My 9-month-old twin sons are wildly different in their mobility. Marty is a crawling machine, pulls himself to standing all the time and is moving tentatively towards cruising. Mal scoots a little bit on his hands and knees and rolls to get where he wants to go, but he's nowhere near the moving force of destruction that Marty is.

We had an early intervention evaluation on Mal last month and found out he has a minor delay with gross motor skills. They really didn't give us much advice as far as helping Mal out. Is there anyone out there who's had a similar situation and can offer some pointers?

Our kid was still army crawling when he started walking (at a year). After he tried walking he reverted to crawling (now hands and knees) for four or five more months. He started walking full time at about 16 months. He was just doing things at his pace, we figured. And now he's walking fine, so, all things in their time was our motto.

I'm pretty sure our guy was a slow crawler and didn't walk much until around 15 months or so. He used to pull the rugs to bring things closer to him.

Hey Alan - Mal does that, too. I'm hoping it means that he's a cerebral little guy who uses brain rather than brawn to solve problems.

My two never crawled at all, they just butt-shuffled until they were about 18 months, and out of nowhere, started walking.

Very atypical.

I thought that was pretty creative too, considering I spread a bunch of stuff out to try and get him to work on his crawling. Now he is almost three and is a physical as any other kid.

Terrier, I think a lot of the time late crawlers/walkers often just have different temperaments than their house-tearing counterparts. It sounds like the EI folks said his delay was mild, and that he didn't qualify for services, so I wouldn't worry too much, especially if he does sometimes get on his hands and knees. As long as he's using his legs and body in a variety of positions he's just getting around in his own little way.

I had a friend whose little boy could FLY by scooting around on his but. He'd scoot so fast and so high up off the ground he could easily beat the crawlers in our crowd in a race, and it was HILARIOUS to watch. So funny how different babies are.

You've got M&M's too. That what my step-grandpa calls my boys (Morgan and Max). Morgan took to crawling like a champ but Max scooted forever. Then he finally crawled and went straight to walking in a week. I felt very cheated.

If it's a minor delay chances are he'll even out with his brother eventually. No professional opinion but rather observation of children at the child development center my mom co-directs.

From what I've been reading it's totally normal that some kids never crawl: as long as they get around it's okay. My girls drag their back legs when they move about.

I think that part of having twins is it's hard not to compare them developmentally. I remember when my girls were first getting weighed the doctor would seem concerned that E wasn't gaining weight the way A was, but both were on totally healthy growth curves. I said to her "If you didn't have A to compare her to, E would be doing just fine!" Now, that's the attitude I tend to take with them, although generally A does everything 3 days after E.

In any case, what are the chances that twins are going to learn to do everything at the exact same time? My friend has 14-month-old twin boys and she said she was thankful when one was crawling long before the other because she got accustomed to their mobility gradually. I say hear hear to that.

I'd cut Mal some slack, especially since he's a multiple and even more if they were even a tiny bit early (anything before 40 weeks).

It's good that he's getting up onto 4-point. I used to write gross motor developmental strategies for babies in another job. Here are a few things to try that are good for kids this age in general:
*when he gets up onto all 4's, help him gently rock front to back moving him slowly from his hips, sing a rhythmic song to make it playful
* make bumpy terrain for him to army/belly crawl over (your legs, body, pillows, wadded up blankets, your lumpy bed)
*when he gets up on all 4's, slide your leg under him to get him to scale an obstacle without rolling
* he's a bit young for this, but try it hand-over-hand: help him clap, play pat-a-cake, hold 1 toy in each hand

Keep us posted!

Thank you guys! We took the boys to their pediatrician yesterday for their 9 month visit and the doctor said that Mal is doing well. She's not concerned about a delay at all and basically told me to chill the hell out. So, I'll be trying to do that although I am a pro at worrying.

Hey Sabine - Mal will scoot forward on his hands and knees if he sees something he really wants. Usually something he's not supposed to have, like one of the dog's toys. Yesterday I had him chase his little glass bottle of Burt's Bees baby oil around as scooting practice.

Mal claps and likes to bang toys together. When it comes to bumpy terrain he'll look imploringly at a parent to be picked up, then he'll try to roll. I'll be trying that trick with propping him up with my leg to keep him from rolling.

Again - thank you!

Awesome. Your pediatrician is the opposite of ours. We try to be chill and she freaks out at the drop of a hat. We've decided to outsource our worrying to her, since she does it so effectively.

we were freaking out because marmaduke was a late walker (and his "twin" - actually their grandfathers are the real twins, but we suffer through all the same comparisons - started walking and talking very early). we were fussed, worried, balance issues connected to hearing loss? should we be booking a ct-scan? we talked to the ent specialist about it at his regular 6-monthly checkup in may, he said not to panic, we could panic at the next checkup in november if he still wasn't walking.

and of course by the end of that very day, he was walking. now he is running. i bought a leash last week.