Saturday, July 05, 2008

Eating

I wasn't going to post again today since I am supposed to be working on my homework right now, but Annika did something pretty cool tonight. She fed herself. It may not seem like a big deal, but to us it is. She doesn't really seem to know that her hands are hers. She didn't really discover that she even had hands until we go her. The second day she was with us she looked down and there was this super cool thing there that had wiggling fingers and a thumb and could turn back and forth. She knew that she didn't like people to touch them but didn't really understand what they were for.

Every time that we feed her we put puffs on her high chair tray. They give her something to chase around the tray and she will pick them up in her palm and that is where they stay. When early intervention was here on Tuesday, they recommended that we foods that are long and thin, similar to the shape and size of french fries, since she doesn't have a pinching grasp yet. They suggested cutting toast into long strips and these things called Veggie Stix.

Today we picked up some of the veggie things. I had to forcefully hold her hand in mine while I fed her a couple, but then after a while she picked one up in her right hand (GO ANNIKA!!!! another big weakness is using her right hand) and began to slowly gnaw away until she got to her hand. At that point she figured it was all gone and stopped not realizing there was more in her palm. Once she started, she was on a roll. I gave her some more and she would eventually position them so she could get them in her mouth and then gnaw away. She was very happy about this, there was lots of growling (her new thing when she eats), and MMMMMMM-ing, and lip smacking. I am going to try toast sticks again in the morning to see how that goes.

It is amazing how fast she learns new things. After you show her a few times she tries and tries until she can do it herself. She also started to stick her tongue out in the last couple of days because we have been trying to get her to mimic us doing that.

2 comments:

Allison said...

Yeah Annika! We're still struggling with food. What's the early intervention thing? I wonder if they could help us with our food issues...

Anonymous said...

What a big girl you are Miss Annika! We miss you and Alex already and now we have to wait until Christmas. By then you will be doing all kinds of cool things.
Grandma