One of my dogs was doing this many years ago, it was his right front paw, I ended up bringing to the vet when he started doing the licking the air thing and twitching his paw away from his tongue. Turns out he twisted his paw and broke it at the joint, caused a lot of swelling and massive pain. but then once it was splinted he wouldn't get off his foot for the life of him and we ended up having to bring him back to get his foot re splinted three more times, not even crating him helped. Eventually we put him on a short leash and a cone on his head. Oh and my dog was allergic to aspirin, we found that out when he began puking after we gave him one to help ease the pain. :-(
Grit, I hope your baby is fine,
Ema