Molly has been developing her walking skills over the last few weeks. We have been counting how many steps she takes at a time. “She took 8 steps!”  “She took 10 steps at school!”  These accomplishments are all normally in a nice controlled indoor environment with some parental or teacher encouragement.

As of today, I think we can stop counting steps. For that matter, we can stop the nightly walking practice.

Today at a birthday party at Claire’s friend’s house, Molly was hanging out, sitting on the driveway playing with an orange golf ball, surrounded by kids on bikes and scooters. Then Molly decided that she wanted to get to the back yard where the petting zoo was set up. So she just got up on her own and walked the length of the driveway to the backyard, dodging bikes and scooters along the way, eventually arriving at the steps of the backyard on two feet with orange golf ball in hand. Molly had taken 50 consecutive steps, that I counted.  There is no doubt this kid can walk now.

Molly then climbed four or five steps up, and then climbed back down, and then climbed up a bit, and finally dropped the orange golf ball, and cried a bit, and climbed back down to get it, and then climbed back up a bit. Then it was cake time, so we went inside, where Molly just helped herself to a seat at the table alongside Claire’s friends. I think Molly earned that seat.