I did it...

camden has been obsessed with counting for a while now...he started pretending to count before he turned three and everything was two...he would point to each object and proclaim "two, two, two...". by his third birthday we had taught him to count to three and we thought it was adorable of course...especially since he refused to answer the question "how old are you" once we told him he was no longer two...so when people asked we tried to get him to count to three since he just didn't get why the answer to that question wasn't two anymore. 

about a week ago we were counting to three...only camden didn't stop there... It was followed by four and five. i caught my breath for a second...he can count to five? 

two days later he went all the way to ten, no problem, all on his own. 

billy and i have been pretty proud parents this weekend...as everywhere we go he proudly counts everything. at the candy store we stopped at, aunt annie's in Idaho falls, he softly counted the 12 barrels of popcorn only it went like this: "1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,10,10" and he then proudly screamed "i did it" over and over as he ran in full circles in front of the register. 

he did it alright. 

moments like this never get old as a parent. watching your child accomplish a feat for the first time is pretty much earth shattering...every time. 

there are days with camden when the words down syndrome are ever present, when the delays are obvious and heavy...when I wonder if we will ever hit certain milestones, when he stagnates, or even regresses. and then there are days when he blows my mind, and the words down syndrome feel like they were attached to that ball he just hit full force out of the ball park. and those days, well they are good, they are freeing...and they get me through. those days are what we live for around here. and i don't know if this tiny boy of mine will ever realize just how proud of him we are...always. he has to work harder for things than most, and still he does it...and this is becoming more and more apparent as i watch his younger brother at eight months easily tackle things that camden worked on for over a year. he really has to work, for everything, for things that come so naturally to other children, like how to hold a crayon and how much force he needs to use to push a button when his finger bends like rubber. 

but he does it. 

and he teaches me, every single time we have a day when he makes full contact with the ball, that he can do it, to never doubt him, to expect instead of accept. his perseverance and love for learning makes my heart happy, and he pushes me because if he can do it, so can i.