To start off, the title of this post might be misleading. ^^|

No, Darius has not started walking yet, which is a milestone usually accomplished by babies closer to 1 year old. In fact, he hasn’t even mastered the skills of rolling, crawling or sitting independently yet.

So why this title then? Well, it started off with a change in how he is beginning to use his feet for. Maybe a short overview about his little pair of feet since the times when he was just a newborn might help explain this better:

Darius had been a hyper-active baby since he was born, and he had been kicking his legs regularly (see Hyper-active Newborn), especially so when he was complaining. People around us, including ourselves, were quite surprised how different he was behaving compared to the other babies we have seen. I, for one, have never seen or heard about a newborn kicking his legs so often. On the hind-side, this might have attributed to him growing taller (more kicking = legs grow longer?).

He had also always preferred us holding him up in a standing position, and had hardly enjoyed lying down. Since he had also preferred us carrying him over our shoulders than cradling, we supposed his reason for the preferrences was likely due to his interests in looking and observing his surroundings from a higher vintage point.

And so standing assisted he often was, since most of the time we would have to put him in such a position so that he would not start complaining. This might have helped strengthened his leg muscles along the way. While lying down, he had also preferred to have something to ‘step on’, so we often placed his feet close to the edge of the bed or the sofa so he could happily kick or push at the object near his feet.

A week ago, he started to be more responsive when he held him under his armpits and played the ‘bouncing’ game with him. That is, we simply carried him up and down while simulating a jumping/leap-off action, while making sure the movements were not too great, which might lead to brain damage. When we used to do that initally, he would just have his his legs straightened throughout. About a month ago, he started to bend his knees as he was lifted off. And a week ago, he started to time our ‘jumps’ and instinctively pushed his feet against the surface he was on while we lifted him up.

This, we suspect, could have been somewhat related to the debut swim he went through a fortnight ago (see Water Day for Darius!). Though it was just a one-time activity there, we did realise his legs were more agile thereafter.

So, back to the topic, what were exactly the changes to Darius’ feet? Read on… ^^

I first discovered the change on Tuesday evening, when I was holding him face-to-face with my arms under his armpits as per usual and expecting him to adopt the standing position. However, unlike before, his knees ‘gave way’ and he wouldn’t stand firmly with his legs straightened anymore.

While I was wondering if he was feeling tired or lazy to stand properly, his right foot moved a little forward. I wasn’t sure what he was attempting to do until he lifted up his left foot too to join his right.

Subconsciously, I moved back a little (still supporting him of course) and he lifted up his feet one after another and started ‘walking’ (or should I call that ‘limping’ instead ^^|) towards me! His feet were certainly not strong enough to support his body weight yet and he would easily topple over without my support, but I was already very proud of him to be attempting his first little steps for his age!

I then guided him to walk from the mattress near the television to the Pooh Bear playmat (approximately a distance of 3 metres), and he really did manage to ‘walk’ through the whole journey while appearing to be enjoying his newfound ‘ability’. Catherine was of course very surprised too and were even suspecting if I was the one lifting Darius’ feet instead. I did tilt his body a little at times to indicate to him which leg he should move next, but Darius had done the lifting and moving forward motions all by himself.

Here are two short video clips we have captured of him attempting his little steps. Before I forget, I would like to mention that my voice in the videos (and other previous videos) is not representative of my real (aka manly ^^|)voice. You know, when we converse with babies, we tend to pitch our tones higher and make it sound more… kiddish, if that’s the correct way to put it. ^^|

Meanwhile, we were also wondering if the walker had helped in his progress too. Recently, we had removed the supporting mat below the walker so that he could touch the floor with his feet, since his legs had managed to reach the surface. He would then start to push himself backwards with his feet, though he had not managed to move himself forward on the walker yet.

Anyway, I did a search on the Web and found this related article from Baby Center:

You can encourage your baby to walk by standing or kneeling in front of him and holding out your hands. Or you might hold both his hands and walk him toward you. He’ll probably also enjoy a toddle truck or push toy that he can hold on to as he walks. (Look for toddle toys that are stable and have a wide base of support.)

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) strongly discourages using baby-walkers. Because they make it so easy for your child to get around, walkers can prevent his upper leg muscles from developing correctly. And because they make it possible for your child to reach hot items or poisons that he wouldn’t normally be able to get to, they aren’t safe.

You can also hold off on introducing shoes until your baby is walking around outside or on rough or cold surfaces regularly. Going barefoot helps improve balance and coordination.

Though we know that baby-walkers could hinder our baby’s development, we will still continue use it, but with monitoring and at limited durations of course.

As for encouraging Darius to continue his ‘stepping’ journey, I have considered getting a Learn-to-Walk Belt but Catherine mentioned that holding him directly would give him more motivation and closeness instead, so looks like I will have to carry on with my backwards duck-walking with him for now. ^^|

I am also interested in getting the VTech First Steps Baby Walker to aid Darius (why are these called ‘walkers’ too? Kinda confusing…). We have two VTech products so far and both have met our expectations, so I believe it’s a reliable brand. Also, there ain’t many baby walkers for 6-month old babies (not referring to the sitting types) so choices are pretty limited in the first place.

Before considering buying/renting it though, I need to remind myself that Darius has not yet learnt to stand up on his own nor has done any cruising (i.e. walking with the support of objects such as sofa or walls) so all these might be too early for him. I will need to think and research more on these topics before we are to move on without disturbing his development.

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