I just kind of casually said that little EC had started crawling the day after her 9th month; and as predicted, we lost containment soon thereafter. Being newly self-locomotive, she is now able to explore anything that she wants (within reason—my reason—that is). I find it funny that she very intently goes after some things (the shoe rack; must pull out and examine all the shoes) and completely ignores other things (plenty of picture frames on the floor or an easy pull up the ottoman).

I’m guessing it’s because she is now able to explore on her own that she’s becoming more aware of her surroundings. On Saturday, she did something new for the first time: she saw a lizard perched on the wall, and while staring at it, she pointed to it. Like she wanted us to see what she was seeing. As an extension, today for the first time she took notice by herself of some flowers on the bushes outside, and pointed to them with the very clear intent that she wanted to be taken over to examine them. I think this would be classified under “social skills”: her actions have predictable impact on the actions of others (me).

In gross motor skill news, she now enjoys perching on her knees unaided by handholds, and pushing buttons. She’s not uniformly good at the button part yet, but good enough to keep her coming back.