Pattern Recognition

Mr Toucan (a.k.a. Timmy, a.k.a. Monsieur le Toucan, a.k.a. Signor el Toucan when we want to work on Alex's Spanish) is no doubt the product of thousands of pounds worth of design.  He has baby friendly chewable bits.  You can grab his tail.  He makes an interesting noise.

He is also significantly less interesting than a cushion.

It goes like this:

"A toucan eh?  And one that's making an interesting noise?  Hmm, better check this out.  Wonder what he tastes like? let's just...  Whoa!  A cushion.  Sorry, toucan, but I've got some serious staring to do here!  Man, look at that stitching!"

Obviously it's not the stitching that Alex is really interested in.  Nor is it the cushion's inherent cushiony-ness.  It's the stripes.

Alex is a sucker for contrasting patterns.  (All babies are, apparently.)  He'll regularly become fascinated with the most random things, just because they've got patterns on them.  Nic's shirts are a common source of entertainment.  The aforementioned cushion gets a lot of interest as well.  His stripy mittens are endlessly amusing, especially as they move around in response to his will.

The baby merchandising world has worked this out as well, and Alex currently has three books consisting of nothing but contrasting patterns.  (Stars and Hearts, Spots and Dots and Snowflakes.)  They're from the local library, which turns out to have a chewable books section specifically for babies.  Alex loves them, although he finds it frustrating that he can't grab hold of the patterns.  (He doesn't seem to have grasped the concept of 2D yet.)  From a parental perspective though, they're marginally less stimulating than watching paint dry.  At least with the paint there's always the chance of a drip.