Diary of a Third Time Dad

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WEEK 41 - DECEMBER 2002

Why isn't the baby crying?

During Joshua's needy phase, we could never leave him alone. So the other day, Cheryl and I realized we were in the kitchen together without the baby. She says, "Wait a minute, where's the baby? Why isn't he crying?" She headed for the living/toy room to make sure he was OK.

It seems like his needy phase is coming to an end. He was sitting with his toys as happy as can be.

Another example of how us dads can tune things out.

Cheryl handed me the baby to hold cuz she was going to vacuum the floor. She put him in my arms, and I continued reading the magazine that I was so engrossed in. She vacuumed for several minutes. Then I heard the vacuum turn off, and Cheryl comes running over and grabs the baby from my arms.

"Hello!" she informs me, "The baby is CRYING!"

Oh, I thought. Was I holding the baby? I guess I was.

In my defense, it WAS a fascinating magazine article.

Crawling toward the edge.

Babies have no concept of gravity. To them, a step down or the edge of the bed is a cake walk. We love to play in bed with Joshua, but he of course loves to head straight for the edge and play Superman.

So I wondered what would happen if I just let him discover gravity on his own. Would he just keep on going over the edge?

It turns out, yes, he would.

No, of course I didn't just let him hit the floor. There was a soft futon at the bottom, and we took our bed off the frame anyway, and I did kind of grab the seat of his pants right before he hit bottom.

Did he learn from this experiment? Nope. Either he is just clueless about the fall, or he has complete faith in me that I will simply catch him every time.

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