What Peanut Has Been Up To?

I realize I spend a great deal of time talking about how I feel about certain things and give a brief  review of what we have been doing but I realized it has been awhile since I've given a full report on how Hailey is.

I think I should start by sharing with you what our therapist told us last week.  As she was filling out paperwork at the end of our session, she looks at me and says, "Just to let you know, Hailey is close to on target with cognition.  You are going to start to see typical toddler behaviors.  In watching Hailey, I have noticed that some of them might be challenging because she is very stubborn and persistent."  On a side note...As I have written these two small paragraphs,  Hailey has attacked the keyboard 4 times and has been removed from the room twice.  Yes...she is persistent.  When you tell her "no", her face lights up and both dimples shine through and lets out a huge cackle!  Yes, a big part of me celebrates that she is going through the same annoying, frustrating habits that her brothers both had.  Then there is that small percentage that when praying for Hailey to do typical behaviors hoped she would skip a few of these :-)

Her newest hobby...emptying the movies & video games

Hmmm...we could watch Signing Times

Or play xbox....

What?  I didn't do it?

Obviously, playing with the laptop, cameras, remote controls, phones...are high on her list of items to chew, attack, steal, etc.  It is quite comical to watch her make a mad dash to the couch.  Once she gets there, she pulls herself up to scope out what is "on that level" and then decides which surface to head to next.  If she spots something she shouldn't have....she likes her brother's homework too!...she drops to the floor and crawls to the next surface to snatch it.

In gross motor, she is crawling...or in the therapy world, creeping.  Sometimes she does traditional 4 point with hands and knees.  That is when she is going at a leisurely pace.  When she is in a hurry and wants to move fast, she have the heel of one foot on the floor instead of a knee.  Sometimes she gets to moving so fast that she face plants.  Little Miss does know how to pull up to stand on almost any surface (stationary or moving).  Sometimes she will actually move her feet too but I am quite certain that we are a long way from walking.  I thought that would make me anxious or freak out because she isn't "on target".  I've read enough that I want Hailey to have the left-right patterning of crawling.  I'm positive that I want her fine motor skills strengthened by the weight of her body on her hands as she crawls.  My oldest did not crawl long and his fine motor skills have definitely been a struggle (especially in school with writing and drawing).  I'm okay with her crawling for awhile.  Don't get me wrong...we are still working on the skills that lead to walking, I'm just not obsessing over it right now.

Standing up to give big brother a kiss

Crawling with one leg up

Yoga...stretching?

Crawling with the other leg up...at least she isn't favoring one side :-)

Let's see...fine motor skills.  When she is eating at her highchair, she does everything she can to grab it by the handful and shove as much as possible in her mouth at one time (without choking, of course).  However, while playing on the floor, she can perfectly display the pincher grasp when discovering small items that the boys have dropped or outside when she is deciding to eat mulch, ants...or the most recent...a button.  Yes, the girl ate a button.  I'm not sure if it is unfortunate or fortunate, but we did not know she swallowed it until we found it deposited in her diaper.  Thank goodness it went through okay.  She also has mastered in record time...almost 2 seconds...to remove her barrette from her hair.  I've learned the hard way...the barrettes and bows do not go into the hair until we have arrived at our destination.  Otherwise, I spend 5 minutes searching through the van to find it.  I bought a snack cup to work on fine motor skills.  Well, that worked for maybe 3 minutes.  She was tired of digging in for the puffs so she decided to start throwing the cup.  She quickly realized that if she threw it hard enough of the kitchen floor that some puffs would escape.  Hmmm...I think we might need to work on that.

Onto speech...Hailey babbles, she cackles, she giggles and she jabbers.  Do I think she "talks" as much as the boys did?   No.  Do I think it is because of Down syndrome or is it because she is #3 and there is so much noise and volume that she can't get a word in edgewise?  I'm not sure.  We may never know.  We do hear a lot of "mamama" and "dadada".  We here a few "br" and other sounds.  She does say "ni-ni-ni" as we are putting her to sleep.  Some of her sounds do sound intentional.  Unfortunately, she is not being cooperative with a straw cup but we have found a cup that is working on drinking out of an open cup and that seems to be going well (Avent 360).  Signing seems to be going well.  She will sign "more"...she uses it generally for more food or just for "eat".  She also will sign for milk.  She will blow kisses and wave (sometimes on command...others not so much).   She is quite the cheerleader...for herself :-)  Clapping for herself seems to be a hobby of hers!

The tail end of her blowing kisses.

When I say that Hailey is a good eater, that is not an exaggeration.  All of my kids have been good eaters at the start.  The girl eats everything.  I wish I ate as good as her or the boys did.  She made a little bit of a face this week with the brussel sprouts but I changed the way I made them and I wasn't sold on it either.   No one ever feeds her fast enough nor can they feed her enough.  There are days that she would eat until her tummy hurt but we always stop her before then.  Look at her "fight" with her older brother for a ring pop...no...she has never had one but boy did she want this one!

Mom...he won't give me any.

I think she is satisfied!

Socially, my little peanut is starting to strange when she is away from mom.  Since I am a stay-at-home mom, she does spend the majority of her time with me.  With two older boys in school and activities, and us not living near family...we have a lot of different people in our lives.  So it isn't that she doesn't "see" enough people...she just isn't away from mom enough.  We are working on this issue.  She does seem to be a little more leery of others.  Church seems to be a time that she loves to explore people (and practice her vocal chords).   Thankfully, we have been sitting by some patient people who at least like children. 

Sensory-wise...we don't seem to have many issues with textures...clothing...except for grass.  She will crawl bare kneed over concrete before crawling over grass.  She'll sit in grass and pull it out with her hands but she will not crawl over it.  We've been working to overcome this one too.

Cognitively...who knows.  I know she is somewhat behind the boys in some stuff.  We work on "in" and "out".  We add new signs.  I know she recognizes more than she demonstrates.  She loves playing with her kitchen and knows exactly which things to push and pull to make it light up and sing...."put some water in the sink...."  Oh that song drives me batty sometimes.  She has learned that if she pushes that bottom lip out far enough making her pouty face that her dad will pick her up.   She recognizes voices and looks for images when talking on the phone...I think technology has her spoiled...she prefers talking on the iPad so she can see who she is speaking with.  We continue to read books and point at different objects and people.  We sing songs and work on the hand motions.  

Her social calendar is a little less active than I would like.  I need to get her around other little ones.  She thinks all children in life are the size and age of her brothers.  She attends lots of functions though...soccer is the main one at the moment.  The end of school is coming and I'm certain she will love having the boys around all the time....not sure they will love the invasion of their little sister!

Snoozing during round 1 of soccer that day

Trying to get her finger to point at the boys

Watching her brothers play in the backyard

 So that in a nutshell...is what peanut (ha!) has been up to.  We have a therapy at the end of this week and then a session at Children's the beginning of next week.  Her big brother is making his first communion on Saturday so everything will be all a buzz over the weekend.  We don't have another doctor appointment until the end of the month.  I am anxious to double check on her growth.  Last time she was about 17 1/2 lbs.  She wears 12-18 month tops to cover her long torso but can wear 6-12 month shorts and pants.

The girl knows how make us smile and loves us.  She plants slobbery, wet, wonderful kisses as often as we want them.  However, now with her new teeth (only one on top and one on bottom) it sometimes stings just a bit....another thing we need to work on!  I'm sure there are things I've forgotten and I will remember as soon as I hit "publish"!