Tough as nails

We went to the zoo today, the day after Thanksgiving, because the whole way home from Bristol I kept thinking about how fun the zoo would be when it's chilly out and not 1000 muggy degrees in the shade.

It was fun. For a while. By which I mean it was fun for exactly 62 minutes.

We watched the penguins, the baboons, and the lorries. We tried to wake up the koalas. We pretended to be scared of the lions. A nice grandma gave us some of her fish food and we fed the koi. And when the bear stood up and growled and scratched his tummy, we giggled. We were enjoying ourselves immensely. Then the inevitable happened.

Owen hurt himself.

This is not shocking to those of us who see the bright purple and green bruises he ends up with on a daily basis. His head is usually so covered in bumps and bruises he looks like he just went through the spin cycle in a front loader. But this one was especially nasty.

Sometimes my limber little Monkey tries to do downward facing dog, the yoga pose with your rump sky high and your feet and hands on the ground. You look like a human teepee. Except he does it with his forehead on the floor, don't ask me why (Mommy has never managed THAT modification of the pose...) and today he decided to try it at the zoo. On the concrete sidewalk.

I saw his head go forward and his waist bend and before I could say "NO, BABY!" and grab him up he had thwacked his forehead on the ground so hard that I heard the sickening smack of barely-covered-boney-skull on pavement. It was horrible. It took 2 seconds for it to sink in, and he screeched and wailed, and it was terrible for us both.

So we came home early.

Next time, note to self: bubble wrap his head.

Elephants never forget. But babies do.

When we went to the beach with Aron's family in October, Owen surprised us all by figuring out one day, when he was in no mood to go to bed and was much more interested in playing with his 47 cousins, how to climb out of his pack-n-play. I had gone in the bedroom and check on him and see if he had finally fallen asleep, because it was suddenly quiet in there. I thought I would find him doing that teensy little waffling snore he does when he first goes to sleep, so I quietly opened the door to peek.

Nope. Not asleep. Not asleep at all.

He was standing on the floor, facing the window, pulling on the cord for the mini-blinds and smiling bigger than those girls who win that top model show. It was hilarious, in a way, but also a huge blow to my travel-with-a-baby plans. I couldn't believe he had figured it out so quickly, he wasn't even all that tall yet! Talk about small crisis!!

We haven't put him in that thing much since then, maybe one night, and he passed out instantly, he was so tired. I figured that the only way he would sleep in it from now on was if he was too exhausted to stay awake long enough to climb out, and that we would have to get him out as soon as he woke up in the morning so he didn't get motivated to escape.

Now, after a week at his Meme and Papa's house, sleeping in it at least twice a day, he hasn't even tried to get out, and there have been several times when he was fussing and cranky for a bit. I thought sure he would pull his Houdini move, but nope. Not once.

Apparently he doesn't have much of a memory :)

Hi Mom. Bye Mom.

We went on our 'honeymoon' this weekend, and for the past three days Monkey Man was staying with our good friends, the Fillmores. For those of you who haven't kept up with our bourgeoning social life in Columbia, the Fillmores are our friends who have two kids, ages 4 and 2, who Owen loves to play with as often as possible. The mom, Melody, is pregnant with their latest bambino (A GIRL!), but even in her delicate state, offered to keep my little monster for a few days so Aron and I could have a little tiny honeymoon, since we didn't get one when we got married. She's brave...

So O went there on Sunday morning, and we picked him up Tuesday afternoon. Melody said he was great, didn't get super cranky with her much at all, slept great, ate well, and played happily with the boys.

This, in and of itself, is only newsworthy because he is getting his 15 month molars, and has been a downright disaster for the few days before we left. Crying all the time, clinging, freaking out and throwing his first temper tantrums, not eating well, not sleeping well, and having serious separation anxiety...it's no wonder we were anxious to leave town! But no, for Mel he was practically an angel. Which, you know, is great. For Mel. (ahem)

So I thought surely he would have missed me, even with all the excitement of playing with kids and running around outside and discovering the true joy of a sandbox. I thought surely he would be very happy to see me when I got there, and would run to me, and smile and drool, and get all wiggly.

He didn't do those things.

He casually strolled up to me, smiling through his paci, and then promptly walked back toward Melody. Hi Mom. Bye Mom.

Little stinker.