Last week saw two more firsts with Danny: his first birthday, and his first time pulling up onto his knees on something.
His first birthday was a lot of fun. We started the day taking a different route to visit his paternal grandparents, because he won't sleep in the car--at all, no matter how tired he is--if he knows we're going there. So, we had to trick him into taking his hour-long morning nap.
He refused his cake, at first. I'd given him his lunch, then handed him a slice of homemade bread to gnaw on while everyone else ate lunch. And he refused--refused-- to give up that slice of bread. Even for cake. It wasn't until that was gone that he was willing.
Then again, after we'd gone to Bella Peppers the week before, we knew he liked bread. Especially garlic bread.
After lunch and playtime with Grandma and Grandpa, we tricked him into taking another nap, by taking a country highway from Andrew's parents' home to my mother's. He got a little bitty burger patty that my mom made (and put through the blender) especially for him, and fries. He loves fries. And then we realized, as we watched him demolish two cupcakes (instead of eating them), that we'd forgotten our camera.
We tried to get a good monkey picture to compare with the ones I'd previously posted, but he wouldn't stay still. I'm posting one where he'd rolled against the monkey, and gotten up on his hands and knees next to it. Should show just how big he's gotten, in contrast to the four day old picture.
The other big first comes with a funny little story. My husband and I have watched the baby watch the cat with delight (it's furry, and soft, and I want it!), and the cat watch the baby with horror and revulsion (it screams! and it moves! and it's bigger than me!) for the past year. The cat laying on the floor is what spurred Danny into rocking forward and learning to crawl. My husband and I joked that it would be the cat, asleep on the couch, that would get him to pull up.
Well, not quite. The cat was asleep on my lap, not on the couch. But it was Danny's desperate desire to get his hands on the cat that prompted him to walk his little hands up the front of my chair, and get up onto his knees.
And the cat promptly ran up my chest, up the back of the chair, down the other side of the back of the chair, and through the baby gate and the kitchen, all the way back to the den. It's the only place she knows the imp can't get to her.
It's been a hectic year, and a hectic week, and I wouldn't trade most of it for anything.
