Another Ethan first: He pointed out his nose.

Mommy has been working with Ethan on identifying body parts, but I ended up getting to do the honors: holding him on my lap, I asked him, “Can you touch your nose?”  And he did.

Another Ethan first: He balanced Mr. Potato Head’s feet on his head.

Ethan finds it amusing to see an object balanced on my head for a while and then slowly slide forward and fall off. He likes making things slide off own head, too. This afternoon, he stayed still enough to balance for quite some time the blue shoes ostensibly containing Mr. Potato Head’s feet. This evening, he did even better: he balanced a funnel on the edge of his crib.

Another Ethan first: He dug a hole.

At the beach today, Ethan made friends with a boy who had a shovel. A hole in the sand was the product of their joint labor (well, Ethan was just playing, really). Later, when it came time to join forces with me, Ethan reversed the process and filled in a hole, demolishing what semblance of a sandcastle I had started.

Another Ethan first: He body slammed the cat.

Julius was standing in front of Ethan, sideways to him. Ethan walked up to him and dove on top, immediately plopping Julius flat to the ground. Julius never left the ground, so it wouldn’t qualify as an official pro wrestling body slam, but the move carried all the entrainment value and then some of what I’ve seen from the staged sporting event.

Another Ethan first: He ate with a spoon.

Another Ethan first: He caught a bun with his feet.

Ethan was all buckled into his car seat, holding Big Blanky Bun in his hands, when the bun suddenly slipped down on its way to the floor. However, Ethan put his feet together to save the bun the from the fall and recovered it all by himself.

Another Ethan first: He led me by the pinky.

Ethan came up to me as I was sitting in a chair and took hold of my pinky finger. I got up and he pointed to Big Blanky Bun, who was up high out of his reach, so I got it for him. I didn’t mind being the gofer; his new way of asking for help is much nicer than the way he’s previously known—crying.