GraceAndGabbie.com

Gabrielle
Text Box: 6 Months We can’t believe that Gabbie is already 6 months old! Just in the past two weeks she has truly reminded us of it, though. She began with sitting up well with little support—by holding Mommy’s fingers. Soon she was holding herself up in a frog position, leaning low to the floor with her hands. Within a week, she was sitting in a tripod position. Now she is doing well trying to sit up without support a few seconds at a time—about 10 seconds each time. Go, Gabbie! Oooh, wait, she IS really going, too! Gabbie now LOVES tummy time (and grumbles when left on her back). She regularly reaches out for toys to pull to herself, and she’ll lie there contentedly, looking up at the action around her. But...the real story is that she is showing signs of wanting to crawl. She lifts her hips into the air, moves one leg up at a time, and does a low-crawl action with her arms at times. Gabbie has even made a half-foot trip so far! No help from Mommy! WITH Mommy’s help (giving her a support behind her feet) she’s gone much farther. Go, Gabbie, Go! Text Box: 8 Months — Oh, busy, busy, Baby! Another two months have flown by (sorry everyone), and Gabbie’s movin’ along, too. In the past two months, Gabrielle has had her 6 month check-up, two hearing tests, her first Parents-As-Teachers outing, her first Easter and visit with the Easter Bunny, Daddy home for two weeks, a Grammy visit, a visit to Grammy’s, and Grandma and Grandpa’s, and Auntie’s for her cousin’s confirmation, and a plethora of regular therapist visits. Whew! For such a little girl, she has a full calendar. But back to the details—I know everyone wants details! Gabbie was tentatively diagnosed by doctoral students at the university (as part of a voluntary screening) as having a type B tympanogram, i.e., a flat reading, i.e., can’t hear well, in both ears. The pediatrician said that since we had a full hearing test with the audiologist coming up soon, we should go the wait-and-see route. Well, the audiologist performed a Visual Reinforcement Audiometry test which clearly showed that she could hear that day. The tympanogram confirmed the students’ earlier findings, but the audiologist was able to give more details. Here’s what it all means: Gabbie can currently hear, but outside the normal ranges—though not too far outside. She must have fluid behind both eardrums (though no sign of infection), and this could mean that her hearing can come and go. That would explain the confusion at home, trying to determine if she can hear or not. Now we’re just waiting for the audiologist’s report to make it to the pediatrician for the next step. As for her 6 month check-up, despite a few days of recovery from the latest round of shots, all is well! And her therapy visits bolster that opinion. All of the therapist say that Gabbie is pretty much on target for milestones. She is behind on babbling—”Of course, Mommy, I can’t hear half the time!”—but she is eating solids well (love that oatmeal!), making lots of noise, tracking well, and sitting for loooong periods of time (She’s got something in the works with Guiness, I think.) Gabbie does, however, like to do things her own way. She doesn’t seem at all interested in crawling, but she found that she LOVES to stand, that is, pull herself up into a stand using Mommy’s fingers. She doesn’t like to roll over onto her tummy, but she’ll amuse Mommy and Daddy with the token roll—then quickly roll back to her back again, of course. Teething is still lurking in Gabbie’s life. A molar and two other teeth (a bicuspid and a canine?) are in the race, but all are SLOW! At least adult knuckles are in good supply in the meantime.