Zagging

Not a month after her "in the mouth" phase began, KC has decided that just reaching for everything wont cut it. Fully living up to her namesake, she's begun employing a variety of strategies to move across the floor as she seeks out toys, shoes, and AC's feet. For longer distances, she goes straight for the barrel roll, flipping herself over and over until she is within arms reach of her target. Once close, she employs the classic baby windmill, pushing her belly firmly into the floor and moving one arm and one leg around until she's turned the right number of degrees to grasp her prize. For objects just out of reach, she has mastered her commando slither. I imagine it must take a wealth of her infant energy to complete this move because she'll only squirm forward about 3 inches before falling to the ground in exhaustion.

At this age, AC was content doing baby push-ups and flailing in place. At around 6 months, he began scooting backwards rather slowly until he finally got the coordination to actually crawl. KC scooted backwards only once before realizing that she wasn't going the right way and reversed her course. Maashaa Allah. Must be a woman thing.

Watching KC always reminds AC of his golden year and he tries his best to relive every moment of his infancy with her. This week, he's moved from sleeping sprawled out on his stomach with his hand nestled next to his mouth to sleeping with legs tucked under in a crawl-attempt position. He seems to be developing a strong childhood sense of fairness whereby everything KC is allowed to do, he should be allowed to do also. With him trying to follow KC's every milestone, it's been a bit of a challenge to get him to understand that it's ok for an 11 pound child to roll around on the floor kicking and cooing, but not so much when you're 35 pounds and living above people.

Since KC can no longer be trusted on her playmat, the "play yard" has been in full effect. This week, AC found himself inside of it with KC after learning that like the toys he constantly dangles over the edge of the play yard, he too is affected by the laws of gravity. Once upright, he grinned his most mischievous grin and began doing his run dance until he got himself forcibly removed.

The weather has taken another turn, back up to 100 degrees. I don't think I could have ever imagined that of all the places we've visited and lived, Iowa would be one of the hottest. Second only to Hot-lanta, where it was frequently above 100 first thing in the morning.

We brave the heat in short bursts, often with AC proclaiming "hop, hop, see" all the way to our destination. Once he sees his bike, the pool, or the path to the park, he forgets his sweaty worries and happily plods along. Pedaling is still progressing slowly as AC is easily distracted by anything moving or not moving, which causes him to constantly turn his head around and inevitably careen off of the path.

AC continues to explore indoors, finding new activities for himself almost daily. This week, he decided that he'd turn the end table in his bedroom into a private retreat. After a few days of going in there for a few minutes and hiding away alone, he decided that he'd like some company and tried his level best to drag KC along. He quickly found out that she's a bit to cumbersome to easily stuff into a cabinet. I imagine that he would have tired harder if I wasn't watching, but he's learned that trying to pick her up often ends in crying. He does seem to rather enjoy patting her back and offering kisses (i.e. raming his forehead into hers) when she does start to cry. Testing my sense of fairness, he's started crying more when he hits his head and looking up with a look of sheer disapointment when he's not greeted with pats and head butt kisses.