Christina and Olive were gone last week. Turns out that while I still remember how to live the bachelor life, I prefer to be with my family.

I was out when they got home today. I got a text that Olive seemed disappointed that I wasn't there when she got in; apparently, she crawled over to my office, and was then perplexed when she didn't discover me sitting at my computer.

When I did come home, the moment I was through the door she was crawling over and welcoming me back. Big grins all around. If there is a better feeling than to see your baby all smiles to see you after a brief separation, I don't know what it is.

After dinner, Olive did something she hadn't done before: crawled over to the staircase and started ascending. I followed behind, ready to catch, but she made it to the top unassisted! She then turned around and needed some real help on the descent: when each step is higher than your knee, it takes some courage to just step forward into the abyss and trust that you'll land balanced when your foot does make it to the next step.

Christina says that this was not among the skills she was practicing last week, so who knows where it came from. I am pretty happy to have a kid who turns up with new skills out of the blue!