Moving Forward

A day I believed wouldn’t come soon enough finally happened. I had my doubts and concerns, but my baby girl started crawling forward, and that accomplishment made us both very happy.

Since she was nine months old, Talia had been crawling backward and rolling. She’d even get up on all fours and rock back and forth, as if motivating herself to jump out of the starting blocks and crawl her way into a wonderful world of exploration.

Then, a day before she turned eleven months old, my chunky baby crawled to me on wobbly legs and arms. I started clapping and singing her name. After repositioning herself into a sitting position, she began smiling and clapping her hands, too.

For a while, I wondered if she wanted to crawl, or if she even could. Experts say nine months is the average age that babies start to crawl, but that it’s also not out of the ordinary if they don’t start until they reach 11 or 12 months. According to Parenting.com, two reasons that make a baby delay crawling focus on:

• Personality – A baby with a low-key personality tends to sit up, crawl and walk generally a month later than a “hyper” baby.
• Weight – A larger baby usually sits up, crawls and walks later than leaner babies.

In Talia’s case, both reasons described her crawling delay perfectly. For the most part, she’s a mellow baby until her big sister comes around. When Nandi enters the room, Talia is all smiles and full of animation. Now with the weight thing, I’ll just say that my baby isn’t even twelve months old, yet she wears 18-month clothes.

So, we now have two mobile children under the age of three in our home – I pray for strength (and eyes in the back of my head) daily. They definitely keep us on our toes, but we enjoy every minute of it. And with Miss Talia’s birthday just around the corner, we’re all wondering if she’ll be walking by then.      

My husband jokingly said she’ll probably decide to walk right before kindergarten.

Being the mother of two little girls with very different personalities has been interesting, even challenging at times. But I have learned, through trial and error, not to rush them into anything. So when our baby decides to walk, it will be at her own pace. But like any proud parents, it will be a glorious day, complete with still photos and videotaping galore. 

Chandra Caradine is a Sr. Public Relations Specialist for Texas Health Resources and Mom to two girls.