Documentationaholic

Hello,  my name is Sarah and I am a documentationaholic.  I have an uncontrollable *need* to document all of the small, precious moments in life as they are happening so that they will never be forgotten.  I take pictures or video of everything.  I'll even snap a picture before "rescuing" my child...

"Who says I need rescuing?!?"

I have posted a few pictures such as these in the past:

Apparently the dishwasher brings out our little dare devil...

"Is his neck okay like that?" - a concerned bystander

These pictures were posted on here and on my personal Facebook.  Most people see the humor in the photos but there are always a few people who are "concerned" for the well being of our child.  The thing is...  We KNOW Ayden.  We know how strong he is, how steady he is, how he reacts if/when he falls or bumps his head.  We know his limits and because of that, we have been able to scaffold his development; which means not being helicopter parents but stepping back to give him space to explore so he can know his limits too.  Our house is not really "baby-proofed".  We make sure cords are tucked away, we use one gate at the top of the stairs and have another waiting for *when* he takes a crazy interest in climbing them.  We are always supervising him and almost always catch him before a bad fall but lets face it.  How is a child to learn if they never experience a consequence?  We also adjust our distance according to the activity, surface, etc. that he is working with.  If he is on straight up cement, we hold on tight.  If he is on carpet with padding underneath, we let him fall.  Ayden will be 9 months old on Friday and we are pretty confident that he will be walking before the 10 month mark.  Some of his strength and coordination could be genetics but I have always believed that nurture always wins in the nature vs nurture debate.  We let him nap on his tummy as soon as he was able to move his head from one side to the other, giving him early head control; and now we let him learn that if he looks too far up at the fan while trying to stand, it makes him loose his balance and fall.

My motivation for this post is not to claim that I think we know everything there is to know about helping a child develop, physically, to his/her fullest potential but to 1) remind folks that parents know their children and chances are there's no need for you to worry about them and 2) children can not meet new goals without a challenge.  Every time we let Ayden climb up on the dishwasher door or actually make contact with the ground when he looks too far up at that fan, he learns.  The same goes for gagging and Baby-Led Weaning.  He quickly learned how much was too much/how far was too far and after finding that limit 2 or 3 times, it never happened again.

REAL food eating champ!

And now when he decides to multi-task while standing, he quickly uprights his head and grabs onto whatever is in front of him and maintains his balance.

Babies are very quick learners and if you give them a chance they will learn lessons and limitations very efficiently making them ready to tackle whatever comes next.

This kid will never be able to complain that there weren't enough pictures and videos taken of him as a baby, that's for sure!  And now, for your viewing pleasure, here is a clip of Ayden's dance party this evening.  He must have had a song stuck in his head because there was no music :).

We love this kid SO MUCH (if you couldn't already tell).  So much love, challenge, and entertainment all wrapped up in a tiny wonder package named Ayden.

~Sarah