Johnny Walker

It started on July 7th. That was the day Xander took his first steps. Xander was at his friend Jonah's for a play date, and the two were having a good time playing outside on the deck and Jonah's house, as Jonah has a big, plastic sink and a little baby pool out there. The two of them splashed and played for the better part of two hours. Jonah is almost two months older than Xander though, and so was already walking at the time. Though mom and dad (and many other family members) had been practicing walking with Xan, he had not really seen it from someone his size that he knew. Seeing Jonah walk likely spurred Xan to take his first steps, steps that he repeated later on that afternoon when visiting his giddoo (that's Arabic for grandfather).

After those first steps, the regularity with which Xander took steps grew slowly. At first, it was just one or two steps before falling. Then, it was three. Then, it was three and lunging towards a person or object. These sort of isolated incidents would happen once or twice a day, but Xander was still mostly crawling. Then about a week ago, Xander burst out for six quick steps, before breaking into his normal crawl. The idea of walking was blooming in his head, but it was not yet fully formed. At this point, mom and dad had seen Xander walk plenty, but it was still not his mode of transport of choice. As such, they were still reticent to say that Xander was walking.

That changed on Wednesday evening. On Wednesday evening, Xander started walking with regularity. And while at times he still stumbles like a drunken gambler, he is becoming adept at catching himself in mid-fall and straightening back out. What clinched it for mom and dad though, was the fact that Xander walked outside. Xan is easily distracted by cars and other kids, and often will stand contemplatively watching cars or people when left to his own devices outside. But on Wednesday night at the park near the family's new apartment, there was Xander, walking, walking, walking. He still hasn't completely abandoned crawling, but Xander has most definitely become a regular Johnny Walker.

Gate-gate

This past weekend, Xander's mom and dad bought two gates for their new apartment, in an attempt to keep Xander from killing himself in either the kitchen (with deadly chemicals) or on the stairs if their back happened to be turned. So far, it has been a very futile attempt.

Mom and dad figured the easiest time to set up the gates was after Xander was asleep, so Sunday night, they set up the first one, leaving the second gate for another time. Upon awakening on Monday morning however, mom quickly realized that they had assembled the gate too high. Dad was tasked with seeing if Xander would try to crawl under the gate. After a few hours, dad was convinced that he wouldn't. Xander tried to climb over the gate, but never made any real attempt to get under it. Much ado over nothing thought dad, and forgot all about it.

The next day, Xander got under the gate on his very first try. Like he does when he crawls down the stairs, he went feet first and shimmied under backwards on his stomach. He even made sure to tuck his head so that he wouldn't hit it on the bottom of the gate. He did it so fast that dad accused mom of deliberately putting him on the other side of the gate in an attempt to make him think he had crawled under. Then Xander crawled under again, emerging right back where he started, with a sh*t-eating grin that mocked "what else you got?"

With the knowledge that the gate was now ineffective as a means of corralling Xander, dad tried to use it as a distraction. Xander's favorite game remains opening and closing (and sometimes hiding behind) doors, so perhaps he would seek to open and close the gate rather than crawl into the kitchen or onto the stairs unsupervised. Sure enough, the gate became Xan's new favorite toy. It became such a favorite that he quickly tore it up. The gate is held in place on the wall in four places. On Thursday morning, Xander yanked one of them loose. With the gate still functioning and other things on mom and dad's to-do list, fixing the gate was still on hold. That was until Friday morning, when Xander yanked the gate not just loose, but free of the wall completely.

Some might say the gate was poorly made, others that it was poorly installed, and still others might say that that's one strong baby. But no matter how you view Gate-gate, one thing is certain -- you can't stop Xander, you can only hope to contain him. And you're going to have to try awfully damn hard to contain him!