Eden's got skillz! A few weeks ago she finally started rolling and being able to get from a seated position to her belly and then roll to her back. But then - "that's all I got! wah! help!"
This past weekend, she figured out how to get back up to a seated position by herself - here's a video of her doing it during a visit to Mommy's office today:
She's also started sleeping on her side (and daycare says she sleeps on her tummy, but we've never seen her do that at home). (you don't need to watch the whole video)
And we bought her a B. Zany Zoo to practice standing and pulling herself up:
(note for the record: she's not pulling herself up yet, but she seems to be trying! She actually bumped her head at daycare trying to pull up on a shelf yesterday!)
[INSERT PIC OF INCIDENT REPORT]
And she's become proficient at Zebra riding:
(This is at her friend Annie's mom Vivi's birthday party)
Since Eden turned 8 months, we have been letting her try a lot more "real food." She's still mostly on fruits and vegetables, but we're giving her tiny bites of appropriately-textured/not-too-spicy foods that we're eating.
This girl loves to eat! She's not awesome at feeding herself yet - she will sometimes pick the food up and throw it on the floor, or just push it around on her tray. So if we want to get her to actually ingest the food, we usually just feed it to her in a spoon or with our hands. In other words, we are too lazy and mess-averse for baby-led weaning.
Eden's foods to date and her official grades of those foods below.
Avocado: A
Banana: A
Beans (Green): B
Broccoli: B+
Carrot: A- (happy to report that second introduction of carrots went well with no rash so the first rash was probably a fluke)
Challah: A (just a tiny bite)
Cauliflower: B+
Eggs, scrambled: A
Egg yolk, hard boiled: B- (we think because of the texture)
Kale: D (ok, mommy's preparation of this probably sucked)
Lentils: C (again, probably mommy's fault - and adding garlic powder didn't really help)
This might not be everything she's had since we let the school give her food and don't know her reaction to it beyond checking the "I ate well!" box on her daily report. We went ahead and introduced eggs and strawberries because they were around, and because our families don't have a history of food allergies. That went fine, which is great! In the next month or so we will probably let her eat the entire school food menu (Suzuki is great about accommodating vegetarians). Next allergen to introduce is peanuts, I think.
Eden's favorite food so far is oatmeal cereal with breastmilk. She loves it, and in fact in the morning she often gets jealous of other babies having it (she gets hers in the afternoon). It has iron, so I'm glad she likes it! She also was getting jealous of other babies' puffs so we had to give her those too.
We bought some of these pouches but haven't tried them yet. But excited that they exist!
Eden had her last evaluation for the early intervention program today. A child can qualify by moderate delays in two areas, or a significant delay in one. Eden qualifies for services based on a significant delay in communication. The evaluators also suspect potential hearing loss/ impairment in her right ear. But interestingly, they said all of her other areas were within normal range, including gross motor (which is what we had originally sought evaluation about). Someone will contact us in the next two weeks to discuss a plan for her.
This is honestly not what either of us expected, and we've always thought of Eden as very "communicative," so we're not sure what to think. I'm starting to get how this process works, which is that the evaluators are looking for reasons to find that you qualify because then you get the benefit of the services. We're above the income level where there is really much of a benefit, however (we will have to pay for the services, in other words). But in any case, Eden qualified primarily based on conservative interpretations of my vague and clueless responses, but there was also some observation that supported the conclusion. So I'm not totally convinced she has a delay, but we will definitely get her hearing checked and go forward with the services to explore it further.
The thing that had concerned us most speechwise was that she stopped babbling around 6.5 months old, just two weeks after she started. About a week ago, she started doing single consonants again. But when they asked me about it I told them she doesn't really do it that much, just a "da" here and there.
Of course, the first place we hang out after the evaluation, Eden was "da"-ing up a storm:
Friday night we took her to a Shabbat potluck at our friend Amy Price's, where we led Hebrew kirtan chanting before dinner. At one point we heard a tambourine playing along in rhythm & we looked up - it was Eden!
Getting ready for Friday night Shabbat...
Saturday I think she cried less than 5 minutes total - wow! She took her first swim lesson at the YMCA. Then we relaxed at home on Shabbat for a few hours. Then we took a nice leisurely walk to Target & Morelli's ice cream.
Eden's first swim class!
Sunday Daddy took Eden to her first "Dance Church" in Decatur - kind of a meditative free form dancing. Then that afternoon we went to Red Light Cafe where our good friends Victor, April & son Coltrane had a going away party. (They're moving to Bend, Oregon for a new job. We'll miss them.) Eden got to sing on stage with Mommy & Daddy as well as listen to our friends play songs.
We had a fun trip to Williamsburg & Richmond for July 4th. While visiting Great-grandma Smylie on Saturday, Eden & Aunt Becky sat down for a little jazz duet...
Once again I managed not to get any pictures of Great Grandparents Puckett - so please send me pictures of Eden with her great grandparents if you have them!
