Sometimes I am just so stinkin' proud of my kids. They really make me want to gush. Which I am about to do. Sorry. At least you were warned. But sometimes, when you get past the snot and the screaming and the general mayhem, you realize they really are the most amazing little creatures.
Right now Michael is practically making me swoon because he walked across the backyard on Sunday. I know, I know. It doesn't sound like much. But for him, this is HUGE. Leon started pulling up Thanksgiving weekend, and he took his first step on Christmas. I'm not sure when he started actually walking since that didn't coincide with a holiday, but it happened. (It stinks to not be the first child. And a twin. No milestones will be remembered for these poor little guys.)
But Michael never had any interest in the whole walking thing. It wasn't that the tried and failed; he just didn't bother to try. You could see what he was thinking. Why walk when crawling works just fine? (Plus there's the fact that he thinks he's a dog.)
Crawling was fine when it was cold and nasty out. Crawling was great when all he had to do was maneuver inside the house. But then it got warm outside. Our big snow was the weekend of Valentine's Day (again with the holidays. Sad, huh?) and the following weekend was gorgeous. We finally had temperatures in the 60s - normal Wilmington winter. So we headed outside. On Saturday we played in the backyard. Sunday the whole family headed to the beach. Michael spent a lot of time watching his brother and sister run around the yard and on the beach. You could just watch the wheels turn in Michael's head. He had to get in on the fun.
So starting the next day, Michael put some serious effort into walking. Every night after dinner he would spend 30 minutes walking in circles from the living room through the kitchen pushing various ride-on toys and walkers. He was even willing to walk holding my fingers, something Leon always refused to do. Michael was determined. But then he started teething, and the poor little guy got nine teeth all at once. Yes, NINE. Then we were all struck by the stomach bug from hell that knocked us out of commission for four days. Then Michael got better and his body could focus its efforts on getting all of his boulder size teeth through his gums. That led to The Worst Night EVER. Seriously. I thought the night when we were all uber-sick with the stomach nasties was bad. I ended up sleeping in the living room with the kids because I could at least hold down Gatorade, which meant I was way better off than Jeff. And I had the kids all in one place because at bedtime Michael was still puking every 15 minutes and Ree wasn't doing much better. Poor Leon didn't know what was going on, but it was just easier to have him with us. But we made it through that night. And it was still better than The Worst Night EVER.
On the WNE, Michael would SCREAM for an hour and a half, pass out for another hour and a half or so, and then wake up and do it all over again. And nothing would console him. His body laughed at ibuprofen and Orajel. He had no interest in teethers or cold wash cloths. He was so miserable he was even turning down popsicles. At 4:00 a.m. I had him in the sling and was jiggling him up and down while rocking him side to side and watching an Elmo DVD. And he was still miserable. And so was I. As though we hadn't been through enough, I had the flu and was running a fever and just wanted to crawl in bed for, oh, about two weeks, and Michael, of course, only wanted Mommy to take care of him.
But we survived that too. And the following night, Michael slept for 13 hours straight. Just passed out. I don't know if he even changed positions during the night. And when he woke up, he was a beautiful butterfly. Wait. Sorry. Too much Very Hungry Caterpillar. But when he woke up, his teeth had all broken through the gums, which seems to be the worst part, and he was free to work on walking.
And that's what he did. Over the last week, he has walked and walked and walked until he was able to walk across a room. On Saturday we went outside, and he watched everyone else run and play, but he still wasn't ready to try his balance on the grass. But on Sunday, he took off and walked about six feet from the kids' picnic table in the yard to the patio. And he was so proud of himself! He did it! He was playing like all the other kids! He just beamed. And so did I.
No comments:
Post a Comment