Milestone Alert!

Welcome ICLWer's! I'm so glad you stopped by. Please leave a comment or follow me so that I can come visit you! Visit the Our Story section of the page to learn how we got to this point. Right now, I'm a proud mama of an almost 9 month old (yikes! How did he get so old!!!) and a kindergarten teacher.  My little monkey and I are bumbling along in this journey--where I'm learning to try to balance being a relaxed, fun mama and my slightly neurotic side!

As you know, I love to read (or maybe you don't remember...here's a reminder).  TH...not so much. But--I'm determined for LM to love books and love to read/be read to.  I read to him before he was born and we've read together most days since. He loves to hear his bedtime books before bed and some of his favorite toys are his books. Granted, a lot of chewing goes on but he wiggles and kicks with happiness when he looks at them. As a kindergarten teacher, I might be a bit biased, but I'd say he has good print concepts skill as he helps me turn the pages and loves to touch each page. One of my favorite pictures is him laying down, holding a book above his head---smiling at the pages!

I've been worried for awhile that he's behind the physical development curve as he's nearly nine months and he still hasn't rolled back to belly. He pushed up on his hands/knees for a couple weeks but suddenly, he hates being on his belly and flips back over as soon as you put him there. While he sits like a champ (if you sit him up), he really shows little to no desire to move himself anywhere. I know babies develop differently, but I'm a worrier.

But, today, amidst the chaos of cheering for football, I watched him lean forward from a sitting position enough that he ended up on his belly. Since he actually wanted to be there, he laid there and played with the toy he had stretched so far for.  I watched as he grew tired of that toy and flipped back onto his back.  He played for a bit that way and then grew bored.  We watched as he looked around for a new toy to play with. He reached out for his colors book but couldn't reach it.  Instead of giving up and moving onto a new toy or screeching for help, he stretched and reached until he rolled himself over from back to belly! He grabbed his book and promptly rolled onto his back to look at it.  We cheered and celebrated with him, but he really just wanted to look at his book.

I'm relieved that he can move himself when he wants to.

But, I'm really proud that the one thing that he wanted enough to roll his chubby self over, was a book :-)

That's my boy!