Alright, on to my observations for the day. So I'm sitting at this table on this chair barely able to hold the weight of my leg, along with one amazingly young looking mother, her 1 year-old son, another 1 year-old girl, and an 8 month old girl. Ami' at this point is knocked out and will be for the next 15 minutes. So it's me, a plate of the suspect food and then these kids and this mother. So the mother is picking at her food while her son is busy feeding himself from a spoon. Well sort of - she scoops up the food with the spoon and hands it to him, he smears it on his face, in his mouth and generally all over the place. But he's sitting up, looks alert if a bit pale, and he's eating the food. The 1 year-old girl is a champion. She's polishing off a bowl of food quicker than Ami' slips a fart and if there's one thing my boy knows how to do swiftly and often, it's fart. While she's eating, she's grilling me intently. Every now and again she catches the Christmas music in the background and starts bobbing her head. After about 5 minutes, I'm bobbing with her. The 8 month old, who on a previous visit went absolutely ballistic the minute I entered the room, is just staring at me, and not really taking to the orange bottled food they are trying to feed her.
Ami's shows up and whether for my benefit or not, he's the center of attraction. The staff is all over the kid! One lady breaks out of a back room and mobs the boy. And while he greeted me with his initial "oh, it's you again" look, he's all smiles for the ladies. Hilarious kid. I didn't like the fact that he had...err...nose matter all dried up around his nostrils, but otherwise he's looking pretty content, until it takes them just a bit too long to heat up his bottle and he notices everybody else is eating. This leads to behavior that's starting to take shape - a temper tantrum. I mean he's almost stamping his feet in anger over the lack of milkage! He's definitely starting to develop his own personality.
Which leads me to this observation - that 8 months to 1 year-old mark is looking pretty cool. When that one kid's Mom finally left, he went bananas. He clearly missed his momma. Ami' leaves me like water leaves a desert - without missing a beat! I guess that's the point where they start realizing "these are my folks!" I also thoroughly enjoyed watching those kids crawl around, sit up and grab things off the ground and play with them. Ami' is starting to get the hang of grabbing things (with dreadlocks and beards being in his top 10...) but he's definitely not there yet. No fret though - he's probably in the advanced group where that stuff goes. But to see him crawling around would be truly magical. More tummy time is definitely on the menu!
