Rescue Me

My daughter has jumped directly from crawling on her hands and knees to pulling herself up and standing on her own in less than a week. This is incredibly exciting. It’s also a bit of a problem, because although she’s learning to stand up, she hasn’t the faintest idea how to get down.

Now, you’d think it would be pretty obvious, even to a baby, that if you’re standing up and hanging onto something, and you don’t want to be standing up any more, you can just let go and fall on your backside. And even if it wasn’t obvious, you’d think that after a very short time, you would let go by accident and then figure out that you could do that on purpose next time. My daughter, however, has yet to figure that out.

When she wakes up in the morning, she often plays in her crib for a bit before crying for us to get her. Now that she likes standing up, she pulls herself up on the crib bars and coos and bounces happily for several minutes when she wakes up. But then she pauses and thinks for a moment, as if wondering what to do next. She might give another bounce or two, just to fill time. But then the realization that she is stranded seems to dawn on her and her lip quivers, her entire face puddles up, and she lets out a pathetic wail. It’d break my heart if it weren’t so hilarious.

She has the same issue when she’s playing during the day. While her brother plays with his toys, she crawls around looking for things to climb up on. Her favorites are her brother’s highchair – when he’s sitting in it, eating, she crawls over to it, reaches up, and peeps over the edge at him, Kilroy Was Here style – and the corner of the couch. In both cases, she reaches as high as she can and hauls herself up on her knees, then with great effort pulls herself up onto her tiptoes and generally sways precariously for a few seconds before regaining her balance. She proudly stands there for a while, occasionally even taking a step or two sideways. And then, if she happens to be wearing a sleeper with particularly slippery feet, she begins to do a straddle. Lower and lower and wider and wider, until she realizes she’s in trouble, at which point the wailing begins. If she’s lucky and she’s already shed her socks for the day, she stays standing for a bit, but then she starts to get tired and again, the wailing begins.

Most of the time, it’s very funny. But there are times when it’s not so funny. When she has her last bottle at midnight and I put her in her bed, turn out the light, and drop exhausted into my own bed, and ten minutes later the wailing starts because instead of lying down and falling asleep like she used to do, she’s hauled herself up by the crib rails and is now stuck. So much for crying it out. Or when I’ve spent 12 hours peeling her off various pieces of furniture (and my legs) every 15 minutes.

She only took about a week to go from barely crawling to full-out climbing the furniture, so I’m really hoping that it’ll only take her another week to go from climbing up the furniture to climbing down the furniture. Because if it takes any longer, she may not be the only one who needs to be rescued. 

Happiness Is...an Empty Apartment

This past weekend, my sister got married. She and her now-husband had found an apartment just before the wedding, so they haven’t had a chance to move any furniture in yet. This afternoon, Ryan and I took a field trip to see their new place. And Ryan discovered nirvana.

The living room and dining room are combined, so the main part of the first floor is one big carpeted room. Not only that, but it has lots and lots of electrical outlets, a low-hanging chandelier, a half-wall topped with banister rails, and windows that open with cranks that are at a reachable height for little fingers. Ryan couldn’t get enough of it. He played with the window crank at one end, then crawled at top speed all the way to the other end of the room, then sat and reached for the chandelier, then turned around and crawled back to the half-wall and stood on his tiptoes to reach the banister rails. After he’d done that a few times, he discovered the next bit of nirvana: the stairs.

Not only are the stairs carpeted, but they make several turns so it’s like crawling up a giant corkscrew. A giant corkscrew with several light switches at the bottom. And more banister rails. (That were just wide enough that he probably could get his head stuck between them. We did not explore that possibility, much to his chagrin.) He would have gone up and down those stairs for hours if we’d let him. But there was more: closets galore!

The biggest complaint about most apartments is not enough storage space. But this townhouse has closets and storage nooks all over. There’s a coat closet with swinging doors right inside the entryway. There’s a pantry with dozens of narrow shelves in the hall. There’s a Ryan-sized storage area under the stairs. There are drawers and cabinets all over the place in the kitchen and bathrooms. There are narrow linen closets tucked in here and there. Nearly everywhere Ryan turned, he found a door to open. And with nothing in them, no-one stopped him from opening them or sticking his head or hands in to explore them. So he tested them all, over and over again.

He discovered a number of places that were tantalizingly within reach, if he could only stand on his tiptoes or stretch high enough. He found that he could just barely touch the faucet and taps of the sink in the downstairs bathroom. He could reach almost all the doorknobs. He could peek onto shelves and into cupboards. He could even look out of the living room windows without needing a boost.

