During the winter break, Aden, my now 10-month granddaughter visited. For a whole week, my favorite time was “Playtime with Aden”. Due to being diagnosed with mild hip displacia, she was sporting a cool white harness but this did not stop her from playing.
Sitting up tall, she would hand me a ball, as we both sat on our TV room rug. I’d hand it back. She’d drop it into the wooden box with a ramp. Cluck. It rolled back toward Aden’s hand. She’s grab it. Repeat.
Sitting next to the coffee table, the bottom shelf was just her sitting up height. She grabbed one plastic toy yellow rimmed cup and handed it to me. I stacked it into the green rimmed cup. She grabbed them both. After pulling the green rimmed cup apart, she handed it to me. Then she grabbed the red rimmed cup and handed it to me. Then she grabbed the orange rimmed cup and handed it to me. I put in into the red cup and placed them on the shelf. Aden’s eyes looked to my hands and to the shelf. She reached for the red-orange combo, nabbed them and handed them to me. Repeat.
My favorite playtime game was with books. Friends gave me books for Aden. Aden brought many books with her from her Advent Book Calendar collection. A few favorites included: Indestructible Baby Faces, The Very Hungry Catepillar with build-in teething ring, and my favorite, Urban Babies Wear Black (thanks, John!). Aden sat, held the book, turned the page, brought it to her mouth to take a bite as times and turned the page again. Repeat.
Once, as I sat on the rug with my legs stretched out in front of me, Aden did her best crawl while wearing her harness. She reached and pushed on my thigh. She scooted herself up up and over my human jungle gym. As I moved my legs to be criss-cross applesauce, she grabbed a book and sat right in my lap. Together we held the book and read. “The cow says moo. The cat says meow.” Her head turned to see my face and then turned back to the book, helping to turn the page. Repeat!