Back to the Grind

We have teeth! Well, we have the very top of a tooth barely piercing the gums and another not far behind. MLO chomped down on my knuckle this morning and I felt a sharp bit. After 4 months of occasional unexplained fussiness, near constant gum rubbing and drooling, I welcome the confirmation of dental development. I never expected the process to take so long.

In the last few days MLO has also started to register the word 'No'....
He seemed to grasp it in response to the dogs' water bowl. He would crawl over to it, we would say the word and he would stop, look at us and back off. Interestingly, he has now decided to resolutely ignore us when we say it, even go at it full force in response to the word. We have used redirection in conjunction with the word, and when he doesn't listen we simply remove the temptation. While he may have a rudimentary understanding of the concept, I don't expect him to fully grasp the consequences of disobeying, so at this point redirection or removal seems to be the best way to handle his behavior. He certainly expresses his disappointment when kept from the object of his desire.

As you may have guessed from the water bowl story, MLO's crawling abilities have greatly improved. He motors all around the kitchen/dining area with speed and purpose. He gets so excited he actually crawled with full determination headfirst into our black dishwasher. The closest Hubby and I can figure it, he thought the machine was a gap in the cabinets. We had a good laugh at that one. MLO has also attempted the stairs. We have a flight of 13 steps that he scaled one day. I stood behind him and kept moving a piece of paper up the stairs to tempt him. We spend some time on the stairs every day and teach him how to go down backwards. I certainly won't trust him on the stairs for a long time, but I would rather teach him how to manage them than to risk the temptation of a gate since he resists penning of any sort.

MLO has also started interacting with the other babies in hiking class. At some point in the hike we stop, sit in a circle, sing songs and share stories. This break provides a great opportunity to air our concerns and get advice, or just to commiserate about our situations. During the sharing part of circle time the babies roam around stealing each other's hats patting each other in the face and chewing on some other mom's water bottle. I really enjoy seeing him roll around with the other kids. I don't remember where I read it, but apparently some studies have shown that children who are in daycare tend to have better social skills than children that don't go to day care. That is another reason why I feel strongly about these mommy groups. As MLO gets older I want to provide an opportunity for him to socialize with other children.

I think that covers it for current events. Wish us luck as we introduce meats this week!