was impressed once again by Eddie's great progress. He's now rolling onto his tummy on purpose all the time. It makes diaper changes a wrestling match. He also just started getting into a sitting position from his tummy. Then, just this week, he started pulling himself up onto his knees next to furniture. He's already ripped our table bumpers off the coffee table three times trying to hang on.

Our new exercise this time is to help Ed learn to alternate arms and legs and, thusly, crawl. We're supposed to get him on his hands and knees, then one of us man his arms and one his legs. Then we go "1, 2," and move one arm, then the opposite leg. Then we repeat on the other side. This is supposed to help him learn how to shift his weight so he can do it on his own.

So, if this exercise works, Eddie should be crawling by his birthday! I guess we'll see...

Ed Screams for Ice Cream

We usually try to be pretty good about feeding Eddie healthy foods since we still have control over what he eats. Occasionally, however, we allow him to indulge in a treat. We spent last Saturday in Layton with Scott, Lari, and Lucy to watch the NCAA tournament. We enjoyed some Dairy Queen blizzards and decided to let Eddie have some.

He seemed to think that the cuter he acted, the more ice cream he would get, so he kept giving me cheesy grins between bites.

No, he's not about to blink. This is his new favorite face to make.