My Ten-Month Old Granddaughter

By Gary R. Oman, CPA, PFS, MST

Ten-month old Taylin is the cutest granddaughter! Taylin wakes up happy and all the pictures her parents share throughout the day show a very happy and smiling baby…I don’t think we see ALL the pictures!

Taylin is my wife Dianne’s and my fifth grandchild and we recall each of them with fond memories of their birth, how beautiful they were when they were born, their smiles, how fast they grow (did I mention our oldest grandchild Joshua, 16, is listed at 6’4”, 230 on his high school football team roster!), and all of the many events and milestones over the past sixteen plus years. Each different, each unique and all precious memories.

About six or seven weeks ago, Dianne and I had another opportunity to “hang out” with Taylin while her Mom and Dad went out for the evening. We enjoy all of the responsibilities of taking care of our granddaughter, like playing, feeding her, entertaining her, changing her diaper (I let Dianne take care of the messy ones, correction, all of them!), along with all the other stuff.

Sometime during that evening, I was on the floor playing with Taylin. Her crawling was improving since I had last seen her. She had discovered “forward” gear. Previously, despite her efforts to move forward, when Taylin crawled, she could only crawl backwards. So, to see her crawling forward was pretty cool.

As I was half lying on my side with my left leg bent and flat on the floor and my right leg bent with my knee up, Taylin crawled over to me. At first she reached out and used my pant leg to pull herself up, sort of just leaning on my left leg. Apparently, she was pleased with her progress so Taylin then reached out and grabbed my right pant leg and began to pull herself up, standing and balancing herself using my right knee. She tired after standing there a bit but then shortly after, pulled herself to a standing position again, holding onto my right knee, and doing so a little more sure of herself the second time.

Not too many days later, we began seeing pictures of Taylin standing here and there and within a couple weeks after that, her parents posted a short video of Taylin walking behind and pushing a little baby carriage. Taylin is not walking on her own yet but it’s only a matter of weeks, maybe even days. She was ten months old on November 17th.

It’s helpful to have support and encouragement or something to hold on to when attempting something that is new to you, like Taylin holding on to my leg as she stood up.  If you would benefit from some encouragement and support or a framework for addressing those important questions that come up about your family’s financial future, we would be happy to help.

Until next time…Gary

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