Monkey See, Monkey Do

We've all seen the videos of chimpanzees or other apes in the wild, where a Mama Monkey will use a tool then the Baby Monkey will try the same.

Imagine that video with Deven & me as the Monkeys, just wearing clothes & slightly less hairy:

This morning, deven wanted to eat some 'pishtas' (Hindi for pistacio) - but he was stymied by the nuts with shells that weren't opened enough.

I took the spoon from our cereal breakfast, and used it as a tool to wedge in the slightly-opened shell and open the nut. Deven happily gobbled the nut down, then within seconds, he used the spoon in the same way.

I know I shouldn't have been surprised, but I still was by level his manual dexterity. And as any good mother, I immediately thought his new skill was proof of his brilliance, enough to get a full scholarship to UPenn or Stanford. :)

Rohan, meanwhile, is taking after cousin Ante and standing up a lot - already enjoying a table Deven got for his first birthday. Spells trouble ahead, for sure!