Wild Child

Elsa is a very careful, observant baby. During our ECFE classes, she takes her time looking around before she starts to play. Around the house, she'll hold both of my fingers in a death grip and walk around fast. If I try to take it to the next level and let go of one hand, she stops in her tracks, sits down, and looks at me like i'm crazy.
So today, we reached somewhat of a milestone. I took Elsa on a long walk in the stroller. We stopped at the park and went on the swings. I set her on the grass under a tree and we talked. As usual, she sat politely and listened. She never tries to crawl in the grass, she just looks around.
Then, the unexpected happened. She started fussing and pointing everywhere. She no longer seemed content to sit and look at things from afar. She leaned over onto her knees and very slowly touched her hands to the grass. She looked at me, the grass, her hands, and back at the grass. Then... she took off and didn't look back! She crawled so fast I thought she was going to wipe out. The look on her face was pure freedom. She laughed all the way over to the playground - a good 20 feet away - where she leaned over the wooden rail and started digging furiously in the sand.


Oooooh, sand.

Feel the sand...

Check out her awesome drool blowing in the wind.

Then she started in on the grass. Rip rip rip! Then look. Oooooh, grass. Rip rip rip!

She crawled onto the pavement, laughing more. Smack! smack! went her little hands, but she didn't even care.

I kept calling her name, but she was in her own world. I sat by the playground and watched while she crawled away, FAR away. Bye bye, Elsa! Hilarious.

It was like I was with a different kid. She definitely found some independence today at the park. These are the little moments you hear about that make parenting so awesome.