By the time Sue and Steven come home from their honeymoon, their bedroom will be furnished, at least, and I’m sure it won’t take much time for them to move their things into the rest of the apartment and make themselves a nice, cozy, furnished little nest. And I’m sure that the first time Ryan visits, he’ll find all kinds of things to explore and peek behind and crawl onto. But it will never be quite the same as that one magical afternoon when he was allowed to open every cabinet, flip every light switch, explore every staircase, and race around the room without being scolded or stopped. When you’re a toddler who’s all too used to being told, “Stop!” and “Don’t touch!” and “No!”, happiness truly is an empty apartment.

Don't Fence Me In

The weather this weekend was some of the most perfect early fall weather I’ve ever experienced. Sunny and warm, but with a hint of a crisp breeze. Herb and Ryan and I spent Saturday at my alma mater, Gordon College, which is in Wenham, Massachusetts. The campus has grown considerably since I was a student, but it’s still beautiful. My favorite part of the day was going on a nature hike through the woods around one of the large ponds on campus. We had Ryan in the jogging stroller so he could get a good look at everything and everyone. He loved being out in the fresh air, listening to the birds, watching the breeze blow through the trees, and smelling the scent of fall in the air. And so did I!

But I think Ryan’s favorite part of the day was after the walk, when we went out to the soccer field and let him walk and crawl around unfettered. We don’t have a very big yard (or very big rooms), so he doesn’t have a lot of opportunities to just take off and crawl as far as he wants without running into some obstacle.

But on the huge quad – which fortunately, wasn’t especially crowded – he could take off and just keep going without us having to stop him. And he took advantage of it! He crawled after other babies, and bigger kids, and dogs. He found a longboard (a kind of extra-long skateboard) that a student had laid down while he chatted with friends and happily examined it and spun the wheels. He watched the girls’ soccer team play. He explored other strollers, and feet, and grass and leaves and sticks. It was a kind of freedom that he’d never experienced before, and he reveled in it!

He’s at the age where he encounters a lot of frustrations – either because I won’t let him do something that he wants to, or because he can’t figure out quite how to do something that he wants to. To when he has the chance to explore without boundaries (and therefore, without frustrations), I want to give it to him. There are so many times that I have to say no for his own safety, so I love finding a place where I don’t have to say no, and I don’t have to rein in his curiosity, and I don’t have to frustrate him by stopping him mid-exploration.

And it was a great day for all of us to not be fenced in.

Walk This Way

It’s official: Ryan can walk. Life as I know it is now over. He’s been on the verge for several weeks now, lurching from object to object, taking a step or two unaided before unceremoniously plopping down on the floor, careening wildly between pieces of furniture. But we managed to capture a solid 6 or 7 steps on video the other day.

My favorite part of the video is watching the expression on his face transform from a victorious grin into a round-mouthed “uh-oh” face as he starts to list to his left. He’s been determinedly and deliberately working on his walking skill, and he is truly proud of his accomplishment (and not just because Mummy & Daddy cheer like a couple of whackaloons every time he takes a few steps). He grins and chortles and hoots with excitement every time he gets from one place to the other on his own two feet. After all, self-propulsion is a pretty big deal!

Being able to walk represents a huge leap in terms of his independence and freedom. If he doesn’t have to hang onto my hands as he explores, he gets to decide where to go instead of allowing himself to be steered away from all kinds of interesting places. He doesn’t have to wait for me to have my hands free to trot across the room. He might even get to spend less time strapped into a stroller once he gets a bit steadier on his feet. He has his hands free to feel and pat and grab and explore the world around him.

And as exciting as that is for both of us, I can’t help but feel a tiny pang that he doesn’t need me quite as much any more. Learning to walk on his own is just the first of many little steps towards independence for him. Today, it’s walking on his own, but soon it will be getting on the school bus by himself, driving a car on his own, getting an apartment away from home. But then, that’s the whole point of being a mom: teaching him how to not need me. So as bittersweet as these moments of independence are, they’re also signs that I’m doing my job right. And I know that if I continue doing my job right, he won’t always need to have me around – but he’ll always want to have me around.

Don't Fence Me In

Whenever I can, I try to give Ryan the run of the house. I’ll march around the basement with him for hours, I’ll let him explore the kitchen while I’m working in there, I’ll supervise him going up and down the stairs. But there are always limits: no playing with the cabinet doors, no going into the laundry room, no opening the drawers. Plus, I have to continually steer him out of harm’s way, whether that harm is in the form of the fireplace tools, some non-childproofed drawers, a delicate piece of furniture, or a wall. And when I need to do something unencumbered for a moment, Ryan goes in the playpen. He can be perfectly content sitting down playing with a toy, but if I put him in the playpen with exactly the same toy, no more contentment. He needs to be free!!

