He's got legs!

Krassi has made some HUGE progress last week in his awareness of and ability to use his legs and feet. After having lived so many years relying primarily on his right arm, his whole body has been slowly blossoming since coming home (well, really, starting even before that during his last year at the orphanage when he had a physical therapist working with him, and his baba who made sure she used her time with him during the week to build on what he was doing with his therapist. I can't discredit that!)

But this is really significant to me. Prior to last week when he would try to pull up on something - the couch, or his lego table - it would require a lot of work from me to position his legs under him, and to give him the push and lift he needed to get up. Really, we would joke about how his legs were unused for so long that gravity no longer works on them, and they would keep popping up off the floor when he would try to be standing. Sproing!!! So knowing that, check out that photo I started with - his feet are solidly on the floor! Now when I help him up, it takes very minimal lift, and he's doing a lot of work with his legs in a tall kneel, and then needs the help for the moment when he works, works, works those toes around and gets his feet under him. Then he can push the rest of the way!

(Like all the sheet rock dust on the floor? That vent you see is in the segment of wall that will be cut out to give us access into the addition, so is right under the window that we crawl through daily getting back and forth.)

And as if that wasn't enough, look what else he's been doing!

Now he's on the right side of the ottoman...

...and now he's on the left!

Big man is cruising!!! It's slow, but he's doing it! I can't help but attribute this to the new pool therapy session we've added with Lori, his physical therapist. She meets up with us at our local YMCA and gets in as Krassi's para and spends an hour with him in the very warm zero-entry pool, and most of what they've been doing is cruising and standing along the wall (with Lori doing an incredible "ballet" to keep Krassi's mouth out of the water while simultaneously stretching him and moving him through his exercises. She is amazing to watch. We like her out of the water, but in the water she's even more incredible!)

This is another fun side effect of being able to climb up onto the furniture:

Sitting with his brothers and sisters!!