Developmentally speaking...

Both of Ethan's top teeth cut through this past week. That makes it official: Four teeth before 8 months old. I always knew this kid would be an over-achiever...

Well, actually, I read in one of his developmental milestones books that many children cut their first four teeth by their 8th month. But guess what? He's still not quite 8 months old (though he will be this weekend), so HA!! He beat those other kids! And so the competitiveness begins... :)

Seriously, though, I am impressed by how much this baby has changed in just a few short months. It seems like just a moment ago that we were working on rolling over, or even just strengthening his neck enough to hold his head up. Not anymore, bub! He has those down pat. He's currently fixated on standing, walking (while holding our hands, of course), and just generally getting around. He's not too enthralled with crawling, yet; he mostly does a sort of marine-crawl on his belly, but he can really get some distance doing that. He is also working on getting himself to sit up alone, but we aren't quite there yet. On the other hand, he is perfect at sitting up by himself, and is quite possibly the twistiest twister in the history of twisted twisting. I can hardly change his diaper-- the minute you lay him down on the changing table, he twists his whole body over onto his stomach within three seconds. It's like trying to change a writhing snake, or something. Once he's on his stomach, of course, he's happy.

That is, he's happy until he decides it's time to try climbing out of the changing table, at which point the wrestling game begins again. I've already had him roll off enough surfaces in this house; I can't really take another one. I'm beginning to wonder what the solution is, here, to the whole Twisty McMover problem; do I just have to get really, really fast at the diaper change, or is there some way to distract and entertain him while I get the dirty business done, or what? I know there has to be an answer, but for some reason those baby development books skip this particular quandary. Hmm...