Last night, the family headed over to the family dance studio so Herb could set up a new sound system. While he was installing the system and teaching his sister and niece how it works, Ryan and I got to play in the studio. What heaven! What freedom! The studio is, of course, a big open room with mirrors along one wall. So not only could Ryan crawl or march without running into an obstacle, he could also watch himself do it. And it got even more fun when Aunt Holly magically produced a bracelet with 4 or 5 sleigh bells on it. He made the most of his time at the studio, happily crawling at top speed from one end of the room to the other, stopping only now and then to ring (and chew on) the bells. He grabbed my hands and marched all over, clearly reveling in the ability to build up some momentum without having to stop or turn aside. He chortled at himself in the mirror as he did all his tricks, obviously proud of his own accomplishments.

For a child who is often told “no” or steered away from something interesting (in his mind) or dangerous (in mine), it was a wonderful opportunity to stretch his legs and not have to be stopped. As an adult, I rarely think about the freedom of movement I have. I can get up and stretch my legs or get some fresh air almost any time I want, and no-one will tell me to stop or come back. I can almost always find somewhere where I can walk freely as long as my heart desires. I’m rarely fenced in. But a baby doesn’t get to taste that kind of freedom very often. So any time Ryan doesn’t have to be fenced in, I don’t wanna fence him in. March and be free, my little man!

Master of the House

Yesterday afternoon Ryan was on a tear – marching everywhere, curious about everything, getting into as much mischief as he possibly could. I figured that he’d burn himself out and be mellower today, but no dice. He’s got just as much energy AND curiosity as he had yesterday, and then some! And he decided to use all that energy exploring the house this morning.

Herb had gotten up with him and fed him breakfast, and by the time I got up, got dressed, and got breakfast, Ryan was downstairs in his playpen having a bottle as a little “topper”. I took him out, thinking he’d be happy to sit on my lap and work on the bottle, as he often does. Ha! As soon as he was freed from the playpen, he lost all interest in the bottle and wanted me to march around the basement with him. So he marched along the couch, looked out the sliding glass doors for a moment, stuck his head into the bathroom, paused for a moment to roll around a few cans of soda next to the fridge, peeked in the study at Daddy, stopped to play with the plastic tag on Daddy’s camera bag, made a thwarted attempt to explore the laundry room, and banged on the air filter for a few minutes. Then he did the whole circuit again. And again. And again. And then he climbed the stairs – but instead of the usual attempt to go back down the stairs once he’d reached the top, he decided to explore the kitchen.

He opened every cabinet and studied its contents. He smacked the front of the fridge and pressed his nose against the sliding glass doors. He crawled under the kitchen table to see what he’d dropped at breakfast. He preened in front of his reflection in the dishwasher, the stove, and the wine fridge. He smacked the trash can on the way into the dining room.

He examined the wine rack and stood up to drum on the extra chair. He fingered the decorative table with the wrought-iron leaves. He stared at the chandelier from every angle. He stood on tiptoe to peek out the window. He crawled through the entryway, pausing for a moment to check out the extension cord on the doorjamb. He nearly fell over craning his neck to look at the chandelier far overhead.

Just as he reached the living room, the clock struck the hour and he stopped dead in his tracks to listen to the chimes and study the pendulum. As soon as the echo of the chimes died away, he was off and running again – checking out the firewood, the fireplace doors, the fireplace tools. No sooner did I thwart that attempt than he scooted behind the lounge chair and discovered the guitar! He spent quite some time strumming the strings and (gently!) patting the body and listening to the reverberations. Then on past the piano and back down the hallway to go back through the living room, this time edging, crablike, along the glass-top coffee table, drumming as he went. Then a peek into the bathroom, checking out a few cabinet doors on the way, and the entire circuit again. And again. And again! He stopped to consider going up the stairs, but apparently decided he was too tired to manage the third floor explorations at the moment.

I wonder if he has the concept of, “This is my house” or “This is where I live”. Is he exploring because he understands that this is where he spends most of his time, and is likely to spend more time here in the future? Does he feel some primitive form of ownership? Or at least of familiarity? Is he exploring in order to create or deepen that familiarity? Or is it just curiosity and the knowledge that exploring here is allowed? Whatever his reason, he certainly does love becoming the master of the house.

It's Just a Matter of Trust

Ryan would happily spend all day long marching around, hanging on to my hands. In fact, he’s got me so well trained in providing said hands that in the middle of doing something else, he’ll decide he wants to stand up and walk and without even looking around, he’ll just hold up his hands and grab, assuming (usually correctly) that my hands will be right there, ready and waiting for him.

