Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Cause for Celebration

I'm a slacker.  Life is just. so. normal.  that I have stopped having things to update.  But I know (since I still want to see everybody else's life in pictures and updates)  that Reagan's fans still want to see her. 
I promise to try and do better :)  For today....some shameless bragging.  I will say here what I said on facebook.  I don't do a lot of sharing and bragging about milestones.  For two reasons.  One is that I've never really been caught up (with any of my children) on when my kids learn to do things, they learn in their own time.
The other is that in general I'm not one to make a big fuss over everyday accomplishments (don't get me wrong, I praise and cheer, but not to excess), I think it cheapens the big things. I am not the slightest bit bothered by Reagan hitting milestones slowly, watching her work so hard and then be so proud of herself (and she IS proud!) when she succeeds is very sweet!  And that is why I am GLAD she has Down syndrome, the hard work makes the victory so much sweeter!  For her the little things ARE the big things and so there are sooo many things to celebrate.  And here are a couple of them.  It took Reagan forever to learn how to crawl. 
But once she did....oh boy this girl is having a gross motor explosion. We stared working on pulling up and cruising in therapy...and....well the videos kind of speak for themselves :)

She was supposed to be learning how to stand up against a wall, but she thought the middle of the room would be more fun. So I teased her about learning how walk independently before her therapist came back on Tuesday. On Sunday she decided to show her new standing skills of to Grammy and Papa so Papa pulled out the camera and asked how many days I thought it would be before she took her first steps. I jokingly answered "two days" and she proceeded to....well it's not everyday that you plan to take video of a baby standing and get this instead.


Needless to say her therapist was blown away that between Thursday and Tues she learned how to stand and walk independently :) And now she is running (in that funny baby wobbly way) and climbing (on everything arrrg).
One more little brag that warms my Mama-heart. Reagan had her evaluation a few weeks ago. They place her in several categories such as gross motor, fine motor etc. One of the categories is Social/Emotional. While my little princess may be delayed in walking (scored 11 months) and talking....she was evaluated at...drumroll please...21 months (this was at 19 1/2 months old). My girl interacts well with her world and that is so much more important than any old walking and talking skill!