Watching him grow

I had a touched Mommy moment this past weekend. Little S and I were camped out at home because of the snow and letting M take my car so he had one with safe tires. We baked loads of cookies which are in the previous post and wrapped presents. While I was wrapping presents little S had been standing on my chair at the kitchen table and turning the light on and off which apparently he found hilarious. He was belly laughing every time he turned it off and I couldn't help but laugh too. After a while this apparently got boring; evident by him litterally putting his head down on the table and sighing. I tried to explain that once mommy was done with the stack of presents on the counter we could call it a day.

He got up and wandered to the family room for a minute then came back. When he returned he started sliding my chair our of the kitchen. Normally he slides chairs around the kitchen so he can stand up on them and help me at the counter; he hadn't moved one out of the room before. I watched as he had a little trouble getting it over the metal piece that separates the kitchen floor from the hardwood floors in the rest of the house. I didn't help him with it; this was his project and adventure so I just watched and kept wrapping. He figured it out pretty quick and moved the chair into the family room. I thought he was probably going to slide it over to my desk and try to pretend to work at it since he can't climb into my office chair. Then I heard the door to the stairs. The stairs lead up not down so I wasn't too worried about him and the chair toppling down the stairs. I gave him a minute before I checked on him. You better believe my mommy ears were trained and listening for so much as a heavy breath or an oooh look what I got sound.

I stepped to my right and  expected to have to walk into the hallway to be able to see what he was doing in the family room but he was right there next to the door to the stairs. He had pushed the chair into the hallway and placed it near the door. When I heard the door open it was to ensure that the door would clear the chair. He had positioned his chair just in the right place to be able to see the tv which was playing Super Why and to be able to play with the door knob on the door to upstairs.

When he left the kitchen he didn't have a binky so during his movements he had to have gone and found one; which made me wonder if the boy genius needed one to be brave today. He spent the next almost hour while I wrapped all the presents (from the other side of the table so I could watch him) playing with the door knob and standing proudly on his chair.

I had a moment when I just got this overwhelming sense of pride for him. He had put two and two together in a new way and found a way to investigate something that interested him. It made me so proud of him and a little heart tender that my little baby is now such a little man.

Since that exploration of the door knob he now knows there is a lock on the bathroom door and how the door knob turns. He is just tall enough on his tip toes to be able with the very tip of his finger to sort of push the lock on the bathroom door. If the child continues to grow like he has ( at 18 months he's 35 inches tall) it won't be long before he'll have the leverage to actually lock the door. Mommy is already looking for one of the door unlock keys that I remember my parents had above every locking door in our house growing up.