Turning a Corner?

Well it seems that Joey has not given up all of his antics - he still likes to keep up guessing, even when it comes to silly little matters!


I wrote about his stubborn refusal to eat, and lo-and-behold he decides to learn to chew! Thanks to those little "puff" snacks for babies, Joey learned how to have something in his mouth without gagging. Thanks to getting the chewing motion down, he is now enjoying eating foods with a little more proficiency. He is still mastering the baby-mush, but I'm thrilled that he's made some progress at all. Oh, and he loves our homemade applesauce, of course. :) We say "bite" and his little baby-bird mouth opens right up!

This, of course, is not applesauce.

His gross motor skills are lagging a little bit, and for a while I was really enjoying the Baby who was content to sit still and play! After a while, though, we started talking about whether or not we should have him reevaluated for therapy. (He qualifies for PT and OT based on his complex diagnosis alone, and we are free to pursue it any time until he turns 3.) All of a sudden a little switch turned and he is slowly opening his eyes to the possibility of motion. He turns himself on his belly all around, especially in the pursuit of someone or something. He is trying really hard to pull himself up, and gets really quite excited when we offer him a little help to do so. Just today he stood holding on to my knees without any other support!

His best source of motion is on his bottom - his wiggle/scooting abilities are growing rapidly. I will find him several feet away and facing a different direction than when I walked away just a few minutes before. The interest is there, the motivation is growing, now we're just waiting for the coordination to come through.
He loves clapping his hands, and plays patty-cake when Bella starts singing it to him. He laughs and smiles and blows raspberries, and you have never heard or seen anything more beautiful.