Of (toy) Mice and (tiny) Men

Well, chalk up another one for bad parenting. This week, Aidan has discovered Darwin and Buckley's cat toys. And, coincidently, Darwin has taken an interest in Aidan's toys. So, dear reader, do visions of Lysol clouds and sanitary wipes fill your head, complete with scenes of hectic scrubbing and whirlwind last-minute grabs before the child puts something in his mouth? Well, get rind of 'em, because it ain't' happening. Aidan will pick up one of the cat's small balls with a bell inside and flail it about happily, sometimes teething on it and covering it with drool. And we. Don't. Care. Not that we don't care, really, more that we don't do anything about it. I think we both decided long ago that there are far worse things that we did as children, and we survived to adulthood (mostly) intact. Plus, you know, it's a well proven fact that childhood exposure to allergens, dirt, and illness makes the immune system less likely to go bat-shit crazy when it encounters the same things later in life. At least, that's how I sleep at night. I like to think of us as extra-gifted parents-- most parents don't achieve this level of germ acceptance until the second or even third child. So really, when you look at it that way, we're downright progressive.

Aidan is also beginning to understand spatial relationships-- specifically, some stuff is smaller than other stuff, and you can put the small stuff INTO the larger stuff! That is friggin' COOL. He's been playing with his stacking cups, and putting his little blocks into the bigger cups. He'll shake them around until the smaller item falls out, grope for it, and the process begins anew. I think that the shining moment in his life so far, to me, was him holding up the cup to show me and smiling. He also seems to be developing ambidextrously (is that a word? need sleeeeep) because he will use his right hand to grab most of his toys, and transfer to the left-- but he uses his left hand for food. Interesting.

Good thing he's not in India...he's be fresh out of toilet paper.