My good friend John, who’s from Atlanta, has been staying with us this week while he takes a class at Dallas Seminaryd. One unique thing about John is what he does for a living. He’s a professional blogger.
Yelp…a professional blogger.
I know many of you have blogs of your own. If you want to learn how to take your blog to the next level, I highly suggest checking out his blog. He is a gifted writer and teacher, and gives all of his expertise away — for free!
He’s married to a super-mom, and they have two adorable little girls. I always enjoy hanging out with him. Not just because he’s one of my best friends and we always have a blast hanging out, but because every time we we hang out I feel like I can change the world!
He challenges me, pushes me, and holds me accountable to do nothing short of greatness. Always. That’s what I’ve got with John – what a great friend.
Oh, by the way. He’s also the person who encouraged me to start this website when it was just a crazy idea I had. (I have a lot of crazy ideas.) He told me he believed in me and that I should pursue this crazy idea of posting a daily one minute video of our son. He told me Noah’s story could impact a lot of people, and that I follow through with my idea of starting this site.
I think he was right. Thanks John.
Noah Drinks From A Straw For The First Time
This cup doesn't suck!
Noah has been doing really well with eating and siting up lately, and seems to really enjoy trying new things. So my wife picked up a Playtex Baby First Lil’ Gripper Twist ‘n Click Straw Trainer Cup (Wow! Trying saying that five times real fast!)
It’s designed to help your child learn to drink from a straw (which is important to help them transition from a bottle.) It’s super simple to use. You just fill the small cup up with water, and squeeze it gently to bring the water up through the straw. The idea is that once the water reaches the babies mouth, he’ll learn that he has to suck on the straw to get more.
He seemed to enjoy it, but at six and a half months old he likes anything he can get into his mouth.
It’ll be fun to see how his straw sucking ability develops!
Have you tried out the Lil’ Gripper cup yourself? Tried any other cups, bottles, etc that you’ve had succeess with it? I’d like to hear about them!
About Rick Smith
j is 11 months and no cups, sippies, anything will work for him. He will only play with them. He won’t hold his own bottle either. We just bought that Playtex cup today! They only had pink, but I don’t think he noticed. It hasn’t worked yet. We’re still trying. Hope it works for Noah!
Hey, thanks for stopping by. I don’t think he’ll mind pink, in fact I wear pink shirts all the time! He’ll be fine.
Noah was the same with the straw cup. He just wanted to play with it….but we’ll keep trying!
How’s things going with your little guy?
P.S. You should grab a Gravatar ——> http://en.gravatar.com/
Straws are great for the tongue and for mouth muscle tone, sippy cups are good too. Thanks for your blog, your son is beautiful, blessings to your family.
Kelly,
Thanks so much for the comments. We agree, he is a cutie!
We are going to keep trying to straw cup. Mr. Noah didn’t want to think of it, since it was his first time ever to try it.
Have you tried any of the Talk Tools stuff? Lots of families seem to enjoy those.
P.S. You should grab a Gravatar ——> http://en.gravatar.com/
good times. thanks for dropping me off so early!
I first saw your blog link on the Down Syndrome Association of Greater St Louis facebook page. It is awesome seeing the progress of your son. He looks so much like my son. My son, Logan, is 11 months old. It is so nice to see others enjoying the milestones and accomplishments as much as we are. You also give some really good ideas on things to try that no one else has told us. We are involved with first steps and have had kind of rough time with getting what we needed for our son but things are turning around now. Logan started his first physical therapy last week and they worked on getting him in the crawling positions and pulling up on things. We are hoping to get him involved in other therapies soon too. Thanks for your inspiration!
Thanks for the kind words, sorry I haven’t replied sooner. For some reason I missed some of these comments.
How is Logan doing now? What are you guys up to?
Rick- Your Pro Blogger friend John was right. Noah’s story has impacted a ton of people. Look where you guys are now, just 6 short months later. I’m so glad, and so are a lot of other people. Congrats – keep up the good work telling the world about all the awesomeness that people with DS have to share!
Hey thanks! Who would have ever thought the story we are sharing would have reached so many people?
God is amazing!
Do you have any children of your own?
The one thing consistent in all straw cups on the market is leaking. I haven’t found one cup that is completely leak proof, but some are definitely better than others.
I’ve found with Noah that a lot of his “leakage” comes from his method of “straw drinking.”
For example, when we finishes drinking, instead of letting the drink go back into the cup, he just sort of lifts off the straw, which makes it spill all over himself. (We go through a lot of bibs.) 🙂
What are some of the straw cups you’ve found to work better than others?
I started Colton at around 8-9 mths(now 15 mths) on a similar type of straw cup(but doesn’t have the squeeze function) after talking to a speech therapist that works with kids with DS. He does a pretty good job of getting some out, but still ends up with a lot down the front of him. He doesn’t even try to suck from a regular straw.
ما شاء الله تبارك الله
I’ve tried this cup with my daughter Joslyn (22 months) with not much luck. I’ve found it very hard to squeeze. Her speech therapist gave us a “honey bear” straw cup that uses the same concept but much easier!
Hi.I’m from Romania. Your friend, the blogger, was right. Your idea really impacted a lot of people, from all over the world.it inspired us as well. Many thanks.