I never knew (before Dr. Ruf's book) that eye contact at birth was unusual. We probably would have been concerned if our second child had not been as alert. Even though I never kept a baby book, I actually have proof of eye contact in the hospital and our daughter engrossed as a book is read to her when she is two months old. We took a lot of pictures (of our first).
The only thing I really took note of was that our daughter walked at 91/2 months and our son walked at 9 3/4 months. Apparently this is not correlated to intelligence.
Here are some interesting oddities of our daughter�s early development (which is/was easily level 4 in comparison to the examples given from birth to six years in the book. She really doesn�t appear THAT different from her peers NOW):
Our daughter had to be held constantly. It�s a good thing she wasn�t a heavy baby because she rode on my hip her entire first year. She wasn�t interested in cuddling. I was simply a means to have a more interesting vantage point. I carried her around with one arm supporting her as she sat on my hip-face out. On one occasion, a concerned woman approached me in public to advise me that I should turn her around for more effective bonding.
Our daughter had a team of imaginary friends! She was always conversing in a sing song voice with �nobody. This spanned from approximately one year to 101/2 years. Now (at 12) when I hear her upstairs by herself and ask who she is talking to, she says �herself�. Almost all of her �friends� were sweet young girls like herself, but one time, I overheard her (just 4) in the bathroom arguing with �Carlie�. She stated, �No! I love my mommy and I�m not supposed to play with matches!� That sent chills down my spine.
When she was 41/2 she completely stopped using any word that began or ended with the ST sound. For six months, she talked around things to avoid making the sound. For example she referred to �stars� as �those sparkly things in the night sky�. As far as I know, she never accidentally used the ST sound during that time. I consulted her pediatrician because I was worried. He said that she was probably practicing in private and when she was satisfied, she would start using it again.
I don�t know if this stuff is related to giftedness or not (although I think I have heard that imaginary friends may be). I did wonder if she was abnormal so I thought I would share the weird stuff to assure other parents who may be experiencing unusual behavior.
