A little over two weeks ago, I described Scott's first time standing, along with my hope that he'd be walking by his second birthday which was just five weeks away at the time. He went ahead and amazed us by taking his first five steps just one week later.
And just like his first time standing, he took his first steps at his physical therapy appointment. Now, we love Becky, his physical therapist, (and Julie, his original therapist now on maternity leave), and she loves Scott. So I'm really happy that she got to see him both stand and walk for the first time. But I couldn't help feeling a little bit left out that I missed both of these events. Particularly since, (from the descriptions I've heard anyway), these were things that Scott just decided to do that were fairly incidental to any therapy going on at the time.
In the two weeks since, we've been trying to give Scott lots of opportunities to walk at home, but he hasn't been extremely enthusiastic about it. He would take a few steps every once in a while, but he'd also be just as likely to just laugh and sit down instead. So I hadn't even succeeded in getting any decent footage to post here.
But then, this afternoon, a friend came over and happened to set her 13-month-old son down to crawl around on the trampoline in the back yard. Scott wasn't going to be left out of this and insisted on joining in.
He immediately realized that this was a nice safe place and he started standing, laughing, and walking as much as possible. And I suddenly realized how foolish I had been. Of course he tried things out at physical therapy before trying them at home---at physical therapy he gets to play on thick, soft pads instead of the relatively hard carpet, tile, and hardwood he has to deal with at home.
So, finally, here is a short clip of Scott walking on the trampoline:
Again, see the video instructions if you need help getting the video to play.
What a difference the trampoline made! As soon as we came inside he kept walking all over the tiled, kitchen floor. He's still fairly wobbly and falling down every 6-10 steps or so, but he clearly gained a lot of confidence from his short time playing on the trampoline. We'll definitely have to get him out on that more often. (But we're off to the coast for the next three days---so we'll have to see how he responds to walking on sand.)
Thanks to everyone that has expressed their concern for Scott in words or in prayer. We really appreciate it.