The whole world in his mouth

Another first. And some fascination with balls.

Not to mention the fact that as of today, the lad has officially spent more time in the outside world than the inner (and slightly more gelatinous) one.
Yes, 9 months old.
Where in the wide wide world of sports did that time go?

Ok, his new first. Its goes a bit like this.

Phone rings; Dad answers.
Dad: "Hello, Dad speaking..."
Bloke-on-the-other-end: "G'day - can i speak to Michael please?"
{Dad stops, thinks, ponders...}
Dad: "Errrrrr... yes,.. but I dont think he'll be able to tell you much - he's 9 months old. Think you go the wrong number mate..."
{Dad goes to hang up phone but as he descends receiver hears a muffled...}
BOTOE: "No... hang on... yes, thats right... I'm from..." {yadda yadda yadda}

Yes, Mikes first phone call. Seems mum forgot to pop her name (or Mikes age) on some form. Told you he was now officially "in the system".

As for balls - well he has three favourites at the moment.

Firstly theres the mini soccerball which, for at least 15 minutes, he chased all round the house bashing along in front of himself as he went. We were most proud. Almost as proud as his grandparents would have been if they had seen him at the beach, chasing, just like the ball, the seagulls. Only this was a very bizarre slow-mo chase, with the seagulls constantly keeping a 6 to 10 foot distance between themselves and this strange little crawling human. He was remarkably persistent. And happy.

But back to the balls. All this rolling and chasing may well have learnt from other balls. These in the form of blueberries. Yup, the boy appears to be a blueberry addict. We're a bit unsure why, as the blueberries on offer are the most tasteless, bland and boring blueberries known to man or beast, but hell, he likes 'em.

(Then again, he does appear to enjoy eating lemons, leaves, grass, snot and stones, so he's hardly a food connoisseur.)

However it would appear that at least part of what he loves about blueberries is that they roll. And that he can catch them. It all started with dad rolling one across the table and the boy giggling. Then grabbing. Then eating. So we rolled him another.
Slowly but surely the grabbing got faster. From "let it hit me in the chest, stop, stare at it, then place my hand on it" grab to the full "thrust and lunge" grab.

We're not quite up to the Gilchrist-like dive, but theres certainly an improvement in hand-eye co-ordination going on. The only question thats remains is, do we train him as left or right handed?

The final ball is his globe stress ball. For an adult its all nerfball like - soft and crunchable and somewhat calming in the hand. For a boy though, it is, apparently, edible.

We first discovered this when bits of partially identifiable (possibly the horn of Africa) blue and green sponge appeared in his poo. And indeed investigation revealed 3 almost continental-sized chunks missing from the stress ball.

He's got the whole world in his mouth.
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