May Monkey Milestones - Say That Three Times Fast

To wrap up May, I just wanted to review some big milestones in Monkey's life.  You are aware of most of them... but there might be a new one.

Kneeling and crawling - he can do both and he does them a lot.  He started out crawling doing the army crawl but now, about 90% of the time he crawls on all fours.  And his favorite thing to do is to crawl after our gray cat Bella who, apparently, is not smart enough to run away.  All the other cats recognize Monkey Movement and run as far away as possible.

Swimming - you might remember that we tried swimming in Cancun but Monkey wanted none of it.  He was 4 months old, stuffed into swimming shirts and trunks that were too small for him, and had just flown from Austin to Atlanta and then Atlanta to Cancun.  Poor guy.  But we tried it again and he LOVES it.  Swimming has also opened new doors for the bathtub.  He is much more active in the tub and the other day he flipped over and started crawling around.

Finger Foods - we have moved in to a new realm.  Monkey now eats finger foods.  So far he had a pickle in New Jersey (he made some seriously bad faces but he sucked on it), cheerios when we eat dinner (he loves them - one must have fallen off of his onesie last night when I changed him because this morning he found one on his changing table and popped it in his mouth before I could get to it), and most recently hardboiled egg yolk (which he loved yesterday but wasn't so sure about this morning - I think because this morning it was cold from the fridge).  The only problem with finger food is that it has given him a false sense of his ability.  He now wants to feed himself from his spoon.  It isn't pretty people... lots of cleaning involved.

Climbing Stairs - yup, he can do it. So far he has only scaled two but he just keeps on going.  Seriously, this boy has no fear.  He decides what he wants to do and he does it.  Never mind that our stairs are metal with treads so they must hurt his little knees.  Never mind that when he slides he slides back on concrete.  He just keeps on trying.  I'm in for it when this boy gets fully mobile!

And last but not least...

Black eye - huh?  Well, Monkey has his first black eye.  Yesterday while Brian was holding him he dive bombed at Brian's head and caught the bone under his eye on Brian's glasses.  It's all bruised but it doesn't seem to bother him at all.  And the way he throws that head around, I'm sure it won't be the last time either.