Sittin' pretty

It's been about a week now that Ben has been consistently sitting up independently of any support! This is exciting for us, of course, because it's a developmental milestone, but he doesn't care about that. For him, it's a whole new perspective. He is now the master of his domain! Well, the master of the 2 foot radius that surrounds him, at least. He can see what he wants and can reach for it.

I love this stage. Because this means now that he can really interact with toys like he hasn't before. I have gotten out the wooden alphabet and number blocks that Dana used as decoration at the Cincinnati baby shower last year and gave to us as a gift. He loves them! What surprises me is just how much fun I'm having, just sitting on the floor playing with him. I build pyramids (both 2d and 3d) with these blocks. He's not really into building or stacking yet, but he very much enjoys knocking over the "buildings" I make. We (okay, I) invented a game, sort of like an improvised version of Jenga, where I see how many blocks I can stack before he knocks them over. I noticed that if you make a small pyramid at the bottom of a single stack (as in, a row of three blocks topped with two blocks, topped with a stack of single blocks) you can get a lot higher than if you just stacked single blocks from the foundation. I assume there's something about the distribution of balance that explains this, but I never took physics, so don't ask me.

We are also getting to the Grabby Stage, sometimes (but not exclusively) accompanied by the Gnawing and Drooling Stage. Anything in his vicinity is fair game. Objects are admired first on their visual appeal, and then appraised as to their gnawability. The evaluation process is fascinating and amusing to watch, except when it's your hair that's being grabbed, pulled, yanked, and eventually masticated and matted down with drool.

But even then it's pretty fun.

The cats love him, but stay a safe distance away from him even when coming close to investigate this strange creature that was smaller than they were when it came home with us 8 months ago and keeps getting bigger and bigger and louder and wetter. We are just loving every single step of this journey called parenthood; it's just such fun and so fascinating.