That last step was a doozy

Tapping into the Cooper genes, Ryan is learning stairs the hard way.


He insists on going down them facing forward, on his feet. Crawl down backward? Forget about it. The scoot-on-your-bottom approach lasted a whole week. So we haven't allowed him to go down stairs at all until the past few weeks, and then only when he's holding one of our hands with his other on the wall.

Until today, when he jerked his hand out of mine on the third step from the bottom of my friend Kelly's deck.


Ryan, say hello to brick pavers.


I've been approaching most of his accidents, which are pretty minor, with my rub-some-dirt-on-it approach. I want him to be able to recover from typical toddler clumsiness by dusting himself off and getting back in the game.

Today, as I watched him tumble down the last two steps and hit the ground, it was a slow-motion horror show. I felt stunned then sick to my stomach. It is so easy to get hurt falling down stairs, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I couldn't move fast enough. And then, the most amazing thing happened.

Ryan cried, of course, because it hurt. But his cry turned into the embarrassed and frustrated cry very quickly. As I scooped him up and literally watched the bruise swell a bit and the scrape start to bleed, he wasn't touching it or indicating in any way that it bothered him. Instead he was babbling to me in that tone of, "Mo-o-om, all I want to do is go down the stairs and my feet won't let me and it is so lame."

We washed the scrape and gave a few hugs and kisses, then he pushed away from me and went right back to playing.

That LG, his future is so bright.