Your child is your life’s biggest blessing — and to be able to witness them reach baby milestone after milestone can bring so much joy to any mama. You can only watch with amazement as your mama heart swells with pride as your beloved baby advances to another phase. These are the moments you deserve to enjoy, mama.
Remember though that every child is different and they develop at their own pace. But to be able to assess if there may be delays that need intervention, here’s a general guide of the developmental milestones of infants — physical skills and behavior breakthroughs they will reach and master in the magical first year of their life.
0 to 3 Months Old
Eat, poop, sleep. Repeat. Even when you feel like your newborn is just on this cycle over and over again, they are already showcasing some skills in their first three months. These include:
- Bringing hands and fists toward the mouth
- Following an object’s movement with the eyes (called tracking)
- Raising head while lying on stomach
- Turning head from side to side while lying on back
- Recognizing familiar sounds and voices (yours!) and turning toward them
- Knowing how to open and close fists
- Exhibiting uncontrolled movements of legs and arms
- Imitating facial expressions and movements
- Cooing or gurgling using vowel sounds (ooh and ah)
- Reacting to loud sounds
- Smiling at your voice
4 to 6 Months Old
Your little bean will want more interaction with you at this point so ensure you are spending enough time with them. They are perfecting the skills they’ve been learning early on. At this point, the infant milestones that babies can probably do include:
- Squeal and laugh more prominently
- Start to roll over
- Follow an object with their eyes
- Reach for objects, hold them, and move them from one hand to another
- Grab their feet and even insert them into the mouth
- Recognize their name and make sound when you talk to them
- Start teething (for some babies)
- Smile at people at play with them
- Push down legs when held in standing position
- Showing signs they’re ready for solids
- Get started with solid food (recommended at 6 months of age)
7 to 9 Months Old
Your little one is not so little anymore. They keep on advancing in the skills department and by this time, their infant milestone development has these items on the list:
- Sit up without support
- Recognize and express emotions more clearly
- Understand what “No” means
- Reach something that’s far away
- Put objects in the mouth
- Start to crawl or can already crawl
- Mumble first syllable
- String more vowels and consonants together when making a sound
- Babble more (you can hear some ma-mama or da-da!)
- Play peekaboo
- Pulling up to a standing position
- Start walking (for some babies)
- Know how to clap and point at objects
- See clearly as vision is fully mature
- Become more curious when looking at themselves in the mirror
- Feel anxious when they are separated from their parents
10 to 12 Months Old
Ahhh, your newborn is on their way to becoming a toddler — they’ve become more mobile by this time. You become more and more excited at the number of things they can do, such as:
- Walk with little to no support
- Feed themselves finger foods
- Enjoy more food variants
- Understand simple statements such as “Don’t touch!”
- Say their first simple words
- Use gestures to express themselves (shaking head to say no or waving goodbye)
- Point to the right object or person when you ask “Where’s the door?”
- Repeat and mimic your words
- Extend arms and legs when being dressed up or down
- Shake or throw objects as their way of exploring them
Your little bean is not a baby forever, mama. So relish the time you are helping them discover things about themselves and explore the bigger world out there!
