Hi everyone, just wondering some rough development stages your little ones had. I’m not following charts, and so on, but I’m quite amazed with the speedy development that Toby had, especially in the last month or so, and I’m reading a bit about it. I feel in some areas he’s a bit ahead of himself.

He just turned 4 months old; he’s been holding his head and back quite well before he was 2 months old, and being generally quite strong; he never liked being held like a baby. I guess this is because he’s carried in the sling all the time (we don’t even have a pushchair). In the last couple of weeks, he’s been very mobile; sitting up (aided, and recently unaided too for a short while). Standing up is his thing. and this is where I feel he’s particularly strong; if you try to help him sitting up, he goes straight into standing up. He also jumps and pushes himself up on my knees. Because he’s only 4 months old, I just feel a bit scared to let him stand on his legs for too long, but at the same time, he enjoys that a lot.

He’s been quite vocal the last week or so too; a delight to listen and watch… He’s turning on his tummy too, very agile; that as well in the last few weeks or so. He loves sleeping on his tummy, and though I understand is not quite recommended to let them sleep like that, he seems to know what he’s doing. I keep a close eye on him as we co-sleep. Thanks, Bianca

Mine have all been very different.

At four months, Len could sit unaided but couldn’t move around much and was very chatty. Fliss could move around by rolling over and over to get what she wanted, but couldn’t sit until she was 5mths and was quite quiet. Miri has been the noisiest, but was still a tiny baby in terms of movement, she can only just sit now at 6mths and is very good at wriggling around now!

Len crawled at 10mths, walked at 18.
Fliss crawled at 8mths, walked at 12.

There is a huge range of normal!

Just go with it, they know what they’re doing! I always had people saying “don’t let him stand on his legs like that, he’s too young!” My son was jumping and pushing himself up from only a few weeks.
He held his head up at 6 weeks,
rolled at 4 months, but back to front came first, and he couldn’t go the other way for a few weeks.
Sat up unaided at just turned 6 months
Commando crawled at 8 months, and started pulling himself up on the furniture.
Crawled on hands and knees at 9 months.
He isn’t walking yet, at just turned 10 months.

I agree, huge range of normal - and bear in mind that developmental charts etc are actually for helping you figure out if there’s a problem, so the ages suggested are ones when *most* babies will have hit that particular milestone.

Neither of mine ever had any head support, so consequently they both had excellent head control from *very* early. At 8 weeks, grace could roll from back to front, and at 5.5 months she wiggled off the sofa and started cruising round the furniture. She couldnt sit unaided until past 6 months though - mostly i think because it involved being still! She walked at 10 months, but *hated* crawling, and cried everytome she needed to do it to get to where she wanted to be. She had well over the “recommended” number of words from as soon as they had lists. At 18 months she was climbing to thd top of climbing frames and shouting down “too easy”! She is a massively physical child though and consequently has the attention span of a gnat, coupled with toddler “deafness”!

Jude is completely different - her big thing is communication, so she smiled, babbled, and made eye contact “early”, but is pretty chilled about the physical stuff - rolled at about 3 months (back to front), sat up unaided and commando crawled at about 5, and at 5.5 is gearing up for crawling.

I think it just depends on your baby - I have heard differing opinions on helping babies to stand though - one tribe somewhere helps them to stand from birth and has very early walkers, another researcher suggests that encouraging the “walking reflex” is not great for babies’ legs. I don’t have an opinion on it, but i’m just aware that there are differing opinions, so you may want to check it out and see what you are happy with

Angie

Aww, this is such a lovely time, I think around 4 months or so you really start seeing their personalities emerge a bit. I’ve always found it interesting too how babies often seem to concentrate on one area, then another, or do a big development spurt and then just rest for a while. It reminds me that whatever we do, tbh, they generally know what they need. I’m really not a big fan of charts and babies, but I think if you are all enjoying yourself, thats the main thing.

Having been through baby stages eight times so far I can definitely say I never noticed a normal
DD1 held her head up from around 3 weeks, rolled around 4 months, crawled at 7 months,started saying recognisable words at 10 months, walked her first steps on her first birthday.
DS1 held his head from a couple of days, but didn’t do much else forever, rolled over around 7 months, spoke recognisable words from around 14 months, walked at 18 months.
The others varied at all ages between. Head holding from birth to maybe 6 weeks, rolling anywhere from 4 months up to 9 months, recognisable words anything from 10 months up to 18 months, walking anywhere from 10.5 months up to 20 months., DS2 DD3, and DD4 never crawled, DD2 used to move upright but on her knees, DD3 used to bum shuffle, DD4 just went from sitting and rolling about to walking. There was no correlation between early/late head support/rolling/walking either so couldn’t even take a guess at normal for a couple of the children
Enjoy every stage, they’re all wonderful x

Becks

Hi Bianca,

It’s lovely to hear an update from you and all the things Toby is doing. I just wanted to mention that Leo was rolling onto his tummy by 4 months and my HV told me as long as they are doing it themselves it’s not a problem for them to sleep on their tummies.

Charlotte x

Thanks lovely ladies; yes, indeed a wide variety. I was just curious to see other than books opinion. Hmm, love being a mama, and so enjoy each stage of my adorable bundle of joy.