our little angel

our little angel

Sunday, July 28, 2013

She's walking!

I can't believe just a week ago I was so excited to witness Hailey stand up unassisted and now she is taking steps! She isn't fully walking and often resorts to crawling (on hands and feet) but I couldn't believe it when she walked towards me yesterday! She even walked about 5 feet from the couch to her play table! She couldn't be more proud too. She would smile, clap and get all excited when she would drop.
Today we went to the beach again and she had some fun playing with other kids and their toys..she took a few steps there too except it's a bit hard on sand so she wasn't very stable and new she could get around faster crawling.
Here are a few photos and a video from last night!




Monday, July 1, 2013

The moment that made me so proud!

As some of you may know, after many different doctor/specialist appointments Hailey was diagnosed with having low muscle tone causing delay in gross motor skills. At first professionals just said "she will get there, she's just content sitting there" etc. I just didn't think it was right and my gut instinct was telling me there was something bigger going on than just her being lazy about it. Finally, after a couple more months of saying the same things to doctors they had her seen by a specialist which then diagnosed her. Her muscles around her joints were just too flexible hence her ability to do splits so easily. Even to this day her knees, feet and toes hyper-extend, though she's strengthened them a lot with regular physio. Her ankles still slant inwards a bit which was preventing her from walking well on her own but is self correcting.
She loves her physio therapist, and is very excited when she comes to visit. This helps a lot because she co-operates and learns new exercises with enjoyment! Suddenly she became interested and determined, first figuring out how to crawl, then pulling up, climbing stairs and walking with walkers.
Having this delay is so heart breaking as any parent would know with any delay. I fully understand it could be way worse and I am very great-ful it isn't, however I had so many mixed emotions and always wondered why and is it my fault! It's very hard to see your child who wants to play with other toddlers her age but can't get around! Even crawling is great and even though is now at the speed of lightening, still isn't where she wants to be. She wants to be at eye level with the others so she can play and explore.
One of the hardest part of this whole thing as well is hearing people say " oh be happy she isn't walking". For one, because she isn't walking doesn't mean she can't get into EVERYTHING. I witnessed her climb up stairs at the park bypassing a little boy who COULD walk and sit at the slide to go down before I caught up to her. She climbs on top of furniture including our bed. She's just as fast! I think the reason people think this is because their child/children probably had the crawling phase earlier and not as long. Hailey only learned to crawl after her first birthday so cognitively she was at the same level as a walking 12 month old. Still wanting to explore and discover things maybe a walker would except she couldn't walk. So she learned to go fast and still can get up and grab stuff at the same level as a walker. So those comments only aggravated me and didn't really help at all. I'm not going to lie haha. I found myself just nodding my head yes when people asked if she was walking and talking. It was just much easier than explaining the whole thing haha.
Now that you know the whole story, you can just imagine how happy and shocked I was when she took two steps towards me at the park the day she turned 19 months! She has been recently walking on all fours (hands and feet that is) and standing unassisted more and more.
It is only a matter of time now until she is walking. Those first couple steps meant so so much to me! I know she is working hard and I am so very proud.

19 months

Hailey is a full on toddler at this point! She just turned 19 months on the 30th of June and she has changed so much! First she is reaching terrible two's I'm sure, she likes to take tantrums when she doesn't get what she wants! It's a huge learning curve for myself and Rob but we're trying our best to stick to a method and not give in. So far it works. She got in a habit of grabbing our faces when we picked her up, not in a bad way cause she was angry, but in a curious/wanting to see our reaction way. We decided to try telling her "Hailey, we want you to be gentle" while taking her hand and gently rubbing our faces. Like we would do for our cats. It worked..she barely grabs/hits anymore! So for now we will just do our best with caution not to give in to her.
She learned a whole new set of skills in the past couple of weeks:
      She eats pretty well with a spoon now and also a fork for certain foods.
      She colours with her crayons with a pencil grasp.
      She gives hi fives, and says/waves byebye, as well as understands a lot more commands.
      She started walking on all fours, climbs up on all sorts of things including up stairs at the park and            
      down the slides...herself.
      My most proud moment (which I'll cover in my next post) is she took her first step! This was such
      an amazing moment especially with her delay due to low muscle tone. She works so hard!

Here are some pics of her new crawl and also Canada day.





Hailey's going to have a little sister

We found out on June 26th that we are expecting another little princess. After my midwife appointment, I got her to write on a paper the baby's gender.
When we got home we skyped with our family and got Hailey to open the paper and we found out together.
Later on we took some pics to reveal to extended family and friends!