You Can Do It! - #8

Next week Janika will be 8 months old she is still not crawling. Now Angie and I take responsibility for this because we aren’t working with her as much as we did with Lenka. She was walking by 9 and half months, which what I hear is very early. When Janika was in the hospital recently, I had the opportunity to talk to some of the doctors and they told me that some babies won’t walk until after their first birthday. But crawling should be a priority for us. So Angie and I going to become dedicated to get our little girl, who is getting older fast, mobile.

I was in need of some tips to practice and I was able to find a nice simple 6 step method to get babies crawling in no time. I thought I’d share this with everyone so they can start working with their infant. This is something that Angie and I are going to work with Janika every day. And may I suggest you not wait until they are 8 months old.

STEP 1: Place your baby on his/her stomach on a carpet on the floor.
STEP 2: Gently hold Baby by the elbows and encourage supporting him/herself on elbows. Continue to provide support.
STEP 3: Measure, or try to get some measure of the distance between the floor and Baby's armpit in the supported position.
STEP 4: Get a *roller with approximately the same diameter as you've just measured. Rollers are soft cylindrical shaped toys... preferably firm. You do get inflatable ones, but firm, dense ones normally last much longer and can also be a valuable aid to get Baby to sit and walk.
STEP 5: Put the roller underneath Baby's upper body... elbows touching the ground in front of the roller. This supported position also allow Baby to lift his/her head and discover the surroundings.
STEP 6: Get down on the floor directly in front of Baby, face towards Baby. Now, let Baby look at your face while you talk to, amuse and encourage Baby to lift his head and take part in the conversation.

*Making a Roller:
1. Take any normal large bathroom or swimming towel.
2. Spread it out flat on the ground.
3. Reduce the width of the towel by folding it in half. You'll now have a long narrow towel.
4. Form a roll by rolling the towel over the length of the towel. Start at one of the short ends and finish at the other short end. You should now have a short fat towel roll.
5. Use this "roller" exactly as described in the baby crawl article.
6. If the roller is too small (low), then use 2 towels rather than just one.