We have started taking him to the local playground, which has two sections--one of which is small and is designed to be wheelchair-accessible, which makes it perfect for very little boys and girls. It's not as exciting as the big playground, which keeps the bigger kids away. And it's fun to walk up and down the ramps. Owen even went down the little slide by himself a couple of times.
While he worked on walking, Owen abandoned a lot of other things. He regressed in his vocabulary and forgot pretty much all his signs for a few weeks. The week before he started to walk was the most challenging week we have had since he was a tiny newborn. Huge tantrums lasting more than 1 hour were happening more than once a day. He wouldn't eat. He wouldn't sleep. He didn't want a bottle. He didn't want to be held. He didn't want to be put down. He didn't want ANYTHING. It was horrible. I tried to return him, but they said they could only give us store credit.
We are just now starting to see him pick up a few words again and use his sign for "all done." Yesterday I think I heard him say "ball," although it's possible that the ball was just another balloon. He's transferred the word balloon, or a variant on it, to nearly anything in the sky or on the ceiling. Light fixtures, smoke detectors, the moon and airplanes are all "boon"s. He loves to pick out airplanes in the sky. It's become an important part of our bedtime routine to go into the back yard, say goodnight to the chickens and then point at airplanes and the moon and say "boon.."
Yesterday we took him to a pumpkin patch at a real working farm. You would think he'd be excited to see a field full of orange pumpkins but he really only had eyes for a yellow balloon that some other kid had forgotten. Fortunately we were able to carry the balloon with us on the hayride and to pick out our pumpkins, otherwise the trip may have been a bust. He enjoyed hugging onto some soft sheep and friendly goats in the petting zoo!
(More photos to come...)
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