A Proud Day

Dear Ellie,

This past week was quite interesting.  You went through your 6 month growth spurt.  All of that reluctance when it came to eating evaporated and you sucked down as much milk as your stomach could hold.  By the end of the growth spurt, it seemed like something clicked inside of your head.  Like you took a leap to a new stage of awareness.  I noticed it when we were taking a stroll around the neighborhood.  Previously, whenever I took you outside in the stroller, you'd just sit back and gaze out across the scenery.  However, quite suddenly this time, you sat up in the stroller and peeped your head out of the side like a dog sticking its head from a car window.  You craned your neck at each little thing on the side of the road as it passed, then looked back at me with a shocked expression that seemed to say, "Whoa, where did all this neat new stuff come from?"

Here you are, sitting up in your stroller

Evidence of your positive development was especially keen today when the early intervention physical therapist came with a team to assess your developmental progress and examine whether you are delayed, as is so often the case with micro-preemies.  Based on the various skills you present, they give you a score and then rank you compared to other babies your age.  After making rigorous scientific observations, you were determined to be a 10 out of 10 on the cuteness scale.  Good work!  But aside from cuteness, they also determined that you were presenting as a 7 month old, even though you are only 6 months adjusted!  Even when compared to 10 month old babies, you are still considered within the normal range.  Today was a proud day.