Antics

I'm sitting on the kitchen floor with Noah while he plays with shapes, gears, a ball and a goat.

(And occassionally my computer - which is why I just had to restart after he pushed my laptop's power button.)

Breakfast ended abruptly a few minutes ago when he threw his milk overboard. Now he's busy and doesn't seem to mind.

He likes to hold a toy on top of his head and let it fall backward to the floor. Then he turns around, picks it up, and does it again. It's like fetch, but retrieval is pretty easy. Until a moment ago, when he just kept turning in circles. I couldn't figure out what he was looking for, until I noticed a lump in the back of his shirt. The goat had fallen inside his shirt. Sneaky goat.

Now he's playing hide-and-see behind my laptop screen. Where's Noah?

Yesterday, I let him hold a bottle of vitamins while I was getting dressed. I was standing right there, and the bottle (which sounds wonderfully like a rattle) has a "childproof" lid, so where's the harm? Except the lid lies. He got it off twice before I took the bottle away. Can it possibly qualify as childproof if a 1-year-old can open it?

Wednesday, he found one of my socks at the back door, carried it to me in the kitchen, and sat at my feet, wrapping it around his own foot. When that didn't stick, he reached the sock and his foot up toward me. So I put it on him, which gave him the joy of promptly removing it.

Last night, we were taking a walk before dinner when he turned in the stroller and looked up at me with a bit of a whine. I was about to turn him around, when I saw a big fat wasp crawling up his leg. I brushed it off, and neither of us got stung, but I think I dropped a few heartbeats.

I can't keep Noah away from my power button, so we're headed upstairs to the playroom where I can sit in a rocker and he can mentally prepare for naptime.

There's a mesh bag full of balls hanging on the closet doorknob in the playroom. It's tantalizing. Noah is currently sitting beside it, shaking the bag vigorously. A ball just fell out, and he's looking at me, gleefull.

I got distracted with email for a few minutes. Noah used the opportunity to grab his milk from the coffee table. That's fine, if he plans to drink, but he decided to see what kind of pattern the milk would make in the carpet. I think it's naptime.

He's down without a peep. We read "Corduroy Goes to the Doctor" - one of my favorite baby books because when the doctor asks Corduroy to take a deep breath, Noah takes a deep breath. It's SOO cute. After the book, we snuggled in the rocker and I sang while he sucked his thumb.

Motherhood really is some kind of miracle. I still can't get over how much I love it. I'm so grateful that Josh supports me staying home with our son. He and I went out last night to celebrate my birthday. Thinking about our date and my morning, I just can't get over how blessed I am.

Noah just cried out and my insides tensed a little. A reminder of the dark side of motherhood -- anxiety. But not enough to steal my joy. Thank God.