Creepy crawler

Batten down the hatches, folks -- Milo has become independently mobile.

Yep, that's right, the boy is crawling. The world is no longer safe -- the world up to eighteen inches off the ground, at least.

He'd been working up to it for a few weeks before he figured out how to make all his parts move in the right direction. First, he learned to push himself backwards, grunting with frustration as he moved away from the toy he was trying to reach, instead of moving closer to it. More often than not, he ended up wedged beneath a footstool or sofa, a sight that never failed to make me giggle and him squawk loudly at the indignity of it all.

Then he learned how to get up on to all fours. Once he felt stable enough, he'd begin to rock back and forth on his hands and knees, looking as if he were revving himself up to make the big leap forward. Either that, or attempting to do something lewd and unspeakable to the floor.

After that, he started experimenting with his limbs. He'd move his hands forward, but his legs would refuse to follow, and so he'd flop on to his belly and start howling with frustration. Or he'd move his legs but not his hands, and end up pitching forward and landing on his face. Again with the howling.

A couple of weeks ago when we were down at a kid-friendly cafe on the Drive, he finally put it all together. We were sitting at the edge of the stage at Cafe Deux Soleils with a mom friend (hi, Niki!) and her little baby, when Milo's eye was caught by a toy at the back of the stage, near the wall with the chalkboard. He moved a hand forward, and lo and behold, the opposite leg followed! He moved his other hand, and the other leg came up behind!

We watched, amazed, as Milo painstakingly made his way across the stage to the toy, falling to his belly a couple of times in the process, but determinedly lifting himself back up on to all fours and continuing the journey until he had reached the toy. He turned to look back at me, as if to make sure that I had witnessed his mind-blowing trip. Then, satisfied by the stunned look on my face, he turned back to play with the toy.

A few moments later, I look over at him and noticed something odd about the drool dripping from his open mouth.

"Am I seeing what I think I'm seeing?" I said to the other mother, as I got up to cross the stage and check on Milo. Sure enough, the boy was dribbling sky-blue drool down his chin. Seemed like he'd gotten his hands -- and then his mouth -- on a small piece of chalk.

Later that same day, I also pulled an elastic band from his mouth. And then a fridge magnet. And then I had to pull him off Nell dog's bed just seconds before his mouth closed around the dog tags hanging off her collar.

Ah, the joys of independent mobility. Looks like Milo's well on his way to living up to his ancient hunter-gather heritage. Guess I'm going to have to make sure the only forms of prey within reach are those that won't poison, choke, cut or maul him.

Now, if only the boy could learn how to roll over.