baby steps

milo seems eager to walk, but his balance when doing so is way off. and he tries to stick his foot way out with pointed toes the whole time, almost prancing-pony style.

we've been encouraging him learning how to walk - more so i want him to learn how to better balance himself as a bi-ped instead of a quad-ped. he stands great if he's holding onto furniture, our hands, even a book - as long as he's focused on something other than the fact that he's standing.

so i've started helping him walk along only holding onto one hand instead of both his hands. once or twice, we've encouraged him to take unassisted steps too...

i'm learning the naivety of my wishful thinking that "the more mobile milo is, the more i'll be able to get done in a day because he'll be able to move about as he pleases and not get bored, so he won't need me every moment."

ha! as any mother could have told me (and probably tried to with her looks of concern or muffled chuckle.)

and while he might not need me hovering over his every move - and i do give him time to play alone and unassisted - but if i don't keep a close eye on him, he's pulling the cat's tail, and likely to lose a finger, because i'm really not sure how much longer she's willing to put up with his antics.

or he's practicing his drumming skills with his hands on the tv screen (which remains poorly blocked off by his exersaucer and a laundry basket full of toys to try and derail him from the pure excitement of messing with the electronics).

anyhow, my new hope is that once he starts walking, i'll lose even more weight chasing him around, and my pre-preggo jeans will finally fit.

again, feel free to laugh at my naivety.

okay, so i don't really expect that to be the result, but i just want him to be more stable so he doesn't fall down so much expecting things to be able to support his weight. i suppose that's not such a realistic hope just yet either, but i'll hold onto it for now.

that being said, he took one almost unassisted step the other day to me from the bin that blocks off the kitchen/basement stairs, but before he got to me, he decided to stop trying and fell to his bottom instead.

and the other night, i was helping milo walk to ben, and slyly tried to let go without him noticing, and ben was holding his hands ready for milo to grab on... ben says he wasn't really holding on and that it was totally an unassisted step. i think i'm still holding out for something a little more obvious, but still, it's a start.

so that's milo's baby steps to stepping. he'll get there eventually; from what i can tell, they usually all do. :)