Yesterday was Witten's 15 month check up. We had a few questions about his development because he doesn't seem to have many regular words yet in his vocabulary, and he refuses to walk. Yes, you heard me...he REFUSES to walk. We are all pretty sure that he CAN walk, but he doesn't think that he can, and he doesn't like to do anything that we ask him to do. When I described what I've seen him do, the doctor agreed. Whenever I've been able to distract him, I'll stand him up and let go. He then is able to stand until he realizes that I'm not holding on. Once that realization hits, he slowly lowers himself to the ground with even more muscle control than I think I would be able to muster up these days.

Tonight, I was able to stand him up on multiple occasions for long periods of time. I don't know if he just decided that standing on his own wasn't so bad, or if he had no idea that I had let go, but many of the times, I actually walked away from him hoping that he would take some steps to follow. While he didn't do that, he did show that he has complete control over his balance now. He just wants to do everything on his own schedule. We also tried eating with a spoon for the first time. I've been giving him a fork with his meal for quite sometime in order to get him used to holding it, and we've practiced stabbing at thicker food like meat, but this is the first time we've really worked on scooping up with a spoon. He seemed to really enjoy it, and loved the praise he got when he did it. While he needed help scooping, he did great getting the spoon to his mouth, and since we used sweet potatoes, they were nice and thick, so he didn't make a huge mess!He started back at his old day care today since I had to go back to school, and I talked to the director about moving him up to the toddler room and out of the infant room. He's been in the walkers class all summer at his 2 day a week school, and I really wanted him to stay with the kids his age. She said that would be fine, but when I got there and talked to his new teacher, I realized that she had not been told that he would be coming. She asked if there was anything that she should know, and I told her that he wasn't walking yet. The first thing that she said was that they had to be walking to be in the toddler room because they're all over the place in there, and that he would most likely be moved back down to the infant room that day. I let her know that that was an unacceptable solution. He is just as into things as the other kids are, he just crawls to get there. I told her that he was 15 months old, and WAY too big to be in with the babies. I did not want his development to dwindle just because he wasn't walking, and she gave in and said that it would be fine.

At the doctor's office, we got new stats on Witten. When he was 12 months old, he was still in the 5th percentile for his age which is great for how early he was. Yesterday, he was up to the 15th percentile in both height and weight. The doctor was shocked and VERY pleased. She said that all of his development (excluding the walking which like I already stated, she thinks he can do) is right on target for a regular 15 month old. He is 21lbs 10oz and 30" tall. I have a feeling that by the time he goes to his 24 month check-up, he'll be right there with the term kiddos!