Yesterday Wesley’s speech therapist came and did an annual review. She goes down a list of questions that she asks me (“Can Wesley do…?”) and if he passes then she goes to the next question. She stops going down the list when he fails five questions in a row. She also does a few tests with Wesley (like set out three objects and ask him to identify and pick one of them specifically) to see how he responds. Then he’s given a percentile ranking.

First off, she was impressed by Wesley’s attention span yesterday. Sometimes he’s all over the place, but he sat and worked with her really well for the first half hour.

She graded him on the scale for 18-23 month olds (he’s 23 months). He scored in the 18th percentile. I thought that sounded really low, but she said it’s actually really good. Kids have to score in the 7th percentile or lower to qualify for the services Wesley receives. On the other hand, when she scored him using the scale for 24-29 month olds he ranked only in the 3-4th percentile. But that’s OK, because he has six months to improve and we’re sure he will. She said he’s functioning, speech wise, at about the level of a 17-month-old. Which I didn’t think was too bad.

Part of the reason he did well is that he hit two major milestones this week. Speech is typically harder for kids with Down syndrome to get, and for Wesley it’s been hard in part because he’s always struggled with imitation. Imitation is one of those essential developmental skills that he needs to have for speech.

He started imitating some motor skills, like clapping, in the last month or so, but if you say, “Hey Wes, say, ‘mamamamama,'” he’ll just stare at you. Or, more likely, grunt at you to get you to stop trying to make him do something he doesn’t want to do.

First milestone: This past week we discovered that if we coughed, Wesley would cough too. This was amazing to us! So now we’re often playing the Coughing Game. See below.

Now, Wesley still doesn’t initiate the game himself. That’s one thing the therapist talked about (with much concern, actually)–Wes has got to start initiating more. Not just with sound games, but with everything. She freaked out a little when she asked if Wes will point to objects he wants and I told her no. If you offer Wes something, he’ll let you know if he wants it or not. If he finds a container of pretzels he’ll bring it to you to give him one. If he’s tired he’ll come up near you and wait for you to pick him up. And if you hold something up for him to come across the room to get, he’ll hold out his hand as he walks towards you to get it. But I’ve never seen him point at something to indicate he wants it. I’ve never heard him make noise to indicate he wants something without me offering him something first. And he doesn’t lift up his hands for us to pick him up unless we hold out our hands first.

I would never think of these things unless someone pointed them out to me. It was kind of exhausting, listening to the speech therapist go over all this with me and give me assignments.

I hope that pointing to objects will be around the corner. I know it took Wes a long time to figure out how to use his pointer finger at all. It’s just been in the last couple of weeks that he’s gotten good at using his index finger to point. I think it’s because we have a star stacker toy that has a button on the top (a very small button) that he learned how to push with his index finger. He will sit for ten minutes pushing that button and making the music play over and over again. And it seems that the therapist was kind of freaked out when Wes was younger (closer to one) that he didn’t use his pointer finger at all. He’s getting it now, though, so maybe pointing to objects isn’t too far off.

Something else the therapist wants us to help Wes do is to pretend feed stuffed animals. She brought a stuffed bear, a plastic cup, and a plastic spoon. She told Wes the bear was hungry and showed him how to put the spoon to the bear’s mouth. Wes didn’t get the idea of feeding the bear right off. But–and this surprised us–after a few minutes he started dipping the plastic spoon into the empty cup and putting the spoon to his own mouth, like he was pretending to feed himself. I don’t think I’d ever seen Wes do anything pretend before. And a little while after that he would put the spoon to the bear’s mouth (or, his face, anyway). I only just started helping Wes use a spoon to feed himself this past week. I put a little yogurt or baby food in a bowl, help him grip the adult-sized spoon, and keep my hand over his to help guide his hand to the bowl and up to his mouth. He gets the basic idea of using the spoon, and his coordination will get better over time so I won’t need to guide him so much.

Second milestone: The other great thing Wes is doing that involves imitating sound is shown here (sorry it’s dark):

Is it his first word? I’m not 100% sure, but the speech therapist thought so. Because he can say one word he scored better on the speech review. Also, while the therapist was here Wes dropped his plastic cup on the kitchen floor and said, “Oh oh.” He makes the sound “oh” frequently, so it may have been coincidental, but the therapist thought maybe it was intentional. It’s hard to know. By the time Wes is 2 1/2 they want him to be able to say five words.

Evidence of Wesley walking downstairs by himself (see this post). Wes is 22 1/2 months old.

Friday I took Wesley to his first parade. He is really into watching stuff that moves.

This is us at the start of the parade. Not really sure what Wes is doing here. Pulling his hair out in excitement?

The parade opened with a long line of emergency vehicles, all blaring their sirens. Why? Not really sure. Especially because it usually makes the little kids cry. I kept an eye on Wes, but he was fine. The only time his face puckered like he might cry was when a fire truck blew its horn RIGHT NEXT to us. Like, five feet away. Even I jumped. But no tears spilled from Wes.

Wes liked watching the cars and people move by. By the end he was tuckered out.

But I managed to get a clap from him anyway.

The next big milestone will be when he can appreciate all the candy that was thrown to him instead of me eating it all.

Announcing the arrival of Wesley’s THIRD tooth!

I discovered it today on accident while tickling him upside down. He already has his lower front two teeth. His first tooth started coming in April when he was 19 months old. The second one started coming about a month after that. Then there was this drought where we thought he’d never get more than those two teeth. So we are surprised and happy to learn he’s not doomed to gumming soft foods forever.

