The joke's on me

The other night I was putting E to bed. Which, for now means holding him with music on in the background and randomly zoning out after he finishes his bottle until he calms down and/or falls asleep AND J has reached the "quiet" time in his bedtime ritual. This last part is key because E would and does go off to sleep quickly and well EXCEPT if he hears or sees J, because big brother is just too dang much fun! So. We kill time at night.

This particular night, I was listening to the music, trying to identify the artist (it's Pandora.com, so I could do that with a few clicks) while absently handing E back his bink which kept falling out of his mouth. After a few minutes, I heard what can only be described as a baby chuckle. I looked down and E was staring up at me, bink in the process of dropping out of his hand, waiting to see if I would keep catching it. He was doing it on purpose the whole time, the little stinker, and just couldn't contain his amusement one more second. Once he realized I was aware of what was going on, he started tossing the bink more energetically and laughing uproariously every time I had to bend to pick it up. I think we were witnessing his first independent joke, people! How funny is that?

Here's a shot from bath time, just because.