"Car-Car"

Sammy's favorite word this week is "car-car". Him and Joseph play cars all day. Sammy thinks airplanes, trucks, vans, anything with wheels besides trains is a car-car. Trains are "tri tri". This age is always so fun, because their vocabulary just explodes. Yesterday the naughty boy kept turning off the girls movie and saying "Over!". The girls can't get mad at him, but after ten times they brought him to me, so they could finish the movie. The other day he surprised me by saying "Hi La lan(Lillian)" when he saw her after school. Lillian had tears in her eyes she was so excited (She cries at everything! She was crying when she first saw him walk, she takes after my mom who cries at everything too).

Sammy continues to improve on his walking. He is having some trouble consistently standing back up. He does it half the time, but it is hard for him so he gives up if it doesn't happen the first time. Because it is harder for him, he tries catching himself with his hands before falling all the way to his bum, then he has no problem getting back up. He is struggling with getting his left leg/foot in close enough to support his weight. We have been practicing with him to put his left foot forward first then his right. If he remembers to do this, he will get up with no problem. But his first reaction is to lead with his strong leg. Our PT says this is a super hard thing for kids with hemiparesis to do, so we are just so happy he is walking and standing up independently way before we expected.

One thing, I always notice when he has a new gross motor milestone is that his left hand tends to get tighter. I am trying to stretch him more, but he is fighting this more and more as he gets older and busier. I know the tightness will go away with time, it is just trying to stay loose during this adjustment period.