Tom and I made sure Leah got lots of floor time. When she was a newborn, we put her on her tummy and dangled toys in front of her. When she was around 4 months old, we practiced a rolling exercise to help babies learn to roll from back to tummy and vice versa (She actually rolled from back to tummy near her 5 month birthday).
When Leah was 6 months old, and some of her little playmates were beginning to crawl, we decided to "teach" Leah to crawl. We would put our hands behind Leah's feet so she could push off. We modeled crawling by getting on our hands and knees. We would lift Leah's butt up. It was pretty funny because she would rock back and forth then drop to her tummy. But our hard work was paying off and Leah was getting the idea. It's amazing the progress she has made! Her crawling went from going inches across the floor, to going a few feet, and now...
Now, Leah is zipping around the room. She's army crawling, but wow, it is fast! She's starting to get on her hands and knees and I predict that in a couple of weeks, she's going to be really crawling - the real deal! Her world is opening up before her. And my work just got harder.
Here are pictures from a class we started called Infant Times 2 for crawling babies. At the beginning of class, we sit in a big circle and sing songs and sign to our babies. Then we have 40-45 minutes of play time and we let the babies loose. Leah had a blast. There were toys all around the room, a huge drum in the center of the room, inner tubes, ramps, and little inflatable houses that the babies could crawl into.
The first thing Leah went to were these plastic tubes. Isn't it funny the things babies like? We have a bunch of expensive wood toys at home that she doesn't play with, but she plays with these things.
Leah getting ready to snorkel (Tom's caption for this picture).
Still playing with the plastic tubes.
She found this spiky ball but...
Went back to the plastic tube.
Leah in a inner tube. She made it all the way through!
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