This is Starting to Freak Me Out . . .

So, this is what 'Tummy Time' looks like at our house:


Each and every time I've pretty much EVER set Ellie on her tummy, you would think we were torturing her most cruelly. The child learned to consistently roll herself off of her tummy at around 4 weeks old, so we've seen the same pattern for 7 months now . . . set Ellie down on her stomach, freak out screeching followed by promptly flipping herself over and glaring at me through her tears like, "How dare you do that to me!"

So, here we are at nearly 8 months old and I don't think we're anywhere near her being able to crawl. She hasn't built up any of those muscles, and I don't know how to help her or encourage her to do the things she needs to that will eventually lead to crawling? And I feel very much at fault. I don't know what to do differently. I set her on her stomach a few times a day (although admittedly there have been whole weeks where I didn't set her down more than once or twice on her belly because of the tantrum that always follows such abusive action on my part.) "Put her down when she's in a good mood, right after she's napped and ate," is the advice I hear most often. Which makes me want to shriek, "Ya really think I'm setting attempting this when she's hungry, tired and grumpy . . . just to make it more fun! Of COURSE I'm doing this when she's in a playful mood!" Of course, she doesn't stay playful for long as soon as she realizes what I have in mind for her. I try laying right there on the floor with her, she just screams, flips herself over and screams at the ceiling. I try putting her down with a toy just out of reach, she buries her head in the carpet and screams. I try laying her down on her tummy and scattering some toys and just leaving the room and letting her wail while I get something like the dishes done, and I come back to the room to find her sobbing up towards the ceiling like she's lost everything and her life is over. What do I do?! I remember feeling like Annie was a late crawler (she started crawling right around the time she turned 8 months old), but she also pulled up to standing on EVERYTHING she could get her hands on. I have a ton of pictures of her younger than Ellie is now, standing herself up against a large bouncy ball and pulling up onto her hands and feet and just resting her head on the floor like, "Wow, this is cool. Don't know what to do with this new skill, but look at me!" And up on her hands and knees ready to explore the world. I feel like Ellie is so far behind Annie physically, and I feel like it's 100% my fault. I didn't try hard enough earlier on to really do the tummy time thing. That's the hard thing about having a colicky baby who screams most of the day (it was a huge issue with Annie too, she just got over it a little quicker, so caught up faster). Your only chance of calming them down is using every comforting technique in your arsenal, and it sure as heck doesn't include laying them down on their own. It's holding and rocking and soothing. Plus, I was kind of afraid of Annie squashing her or something, so I didn't put Ellie down as much on the floor as I did Annie (screaming or not). So, I feel like I've gotten my daughter off to an unnecessarily slow start, and I feel bad about it. And it's freaking me out. I've spent a lot of time lately looking at pictures of Annie at this same age and just marveling at how much more active, physical and capable she seems than Ellie, and I keep asking myself, "What have I done different? What can I change now? Will Ellie suddenly decide one day that all this moving around on her own seems like it could be a fun thing and just start trying to crawl?" (That's pretty much how it seemed to happen with Annie. One of the reasons I haven't pushed 'Tummy Time' with Ellie more was Annie hated it with a passion too, had no patience for it whatsoever until one day it seemed like something just clicked and she realized, "Hey, this'll eventually get me mobile," and she just started to enjoy being on the floor, trying to get on her hands and knees and before we knew it, she was crawling. So, will that just happen with Ellie? Or, do I need to push it more? Do I stick her on the floor, like it or not, and let her scream? Will that finally just piss her off enough that the toy is just out of reach that she'll lunge for it? Or will it further solidify hatred for all time spent on her belly?

I thought I should add, she's not like a complete lump or anything either. She's been sitting up perfectly for months. And Ellie can roll over both ways, when she wants to. She's standing more and more up to her activity table . . . tonight even letting go with both hands and standing completely unassisted for a few seconds before plopping backwards onto her butt (she looked as shocked and pleased as her father and I did!) She's just starting to pull up more on her own, but only if she has a hold of my fingers -- I don't have to help her or anything, it just has to be a person she's holding onto, she won't try pulling up on inanimate objects or anything . . . she needs the illusion that she's being helped, the chicken. :-)

As much as she hates her tummy . . . she is really starting to love standing up . . .

She's even starting to get more adventurous, moving away from the table and towards me if she's done playing. She is just barely starting to get the whole 'taking steps' thing . . . which is different for us, since Annie pretty much came out of the womb wanting to stand up all the time, loved to 'walk' holding onto our fingers from way younger and was starting to walk around the Activity Table as soon as she learned how to stand up to it.

This was just Annie dancing tonight. I thought it was cute, and thought I'd throw it in.

So, did anyone else have a hard time with the tummy/crawling thing . . . any advice that will hopefully work and save my sanity and soothe my guilt nerves?

Edited to add: I should probably add (since I probably rambled way too far from my actual point) that my problem isn't really that Ellie's not crawling yet . . . I don't think 8 months is in anyway cause for concern as far as a 'delay' for crawling. My stress is that I'm not seeing ANY signs of any preparing to crawl, no pre-crawling skills if there's such things :-).