Thinking About Walking

G is one year old later this week. She certainly looks a lot more like a toddler than a baby now. The only thing is, she doesn't actually toddle anywhere, at least not without me holding on to one or both of her hands.
This picture shows a typical scene. She's steady enough on her feet, and is barely holding on to the sofa. But try to edge her away and she'll just plop straight down and start crawling. She's been crawling for so long, and is able to go so quickly, I don't think she really sees the point of toddling yet. No doubt once she starts I'll curse the day she ever learned. But then parenthood is full of these little contradictions.
G's singing group has started up again on Fridays, and last week as I looked around the room I realised G was just about the biggest baby there (toddlers go at a different time). This gave G a significant advantage, and she crawled around stealing toys from the other babies, even making off with one poor boy's sock. In fact, I thought she fitted rather too well into the role of playground bully. Hopefully she'll start walking soon, so she'll be the smallest one in the class again.

1 comments:

Hackney_bloke said...

Have you tried standing her with her back against the wall and moving slightly away from her. This trick was shown to me by the leader of my son's singng class when he was at about the same stage. It worked the first time I tried it - something to do with straightening their posture.
Even after your daughter starts to walk, crawling will probably be a preferred mode for a little while as it will be quicker for a while.