Woof
Having a baby is not unlike having a dog.
(And before people start e-mailing me shaming me for calling Henry a dog, take a deep breath, play a game of Soduko, and calm down.)
What I mean is that much of early childhood development is just training your baby to do certain things, rewarding them when they do it, and then repeat. For example, for the past few weeks, we’ve been helping Henry roll over, a key component to his one day become a member of the Jessie White Tumblers. (That’s a Chicago joke.)
We lay him in the crib or on the floor, and, letting him get a good grip on one of our fingers, we pull him to his side, gently guide his leg over, and then give him one last push until he’s on his stomach, usually with a look on his face that says, “Where the heck am I?”
While not fully able to do it on his own just yet, he’s improved quite a bit, so now he really wants to roll. And every time he gets part of the way or, with our help, all the way, he gets plenty of kisses and hugs and “yay”s. We’re rewarding him, praising him.
Other than the fact we don’t have liver snaps at the ready, how is this different than teaching a dog to heel or fetch or, obviously, roll over?
Now where did I put that baby collar…
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I mentioned we bought a video camera a couple of weeks ago. Neither Kristen nor I is the next Martin Scorsese, so what we’ve captured so far is not particularly exciting. The script is terrible, the direction is shoddy, the cinematography is embarrassing. The only thing we’ve got going for us is the leading man. He’s a winner.
