The Shopping Cart

With Asher I notice the little things. And I mean the really little things. Like how his hands clasp or how he makes a certain sound or how his toes curl when he's working too hard. Some of these things I notice because I'm celebrating an achievement, and others because I'm over analyzing and worrying. It's become all about the small things, and the big ones have gone out the window.

For instance, a long while back I gave up on wishing for Asher to sit. Now don't get me wrong, OF COURSE I wish for him to sit, every minute of every day. But instead of just focussing on the act of SITTING itself, and feeling depressed and worried because he isn't, I have started focussing on the little things that are going to come before he sits.

Nine times out of ten he is well supported to sit - either in a lap, his high chair, his child rite chair, or his stroller. In fact, at first glance at him in any of those positions, a stranger would be hard pressed to see there's anything different about him. There are however, some places that no matter how much we try to support him he struggles. Take a shopping cart for example. He's floppy and bent on an angle and usually has an arm in the air for stability. He has bags and coats and whatever we have shoved in around him to give him some support but it's mostly futile. It's not pretty and it makes me sad to think that people are looking at him and wondering what's wrong.

But all of that changed this weekend. As you can imagine, we don't take the boys grocery shopping very often, for obvious reasons. Two babies/toddlers in a buggy for an extended period - not good. But on Sunday both of us were available and we had no plans so the whole family went for a field trip. Pretty sad that the grocery store excites us isn't it? But it's Superstore! You can buy EVERYTHING there! Jordan and the boys got the food and Rio and I spent some time with our good friend Joe.

We put Asher in his side of the buggy (thank you Superstore for having buggies that fit two kids!) and he grabbed the handle in front of him. WHAAAAAT! I nearly fell over. Grabbed the handle, with two hands no less, and sat there proud as punch! No bags or coats or purses shoved in around him - just him. Unheard of.

So we started pushing and I watched him closely. There he was, upright. We continued pushing and he continued sitting. Yes, he had the shopping cart strap around his midsection, and of course a metal bar between his legs, and then there's the fact that his jumbo brother was next to him. But I cannot tell you how much better he sat in there - how good he looked. Just two adorable boys in a shopping cart on a Sunday afternoon - no big deal to anyone else (ok well truthfully any time identical twins are out together in public it does cause a bit of a scene) but a HUGE deal to us. We had to adjust him a few times and by the end he was getting exhausted from working so hard, but this was a major achievement and a tangible way for us to see his progress.

Sitting completely unsupported? Still pretty far in the future I can imagine. But we're getting there - one shopping cart at at time.