9 Month Update

Aaron turned 9 months last week. At his checkup, he weighed in at 20.8 lbs, which surprised us since he feels like he gains a pound every time we pick him up. But a friend of ours with a 1 year old said their chubby baby seemed to take forever to go from 19 to 21 lbs, so it must be a normal slowdown. He is now in the 50th percentile for weight and the doctor thought his weigh gain was good. His height is 28 3/4 inches, which is also down around the 50th percentile. She thinks he is en route to a physique like his father - tall and lean.

Aaron is still not crawling, and the doctor was a little worried about this. Since he had trouble sitting up on his own, we've been focused on getting him to sit (which he does really well now). But we probably haven't given him enough time on his tummy (which he's not a big fan of). We have to go back to the pediatrician at 10 months and if he is still not crawling, she may want to refer him to a physical therapist. It seems a little extreme to me since he's advancing overall, but she just wants to be proactive. She said chances are the physical therapist would say he's fine and that she is crazy, but she wants to be sure.

But now that we know that he should be crawling by now, we are actively focusing on that. I did read in one of my books that they need to sit up well before they can crawl, and since he had trouble with that, it stands to reason that he'd crawl later. The book also said that 7-10 months was a normal range for starting to crawl, so I'm not really concerned - just trying to avoid the referral to a physical therapist. Since most of our house has hardwood floors, we have made room in the carpeted dining room for Aaron to move around and play on the floor. He also has an area of our carpeted bedroom where he plays with toys, but we thought he needed somewhere more central.

Her other concern was that when she held him up with his feet on the exam table, he stood on his toes, and/or bounced. She had a hard time getting him to stand flat footed and support himself. No doubt this is a result of spending time each day in his Jumperoo. He has really strong legs, but strong for jumping, not for standing. He should be pulling himself up to standing position which he is not doing. So we are laying off the Jumperoo and giving him chances to stand holding onto furniture. I didn't realize that the 30-45 minutes a day he spent in the Jumperoo (over 2-3 sessions) would have such a strong impact, but apparently he got used to jumping whenever he is in a vertical position. I'm not ready to throw the thing out, but I will definitely be more cognizant with baby #2 (sorry Aaron, you are the experiment).

Other than that, he's doing great. And he only had to have one shot this time, but they did prick his toe for an anemia test.