Ethan, Ecih, and I are grooving on a Sunday afternoon!

Ethan appears to be trying to skip the crawling phase and go straight to walking. He’ll chill on the belly and back for a few minutes, however, he’d much rather be upright, in our arms or attempting to walk with our help. Any crawling that Ethan does at this point resembles a jet ski that you’ve fallen off of, it just goes in a circle and then starts idling funny.

Ethan loves lying on the ottoman and bouncing. For a really long time, he loved it more than anything. That is until he did a back flip off the ottoman… yes folks, I had the front of the ottoman protected, I had my legs on both sides, the little man just kicked really hard and swoosh… thuthunk… waaaahhhh! Ethan has officially done his first back flip from the ottoman onto the carpet. I felt like a bad parent for a moment. Then I realized, no scars, no strawberry burns, no red marks, no bumps, not even a tear… just a big waaahhh, I want a booby, now! I’m sure it must have been shocking. No tears though, he was ok. The next time Ecih put Ethan on the ottoman though, he let us know that he’s not exactly cool with it.

As a parent, my takeaway is that kids will fall. As a parent you want to minimize the distance and pain in that fall. This can be a metaphor for every kind of lesson. Strangley, in my life, I feel as if I learn the best when I fall, when I hit the ground, when I feel the pain.

Ethan learned that he needs to master the ground before he’s ready for the sky. We’ve both learned that if you’re doing back flips, make sure to do it off a swing, when you’re in third grade, on a play ground retro fitted with wood chips for a nice soft landing.