Baby animals

Connor is in that funny phase of four-year oldness when he is both increasingly independent and still wants to be a baby in some ways. We could NEVER, of course, call him "baby brother" or any such thing. He wants always to be with Jamie and the big kids and is desperate to keep up with them.

But at the same time he loves to be a baby animal. It's very funny the way the whole thing plays out. Lately he's been a baby stegosaurus (that's the preferred dinosaur of late) and we have to watch him hatch from his egg, narrating the whole time ("Look, I see a leg!") Sometimes, then he can't walk, because he'll explain, "My legs are brand new!" He is often the usual things like a puppy and a kitten, but has also been, all within the last month: a baby sea lion, a baby giraffe, a baby eagle, a baby peacock, a baby bird generally, a baby elephant, a baby monkey, and perhaps strangest of all, a baby vulture.

It's nice when he does this actually because he allows us to hug him (never kisses!) in our role as parent vultures, and we very rarely get to do this as humans because in this role he is such a big boy and that would cramp his style.

It's funny how much more focused on animals he is than Jamie. He has these two pillow pets, a bee and a polar bear and he sleeps every night on the polar bear. It's perhaps the cutest thing in the world to see him snuggled up on that bear with his woobie close by.