Dancing Success

All smiles at dancing today

What a difference a week makes! I am beyond pleased to report that I took Felix back to dance class today, armed with some new tactics, and he had a great morning! He took his two favourite teddies this morning (his technicoloured monkey and his ugly sock cat), and whenever he felt a bit insecure he was able to cuddle them for a while. If Felix was shy about doing the actions to the songs, I made the monkey or the cat do the actions which soon had him giggling and wanting to join in.

I planned to sit, slightly outside of the circle of kids, this morning so Felix could observe them for a while. However, wanting us to be included, the circle kind of moved out towards us until we were a part of it (which was really lovely). I was surprised that Felix wasn't actually bothered by it at all. I could tell he felt more comfortable having his toys there, and a couple of dances today were to his favourite songs which made it even better. He was full of smiles and even did a few actions to the songs he knew. He still didn't stand up too much and preferred to be snuggled up against me or on my lap, but it was such a huge step forward from last week so I was very happy with that.

Quiet time with Spartacus

During one part of the morning, the teacher pulled out some padded mats to see if the kids wanted to try and do a somersault or a backbend. I took Felix over to the first mat, and put him in position to do a somersault and he did a beautiful one, with his head tucked under nicely. He looked quite pleased with himself after. I then took him over to the second mat to try a backbend. I wasn't too confident that he would even lay on his back on the mat, but he did, and even let the teacher put his hands behind him and help him up into a backbend position. He's so super flexible; one of the unique traits of people with Down Syndrome. If it's something he enjoys, then I think dancing or gymnastics could become a regular thing for Felix. He certainly has the agility for it.

After his very busy morning at dancing, Felix was well and truly ready for his sleep. I put him to bed and he waved at me and blew kisses as he sat there, with his monkey under one arm and his sock cat under the other. A few minutes later I heard a big bang and Felix crying. Poor little guy had whacked his forehead against the side of the cot really hard. He was sobbing but, after a quick cuddle with me, he reached out to go back in his cot. He lay on his belly, with his sock cat tucked under him, still breathing heavily from crying but happy to go to sleep. He is now sporting two nice big, blue bruises on his head; looking every bit like a typical two year old accident-prone boy!