Stand Up!

Today was a great day!

First of all, after yesterday's frustrating visit to the ER (nothing serious, Avyaan hurt his gum a bit while playing and we had to go to the ER because everything else is closed on a Sunday, everything is fine), a regular day would have felt wonderful, but today was more than that.

First, we decided to visit the wildflowers in Chino Hills State Park and La Sierra Trail Loop after seeing some posts om Instagram. We couldn't spend much time in the State Park as we reached just 45 mins before closing, so had to contend with just driving around and taking a few photos at the few pull-out points.

Went to the La Sierra Trail Loop after the park and the flowers there were gorgeous! Avyaan had a blast looking at all the colourful flora. It was a nice scenic tail but we were misguided by one of the patrons at the entrance when we asked if it was stroller friendly. Though the trail is only about 2 miles in length and has an elevation gain of 350 ft or so, the elevation gain and drop happens in small parts of the trail, making them extremely steep and therefore tricky to navigate with a stroller. Though exhausted, we came out happy. The few bird species that we saw were a bonus.

After a quick coffee stop, we returned home and had a quick dinner. Post dinner, it was time to try and have Avyaam stand up and walk. He has had the physical capabilities to do both for at least a couple of months now, but he seems to be scared of letting go of support. I'm not sure if it was the euphoria of the dose of Vitamin N, but today he did stand up for a few seconds and then made a game out of it where he will have me prop him up and let go, he would stand for a few seconds before jumping into my arms, giggling.

I can't wait for him to take his first independent steps. Anyday now, fingers crossed!

Climbing up in life, quite literally

In the last couple of days, Avyaan has reached three new milestones.

1. He has two new teeth now. The one to the right of the top incisors is halfway out, while the one on the left has had the tip come out. In the next few days these will come to their full length and I can see signs of more ready to shoot. With every new tooth, he's looking more and more mature. My baby is growing up :) :') 

2. He has pretty much mastered getting up to standing with support, but since yesterday he has been trying to get up without support. He can only manage to lift his bums  off an inch or so off the ground but I'm sure he'll be standing up on his own pretty soon. Once he did get a little further up, but quickly lost balance, rolled back like a skinny teddy bear, and started crying. Not the 'I'm in pain' kind, but the 'I'm not sure what happened and it felt scary, so I'll cry' kind. It took only a few seconds of calming him down for him to return to his usual shenanigans.

3. Today, he quite literally climbed onto the sofa, not from the ground up though. Prajakta was sitting on the floor, folding laundry and keeping the folded clothes on the sofa. As anyone with experience with kids knows, freshly folded clothes are a big flashing bull's eye for kids. So, Avyaan wanted to get to them. However, not being quite tall yet, he couldn't climb it. He soon figured out a way. He stood on Prajakta's knee, supporting himself with her shoulder and then put his knee on the sofa, followed by one hand, the other knee and the hand holding her shoulder in the end. Within seconds the neatly folded stack of clothes was history, but we were too amazed to care. He repeated the show a few times before getting bored and moving on to other things. Too bad I didn't think of taking a video.

Tomorrow he turns 11 months old and hopefully I'll be able to finish drafts of a post I've been meaning to share for more than a month now. 

Stay tuned.