Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Bonding

Last night I finally bit the bullet and attended the monthly meeting of our local DS parents' group. I took Kiki with me on the off chance that there might be other babies her age to play with.

Score! There was a little girl about 18 months old there in the day care room. I plopped Kiki in front of her on the floor. They stared at me; they stared at each other. Then they both leaned forward in slow motion and grabbed each others' noses.

Kiki was so engrossed in the new toys and little people her own size that she didn't even notice me leaving. The woman in charge assured me that if Kiki started crying, they would bring her to me.

Sure enough, about an hour and a half later, I hear an approaching cry. You know, I kind of assumed all babies sound alike when they cry. But I recognized Kiki immediately. I jumped up and made it to the door before they did! And of course, the minute she was in my arms, she was immediately smiles and giggles. The little monster.

But she did so good! One and a half hours in the care of strangers without incident! So I will continue to go to these monthly meetings. The information itself was great, and networking with other adults is always a good thing, but the socialization with other babies? Priceless.

And of course, I used the opportunity to aggressively pursue play dates. I collected numbers and names and all that. Because I am a pit bull mom or something.

We set therapy goals today for Kiki. She'll be starting occupational therapy pretty quick here. In the meantime, we're working on her tracking and passing smaller objects from hand to hand. I'm trying to encourage her to take things out of things and put them back into things. So far she just thinks it's fun to hear me cheer when she accidentally drops a ball into a cup.

She picked up a new game really fast. I pressed her nose with my nose and said "beeeep" like maybe twice, and now she does it. She'll lean forward and press her nose against mine or Kipp's as long as we'll "beeeep" for her.

And to truly prove she got the point of the game? Today during speech therapy, Ms. A put a large mirror in front of her on the floor. She said babies, when first introduced to mirror play, will generally just reach out for the mirror and touch at it.

Kiki scooted right up to it, grinned, and pressed her nose against it. "Beeeep!" I said immediately, because I am as trained as they come, and she giggled and did it again. And again. And again.

I think I'm on to something here. I'm not sure how to incorporate it into teaching her other things, but.... I think I'm on to something.

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