January 2010 mommies

Elsa - they have been there for about 6 years. Mom married a American so they are staying there forever! I hate her boobs! i told her she made it WAY too big but ja she likes it! Perky boobs is a requirement in USA lol!

M2B Googled your sister... she is pretty!! Why dont you also live in the States? Did they move there recently? Looks like she already got the boobs, they are requirement for living in the USA!

Logan crawled but with his bum in the air, like bear walk! was funny. Bismarck is also too lazy to crawl yet but he is sitting up at least but still falls over! Hope he crawls soon. He loves being up and entertained. I know people say that walking rings are bad, but Bismarck loves his!! I just dont leave him in it for longer than 30 minutes!

Im so excited that my sister is busy recording her album in Nashville and it will be out in about 5 months or so! FINALLY! She is so beautiful and her boyfriend is U-G-L-Y!
If you goolge Nikki Williams there are loads of stuff on the internet about her. Going to be rich and she says then Im getting my boobies !

Morning!!!

Tyler is also not a fun of Tummy Time...But I have started putting toys he wants infront of him and then laying him on Tummy. He has started Kicking his legs and trying to get forward...I guess its a start to crawling.

Not too concerned about the crawling thing, my Niece is 14 she never crawled - went straight to walking, has no development issues. Does well at Maths and gets high marks...So I guess if your kids dont want to crawl its really not a big deal.

Christelle, I haven't really ever compared Tyler to other babies his age...all babies develop differently. I also dont try to force him to sleep on his own or anything. Lately all it takes is me laying him on my chest and putting on his lullaby CD and he falls asleep.

Lollipop, Cute @ Tristan chasing the Cat! Tyler chases my sisters pocket Size yorkie!

Morning!

Sniff sniff - I'm also getting a cold.

Glad you didn't get stuck in the lift for long M2B! Freaky!

Troy also moans after a bit on his tummy but what I do is usually after his bath is put him on his tummy on the bed and then play peek-a-boo which he loves. Keep on popping my head up and down and he laughs. Or I put a toy in front of him and he tries to reach it. Or pop in him front of tv and the tv distracts him while on his tum tum.

The Importance of Crawling.

Crawling I talked yesterday about the importance of tummy time. Today I want to share some information on crawling. There have been some studies that indicate that late walkers score better later in life on academic achievement tests. It is hypothesized that because of the use of alternating sides of the body (e.g., right arm and left leg, then vica versa), there is increase communication between the two sides of the brain thus enhancing learning.

There also is an interesting theory out there about a link between crawling and ADD/ADHD. Before talking about this possible link, however, you need a little background on the basis of this theory.

It all has to do with an innate reflex called the symmetric tonic neck reflex. This reflex tells the neck and arms to work in opposition to our legs. If the arms bend, the legs want to be straight and if the arms are straight, the legs want to bend. So in a nutshell, they are learning to operate the upper and lower body independent of each other.

This reflex emerges between six and nine months and should be inhibited between nine and twelve months. This reflex dissipates as the child learns to stand and walk.

In addition, crawling requires that our little ones learn to lift the body off the floor while on all fours. This helps align the spinal cord for standing and walking later on.

Another important piece of development that occurs during the crawling stage is binocular vision. This involves training the eyes to look off into the distance and then back at the hands while creeping. This helps integrate the vestibular, proprioceptive and visual senses (if you don't know what these are, see my post "Our Seven Senses") for the first time. The integration of these senses helps the sense of balance as well as space and depth perception.

It appears that for some kids where this reflex does not dissipate. The cause could be genetics, little time spent crawling or extended periods of time spent in walkers or exersaucer. Whatever the cause, there are some hypothesized negative outcomes for some kids when this reflex does not subside:

* Sitting at a desk becomes uncomfortable
* Poor eye-hand coordination
* Difficulty copying from a blackboard while at a desk
* Slowness at copying
* Difficulty with vertical tracking (needed for math equations!)
* Difficulty with activities where the upper and lower parts of the body have to work independently, e.g., swimming, etc.
* Poor attention

Can you see the correlation between crawling and the above mentioned activities? Sitting at a desk requires the upper and lower parts of our body to be working independently. Kids where this reflex is still prevalent may slump at their desk or display poor posture. In addition, copying from a blackboard requires binocular vision (look down at the paper and then looking up at the far away blackboard).

As with the discussion about walkers exersaucers, I share this information with you as something to consider. There is no definitive research out there to say that absolutely without a doubt if you child doesn't crawl he is destined to have ADHD. There may be plenty of children out there that skip crawling without any negative effects later on. Again, this is just some information for you to tuck in your parenting tool box.

So how do you encourage crawling in a little one who has already taken to walking? Get a tunnel for them to crawl through. Play pretend games like being a dog or a horse and chase them around while they are on all fours.

Good morning all!

Hope everyone had a nice restful evening.

Shame, feel like such a bad mommy today. Zani woke up at 12 and I thought she only wanted her dummy. So, I put the dummy in her mouth, patted her a while and when she was quiet I went back to bed. Then she started moaning again and I just repeated the whole process. This went on for a whole hour!! Then I had a sudden spurt of intelligence and I thought, maybe she is hungry. So, put her on the boobie (she attacked it!) and after she drained it she fell asleep and slept till 7! My poor baby was hungry and all I did was put a dummy in her mouth! What a dumb mommy!!

I really miss my little girl during the day, so decided to take leave tomorrow and going to spend the time with her. We will do a little shopping, maybe go for tea and cake with my mom and sister, but basically just have some girly time! It’s going to be great!!

I know we are not supposed to do this, but do any of you ever compare the development of your lo to other babies? My SIL little boy is about a month younger than Zani and I can’t help but compare her to him. He loves spending time on his tummy and is basically already crawling away. Then I look at my daughter and she is the exact opposite. Then I start to wonder if I’m doing something wrong? I know I shouldn’t compare them and I keep telling myself that, but I just cant seem to help myself! My daughter sits unsupported and he doesn’t, but I keep on doubting myself the whole time. He gets put in his cot and falls asleep on his own and I have to hold her and pat her bum for her to fall asleep. Arrrggg, I hate feeling like such a failure!! Now I try and find excuses not to see them and that’s not fair to hubby either!

Anyway, that’s my moaning out of the way for today.

Hallo!

Good Luck for today M2B!

Stellie Tristan refuses to do Tummy time, and so far I haven't seen him roll over eiether, if I put him on his tummy he just lies there with his face in the blankets, he is so lazy.

On another note I think we had a milestone last night, he wanted to go to the cat,so MIL was holding him under his arms so that he could "walk" to the cat. The cat saw him coming and fled underneat the table, so he stood by the table, seeing the cat but didn't know how to get to him so he saw that he would have to sit to get to the cat, and he did. The cat of course saw him coming from a mile away again, and moved just out of his reach, and Tristan slided on his bum to get to him and grabbed a nice big chucnk of fur...poor thing. Get the feeling T is not going to crawl but rather slide on his bum. Not sure if that is a good thing?

Shame I think he is getting sick, he was crying to sadly last night and I just couldn't get him to settle down. He is coughing a bit and has a blocked nose, but no fever (Thankfully!)