My baby started crawling, which makes me terrible at Twitter.

If you have a blog, you have a Twitter account. Somebody made that rule so I have one. I am terrible at Twitter and I secretly hate it because I am awful at it.

Why do I fail miserably at it? It's because I'm a mom of a crawler. Let me explain…

My daughter started crawling on her first birthday party. The cake and ice cream energy boost seemed to kick her motor into high gear. She's been in the fast lane since leaving Twitter in the dust.

The other day while chasing my crawler around the house, I thought up the "most clever thing ever."

I think, "Yes, this is so clever, it will be a great tweet! Everyone will message me and tell me what an amazingly clever tweet that was. The entire world will re-tweet it!"

But I can't tweet this clever thing right now because I just caught my baby gleefully splashing in the toilet bowl.

Most babies start crawling somewhere between six and nine months old while others like my daughter, take their sweet time putting four on the floor.

It's inconceivable that I spent days worrying about her lack of mobility. While she happily flapped like a tortoise on its back, I could've been tweeting, laying on the couch, sipping tea or reading books. Not unlike my tight abs, those days are a long gone.

Even when my baby isn't face first in the toilet bowl, I cannot use my phone for Twitter when I am with her. I've tried it.

The moment she notices the phone in my hands, she drops her toys, picks up speed, and descends like a mini vulture. She will stop at nothing to get her little slobbery mouth on my phone.

So instead, I tweet in secret during her rare afternoon naps. Only by now, I can't remember what that clever thing was from earlier.

So under pressure and time constraints (must. tweet. something. now!) I panic and write something boring, like, "I'm starving. It's time to make lunch."

But this is ok. I rationalize. Twitter isn't about being clever it's about conversation. Twitter is all about connecting with people, building relationships, and warm fuzzy stuff like that.

The baby wakes up and I put my phone away because it's time to start moving again.

As a parent, I looked forward to witnessing my baby master the exciting milestone of crawling. I romanticized just how amazing it was going to be. After watching her beeline for everything from live sockets, power cords, and cell phones, the romance has fizzled.

Now when I hear the slap of little hands on the floor, I know it's time to get moving. As a result, my Twitter account has suffered. I don't get around to checking Twitter again until my baby is in bed.

I discover that people actually responded to the not so clever thing I said from many, many hours earlier! It's a conversation!

Except that the conversation is old news. All kinds of wonderful and fascinating things were discussed while I was busy chasing my daughter, reading her stories and playing hide-and-seek.

I missed it! I missed conversations that I could have been part of! I missed chatting with total strangers because I was too busy spending time with my daughter.

Wait a second. What? Who cares?

This is why I will always be terrible at Twitter.

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