I assumed his next teeth would be his upper front teeth. But his third tooth is coming in the top left side, near the back. A molar? Possibly a canine, but it seems further back than that. So at 22 months we have a grand total of three teeth.

Let the rejoicing begin.

Also, since he’s on a roll of big boy-ness, here’s something else he did that surprised us this week. Wednesday he was visited by his physical therapist, who was extremely impressed by how well he’s doing physically. She said even if Wes were “normal” he’d still be doing great. One thing we’ve been working on is helping Wes walk up and down stairs. I hold his hand and make sure his other hand is either gripping a rail or sliding along the wall. He’s been doing well with that, and I’ve even seen him walk up and down the stairs by himself, sideways, holding onto the rails with both hands.

His therapist gave us the next goal: to help him walk up and down stairs with one hand gripping a rail/sliding along the wall and the other hand holding a toy, while I guide him along by his elbow.

Not two hours after his therapist left, John and I were standing in the upstairs hallway, talking, when Wes goes to the top of the stairs and starts walking down them. BY HIMSELF. Sliding one hand along the wall. Without a toy in his other hand.

He must have just felt confident or something after his therapist’s visit. I stopped him, though, because I wasn’t quite ready for him to think he can just march downstairs on his own like that. But hey, now we know he can do it.

Today during sacrament meeting at church John and I looked down at Wes, who was sprawled across both our laps, dead asleep, and John whispered, “When did he get so big?”

It’s true. Wes was 3 lbs 15 oz at birth and so small you could pretty much hold the trunk of his body in the palm of your hand.

He’s still small for his age–he wears about size 12 month clothes (and we have to roll up his pant legs twice) even though he’s 22 months old –but he has definitely grown.

I was carrying him out of church today and he felt like a load of bricks on my hip. I think he weighs about 20-21 lbs. Which, as you parents know, is the magic number for moving the kid from the backward-facing infant car seat to the front-facing BIG BOY car seat.

I bought him a front-facing car seat a while ago when I saw it at CostCo at a good price. The outside of the box said the child needs to be 22 pounds to sit the seat facing front. OK. Wes is really close. So we got the seat out of the box to see what it was like and to see how Wes fit in it.

And then I looked at the actual instruction booklet, which sneakily includes more details than the outside of the box. It says the kid has to be 22 lbs AND 34 inches tall.

Wes is only 30 inches. Which is a huge improvement from the 16 inches he was at birth, but it’s taken him almost two years to put on those 14 inches. How long will it take him to get an extra four inches???

Also, when will he get more teeth? We’re extremely proud of his current two teeth. We waited a long time for them. But Wes is going to be 2 in less than two months, and how many 2-year-olds do you know with only two teeth? Alas, another lesson in patience. He doesn’t mind, in any case. He can still eat pretzels, and in his mind, this is all that matters.

I read the other day that if your child is 18 months old and doesn’t say a couple words in addition to “mama” and “dada” then he or she is probably speech delayed.

I thought, “Wow! Kids at 18 months can talk?” This was astounding to me. Since Wes is my standard, I forget that he’s not the standard for “normal” kids. Wes is nowhere near talking. But he knows three signs really well: 1) more, 2) please, and 3) snack. The essentials, you know.

I wonder when he will talk. Wes is really excellent at some things. Like physically he’s strong and athletic and loves to move and run (which is unusual for kids with Down syndrome; they usually tend to be more lethargic because of low muscle tone). He has a terrific attention span and keeps working at things even when he can’t get them right away.

But the one thing that it’s obvious he’s slower at is imitation, especially imitating sounds. I guess this is why it took him 19 months to learn his first sign, even after I’d been doing that sign to him for over a year. With sounds, we can’t get him to imitate at all. He’s really great at watching you make the sound, though, if that counts for anything. He’ll often smile at you, too, because he thinks you’re funny.

But he babbles and talks to himself (makes sounds) when he plays, and his speech therapist says that at least that’s something.

I just know that his increase in height and weight is only one indication of how much he’s grown. I was looking back at our blog posts when Wes first joined us and, wow–both he and we have come a long way.

All I’m asking for now is four more inches, just four more inches…

No, Wesley didn’t get beat up. He just found the canister of cocoa. I guess I’ll have to be more diligent about closing that pantry door.

Wes is at that age where he is into EVERYTHING. Like baskets.

And he’s like a little rocket, zipping from one exciting thing to the next without pausing. Therefore, our living room (and rest of the house) frequently resembles this:

It’s exhausting trying to keep the house in perfect order, so I save my energy for when I know we have company heading over.

This week we spent some time in Park City after one of John’s interviews and visited the Olympic Park. A few highlights.

Future bobsled driver?

We took a guided tour that included a handful of tourists who were obviously parents/grandparents based on how much attention they gave to Wesley. When they were taking photo ops at the bobsled, they insisted Wesley get in for a picture, offered to take the picture for us, and waved their hands wildly and made funny noises to catch his attention. I tell you, you can’t be inconspicuous with a baby. Especially with Wesley.

We also watched the aerial jumpers practice. In the summer they use a pool with bubbles (to pad the landing). Can you see the ski jumper in red pants doing a flip?

The tour took us to the top of the ski jump. I decided I’m too afraid of heights to be a ski jumper. Do you see how STEEP and HIGH and ON THE EDGE A MOUNTAIN this is? I’m just saying. Good thing that wasn’t one of my great life ambitions.

A family photo in the mountain heights.