Unwanted Milestones

I'll admit that I was pretty impatient for E to learn to crawl (he didn't until 13 months) and then to walk (he didn't until 17 months) but with that has come some milestones that I hoped he'd never reach.

Enter the first black eye:

We were helping E play on a step stool but he pitched forward face first onto a sharp corner. It hit just above right between the eyes and immediately swelled up into a hard knot. An inch lower probably would have broken his nose. We felt so so so bad. Luckily, he only got this (relatively mild) black eye and a few days looking like a caveman because of a swollen eyebrow ridge.

Other milestones I'm not so thilled about E reaching (first tumble down the stairs, first goose egg, etc) all seem to be because he falls down. A. Lot. Maybe it's because I hate seeing my baby cry, but it seems to me like E is clumsier than most toddlers. He doesn't know how to catch himself in a fall. If he trips a little, he goes down all the way. Instead of landing on his knees or even on his hands and knees, he tips forward over his hands to land on his head. Instead of reaching out for something to steady himself against, he stiffens up and goes straight down. Instead of holding on when we push him around on a toy or give piggy back rides, he flails around and tips backwards. Is there any way to teach a kid how to fall correctly?