Just when you think you know it all...or a least something...Ah, forget it.

So after having two kids, you have a few tricks up your sleeve, a few tools in your belt. Then you have Number Three and God thinks it's funny that you think you know what's going on. 
This week has been momentous in the life of The Babe.  He has gotten tooth #2, learned how to crawl AND how to pull up to his feet. He has been very close to crawling for some time now, he just hasn't been able to put it all together.  Who woulda thought that something as simple as a stuck toy would make the gears click? 

Now that he's officially mobile, he has decided that he's going to venture out into the big, wide world: The Kitchen. He only crossed the threshold into the kitchen twice before, even though he could army-crawl very well.  Today he is my shadow at the sink. 

At our old house, there was a small, definite path to and from the kitchen.  One gate and three closed doors later, the Family Room was a baby-safe area.  Here at the new house, the space is slightly too large for a gate, so here comes Babe.  Luckily, there is a pocket door at the top of the stairs, so I don't have to worry about that. 

I remember Maddie learning how to crawl. I got home from work and Ryan showed me mauled pink rubber ducky.  He had let her chew it as a "treat" when she would crawl correctly.  He was SO PROUD!  It took her longer to crawl than Owen, maybe 8 or 9 months because she could roll everywhere so well that she really didn't care to learn.  I don't know where she gets her stubbornness from.  Owen is at the age where I can't remember anything from Ben.  I was in a cast and miserable and I know I wrote some stuff down, but poor kid, mommy was not in her right mind.  I do  know that he was earlier, closer to 6 months.  Owen splits the difference of everything Maddie and Ben did.  Maddie got her tooth at 6 months, Ben at 8, Owen at 7.  I could have predicted it. 

The Babe is also not sleeping quite through the night. His sibs were by and before 6 months.  So I'm still feeling the sleep deprivation.  He actually slept better at 3 months!
He doesn't eat baby food.  Nothing pureed or mushy.  I felt bad about not making it myself for Maddie and Ben, and when I do make it for Owen, the kid won't eat it. Huh. So much for Mommy guilt.  He also learned his pincer grasp on Thursday. Now he can feed himself, which is awesome.  Here we come, Cheerioland!!

 It's amazing how cool it is to watch something you made grow into a person.  It's frustrating, challenging, exhausting, but at the end of 18 years, maybe we'll get a break.  And hopefully we've done a good enough job that we won't have to worry.  Or not too much.  Who'm I kidding? I will never stop worrying!!