Miles Signs!

Miles reading a map of Muir Woods

Although I'm no longer on "blog strike", I'm still not blogging as often as I used to because I'm trying to get a handle on my schedule. Until I do, you will get these random bursts of information. Hopefully they'll be insightful and entertaining!

I've been dying to share some exciting Miles news!! No...he's not walking yet. You'll hear about that one as soon as it happens. Which might be in the next few months because he is definitely getting closer to it! This morning during his physical therapy, Miles actually stood on his own while doing a task for a good 6 seconds or so. Before today, he hadn't stood on his own for more than 2 seconds and he wasn't even standing straight. So today was really amazing to see. As long as he is focused on something fun, he can do anything.

Miles has also made a HUGE leap in his communication skills. We have been teaching him certain sign language words for about 9 months, but he just wasn't picking any of them up. "Food", "more", "all done", "milk"......nothing. Well, with the help of his speech therapist, we decided to change our approach a little and teach him signs to things that he likes to do. His favorite thing, besides playing the drums, is reading. So "book" and "read" became our targets and within 2 days, he was signing both! Once he understood that by using the sign for book, he could get us to give him a book or read with him, it all started clicking! A week later, he was finally using the signs for "all done" and for "more". I have also seen him use the sign for "bird" and "train". So little by little we are introducing signs to words we use daily. "Music", "milk" and "food" are our next targets.

It's been such a gift to finally be able to communicate more specifically with Miles. More importantly, it's been great for us to realize that he understands a lot more than we gave him credit for. And not just in English, he understands Spanish just as well.

I have been speaking to Miles in Spanish since he was born. That's my primary language with him. Any conversation that I direct towards him, is in Spanish. And I can ask if he wants a "libro" (book) and he will point at the book. He might not be able to do the sign for "milk" yet, but he knows what "leche" is. And when I ask him to give me a "besito", I get a big, wet kiss on my cheek. Oh yeah, that's another awesome thing he's doing now, giving kisses. Not only does Miles love to hand out yummy bear hugs, but he is now really into giving us big, open mouthed kisses. He will blow kisses and wave at everyone wherever he is. It melts my heart to see him be so loving and friendly.

As for spoken words, he can say and mama and dada, though he doesn't seem to use them that often. He has tried to say "book" and "bubbles" and has on occasion said "agua" (water in Spanish) and "up". Someone was asking me the other day if teaching my son sign language would make him lazy about learning to speak. Honestly, I haven't met anyone who has had that problem. Miles wants to talk. In fact he does talk, all day long, in his own language. He will babble while he's pointing at things and looking back at us. He is constantly trying to communicate with us through his words, but we just don't understand them yet. So using sign language is helping alleviate some his and our own frustration. And if anything, it's made him babble even more and with a wide range of sounds that he wasn't using before. I am confident that Miles will speak and he'll probably be blabbermouth like his dad and I. But until then, we will use a combination of words and signs so we can better understand each other.

I will leave you here with a short video of Miles standing unassisted during his physical therapy this morning. Good times.