Nappy Dance

I’ve decided to set myself the deadline of writing something – a paragraph at least about Edith’s development every month. It seems she is developing and changing so fast and that the discipline of writing will help me to try and save a memory or a moment regularly.

When Edith was born the community nurse gave us a red book where her weight, 

measurements, and developmental information will all be placed throughout her childhood. One of the pages in the book has illustrations of some of your child’s developmental milestones, and next to the illustrations you can write the age when they first did this thing. Seeing all these changes taking place is a matter of observation, we’ve spent much time discussing the first time we saw Edith lift her neck  fully or the first time she smiled. But the other half of observation is speculation about what we are seeing, how are we to read and interpret the gestures and sounds that Edith makes. Are we right to see them as Edith exhibiting emotions similar to ours, or could we be misinterpreting them?  How similar, or how different is Edith’s world to ours?

I come home and often change Edith’s nappy to give Amy a rest. Edith initially hated having her nappy changed but now she seems to enjoy it, particularly when she can kick and throw her arms around freed from her nappy. This seems to be a time of day when she experiments with movement and with language as well. Cooing, clicking and testing intonations, rolling the tongue around in her mouth, responding to me singing to her, moving my face closer and further away from hers. This is the most exciting time for me, seeing her experimenting and playing with the possibilities of communication. Language seems to bubble up almost unheeded from her.  It combines with a whirlwind of kicks and waves in an energetic horizontal dance.