Some day soon, I'll definitely pen my research-based ode to breastfeeding and all of its marvelous, miraculous and mind-blowing benefits. For now, however, I just have something I need to get off my chest ...

Back when Kai was still just a wee ball of mushy baby, Gage and I agreed that when he was old enough to walk up to me and verbally indicate that he wanted a nip of ... the nip, it would be time to give him the boot. 

Well, my friends, that time is upon me, and I find myself ... pretty much doing everything in my power to back-peddle on my previous promise -- I am so not ready to stop nursing! And to think, I soooo thought that by this point, I would be craving the freedom from having to pop my boob out at Kai's every beck and call!

And in a most interesting twist, when I envisioned this moment, I totally thought Kai would be well into the walking facet of the clause, while only slightly adept at verbally conveying his wishes. Instead, as you know, he just learned to walk, but his vocabulary is expanding exponentially by the minute.

Um, please know how all-too aware of the bragadocious-mother syndrome and do everything in my power to not reify this kind of mom, but ...  if I feel it is really objectively warranted, I'm not, like, not going to talk about something just for that reason. Clearly, I've inner-monologued about this very quandary quite a bit, because of how much it would grind on my last nerve to have to endure such sessions myself.

In the case of my kid's killer vocabulary, I seriously have to talk about it. He may not be a champion racewalker by any means, but the boy surrrrrre can talk!

His lexicon has now by and far breached 50 ... I was keeping a list, but I have really lost track!

Of course, one of his first words was "mama." Another, "baba," for "bottle."

He called me "mama" with a most adorably earnest endearment for I'd say four or five months straight. A few weeks ago, that changed. My new name?

"Baba."

It hasn't lost that tone of affection, per se, but I soon realized realized the connection he had made when he first bellied right on up to the Korova Moloko Bar, pointed to this sexy-turned-sustenance area and stated, simply and with authority: "Baba."

So this probably falls under the "grounds for weaning" category, huh?