The Cannon Hackett Chronicle: Not a baby any more

I don't want to jinx things around here, but Ben has been doing a lot of growing up in the last month or so.

For the first time in nine years, we are not using any baby gates in our house (pre-baby we needed one to keep The Colonel from chewing our shoes). This means no more middle-of-the-night stubbing of toys or stumbling through the house! We had been keeping a baby gate up at the entrance to the bathroom to keep my sweet little scientist boy from experimenting with the toilet or investigating the cat box. However, these days instead of wanting to touch everything, Ben now is more discerning in what gets his interest. (Luckily at the moment the bathroom isn't very interesting to him-- unless I'm trying to use it, of course.)

"BIG push, Daddy!"

Another fabulous change in our house is that Ben no longer uses sippy cups. Sometimes he still spills a bit of milk or water by accident, but there is no willful pouring of liquids and very little sticking his hands into his cup. For the boy who loved to joyfully bash his bottles and sippy cups upside down until they leaked (leaving little puddles on windowsills and bookshelves), this is a real leap forward. Plus, no more sippy cups means no more sink full of items that had to be specially washed with bottle soap every evening (since we don't have a dishwasher). The counter top near our kitchen sink is fantastically empty of needs-to-be-washed and drying baby stuff.

tea party with a triceratops

We've also eliminated Ben's milk-with-sleepy-time association. Previously he had a sippy cup full of milk before nap and at bedtime, but now he just cuddles his favorite stuffed tiger toy and listens to the nap/bedtime stories like the incredible little boy that he is. With the help of some watermelon-flavored kids' toothpaste, Ben also now happily allows us to brush his teeth at the bathroom sink.

The next truly drastic hurdle we're going to cross is potty learning... I've got several good books on the process, bought some cool undies for him, and I am going to do a 3-day potty camp in a few weeks.... when I get my courage up.