Click Above for Some Cuteness
Can I just say how over the moon I am about Evie's newest accomplishment? I've watched hundreds of kids learn to crawl, and as exciting as it is, it's one of those (pseudo) milestones I took for granted. That is until I had Edmund who decided to march to the beat of his own drummer. The road he took to accomplish all those important gross motor skills was anxiety provoking for me and Steven, to say the least. But eventually he got there in his own roundabout way and is such a happy, fun little boy who still likes to throw us for a loop.
Evie seemed to be heading down a similar path, and since we'd had one child who'd done the same, Steven and I only had fleeting anxieties, but knew she'd be fine without the interventions we sought for Edmund. We determined we had kids who skipped class the day typical development was taught, and that was OK. But I was really hoping for a crawler and began to grieve that we might not have children who ever do the cute little creep. Silly I know, but it is what it is.
Last week Evie starting scooching forward on her bottom. Then a few days ago she began commando crawling. Every day before that I tried to practice the hands and knees crawling position with her, but she hated it. Once Evie began scooching, I resigned myself to the fact that even if Evie wasn't a true crawler at least she was a mover. In fact if I had tried to put her on her hands and knees this morning I can say with 99% certainty she would have let me know emphatically that she would have none of it.
Tonight I reminded Edmund to clean his playroom before bed, but he was not thrilled with the idea. I said I'd make it fun and began singing "A Spoonful of Sugar" while he cleaned and acted out the scene from Mary Poppins complete with doors and drawers popping open and shut. The two of us had almost completed clean-up when he went to put his United States puzzle on the table, and then the inevitable happened. All 50 states toppled to the ground. I told him I'd work on it, but he said he wanted to keep cleaning if I'd sing the song. And it was at that moment that Evie decided to crawl. If I hadn't been bending over to look for Iowa I would have missed it. She was full-on cute, butt in the air crawling. I have no idea what prompted her, but she was crawling, albeit at a snail's pace, across the room.
Edmund and I cheered her on. Hoping she would do it again, I ran to take a video for Steven, who had just left for a night at the hospital. Evie performed until she could take no more, and so we were able to get the video. This may not be the ultimate in baby achievements, but in our family it's a big deal.
