You keep me hangin' on

I can't pinpoint exactly when it started, but the evidence is getting to be undeniable. Abby is, ever so slowly, evolving into a monkey.

Don't believe me? Let's apply the scientific method and see if I can prove it.

OBSERVE
Her dad and I noticed that some of her clumsier tendencies were waning, and being replaced with an insatiable need to climb (furniture, stairs, adults) and hang (from tables, countertops, and outstretched arms).

PATTERN
As the climbing and hanging trend continued, we began to notice that the monkey-like behavior occurred during her most energetic times of day, or whenever a challenge (an out-of-reach toy, for example) presented itself. We also saw an emerging pattern of more and more skilled behavior, such as the dramatic flip into her brother's crib, or the attempt to scale the kitchen cabinets by creating a series of steps with boxes and chairs.

HYPOTHESIS
After noting the subtle change in behavior and the emerging agility and balance where once there was only clumsiness, I wondered if perhaps my daughter could be turning into a monkey. My mom reports that I went through a stage of childhood where she firmly believed I was a monkey, so it was feasible to think Abby could have had those same traits passed on to her.

EXPERIMENT
I released our daughter into the wild world of the local park, and set up a series of challenges to test my theory. She was shown various bars, slides, steps, ladders, bridges and poles to see how she would respond.

RESULT
When presented with a bar--any bar, in any sort of configuration--Abby would indeed attempt to hang from it, and often swing from it, for as long as her little toddler fingers could support her weight. Poles, stairs and ladders were climbed. Bridges were crossed in a variety of fashions--from simply running across the bridge itself to teetering across the bridge railing on two feet like a balance beam. And to drive the point home, Abby even looked to us for help getting from one side of the equipment to the other, across the monkey bars.

Faced with this evidence, I think it is safe to assert that our little girl is, in fact, becoming a monkey. I'm sure it's only a matter of time before she's scaling the door frames like her mom used to do.