It’s such a lovely demonstration of trust. He doesn’t need to confirm that I’m there, or that I know what he wants, or that I’m willing to help. He doesn’t need to see me, or to see my hand and reach for it. He just reaches out, like a surgeon who needs a scalpel, without a doubt in his mind that my hand will magically be there for him. I find the most interesting part of that to be the “not looking”. When you sit down at the dinner table and reach for your fork, you know the fork is there, and yet you still look at it before you pick it up. You don’t just blindly reach out and assume it will somehow land in your hand. But that’s exactly what Ryan does. That’s true trust.

What a wonderful thing for a child to have that kind of trust. No doubt, no hesitation. Expecting Mom or Dad to be there for him all the time, with never a flicker of thought that they might not be. He plunges through life, absolutely secure that we will be there to protect him from dangers and to provide for his every need. And we do. When he climbs the stairs, I’m right behind him to be sure he doesn’t fall back down. When he scrambles across the couch, I’m at the edge making sure he doesn’t launch himself onto the floor. When he’s playing beside the pool, one of us is always between him and the water. When he’s playing in the pool, Daddy has him securely to be sure he doesn’t try to breathe underwater or forget that he can’t actually swim. We strap him into the car seat, the grocery cart, and the stroller so he doesn’t get himself into trouble. Everywhere he goes, and everything he does, he doesn’t need to be concerned with his own safety because we do it for him. He trusts us to protect him. He trusts us utterly and completely.

But someday, probably sooner than I expect, he’ll decide that he’s ready to trust himself. He’ll walk without holding my hands. He’ll bob in the pool without assistance for a split-second. He’ll climb the stairs without a human cushion behind him. He’ll launch himself off the couch. And he’ll probably crash into something, get water up his nose, fall down a stair or two, and land on the floor on his head. And he’ll probably cry. But he’ll also probably get up, dust himself off, and do it all over again. And he’ll discover that he’s pretty trustworthy, too.

Battle Scars

God certainly knew what He was doing when He designed babies to be fast healers. Every since he was tiny, Ryan has been scratching his face or knocking his head against something or banging his wee feet into the changing table or even accidentally biting his tongue with his brand-new teeth. And now that he’s both mobile and extremely curious, there seems to be no end to the scrapes he gets himself into. Just a few days ago he managed to hurl himself off the changing table. He often tries to pull himself up on things that aren’t attached and bonks himself on the head. He trips over his own feet when half his body gets ahead of himself as he marches along. He’s launched himself off the side of the couch once or twice. He forgets that he can’t stand up for more than a second without holding onto something and careens into walls or tables. He pinches his fingers in drawers and cabinet doors. He’s come very close to falling down the steps, or through the screen door, or out the open sliders. He gets himself wedged under a table and coshes his head when he tries to get up. He stands up on his tiptoes to look over things but then loses his balance and so far has just barely missed clocking himself in the chin or the mouth. (It’s inevitable he clocks himself eventually – it’s in his genes. I have a scar under my eyebrow from walking into a table as a baby, and my mom’s dining room table has a lovely semicircular imprint of my top teeth from an ill-advised attempt I once made to peep over it.)


Some of his battle scars aren’t completely his own fault, I must admit. When we were at the airport last weekend, waiting to board our flight home, I let him crawl on the carpeted area near the gate. He would crawl a few feet away then I would “chase” him, grab him by the feet, and haul him back to me while he giggled uproariously. Unfortunately, one of those times his T-shirt rode up and I gave him a horrible rug burn right on his tummy. Luckily, even just a few days later it’s nearly healed. As is the bump on his head from the other day when we were roughhousing on the couch and he managed to overshoot my arm and went right over the end of the couch onto his head. Being somewhat neurotic, I’m probably more careful with him than some mothers might be, but he still manages to bonk himself silly every now and then. It’s just part of growing up.

But above and beyond his battle scars, I’ve been getting my share as well. My latest is a small goose egg over my left eyebrow from catching a lamp that Ryan knocked over - with my face. I continually have bruises along the sides of my legs from blocking drawers and cabinets from being opened by little hands. I’ve had a few fat lips and near-nosebleeds from an overexcited head bob. There are often a few sore spots on my scalp from strong little fingers clutching my hair. And I’m not even counting the endless sore muscles from hauling around my wiggly, 32-pound sack o’ potatoes.

But they’re battle scars that I’m proud of. I’ve earned them keeping my little monkey safe, playing with him, teaching him new things. So I don’t even mind that I don’t heal as fast as he does. I’m happy to wear my battle scars as a badge of motherhood!

A Day in the Life

When his daughter was not quite a year old, Herb made a video he called “A Day in the Life of Rosemary”. He started with footage of her waking up in the morning and caught ordinary moments throughout the day (eating breakfast, playing with her toys, climbing the stairs, etc.), and ended with tucking her back into her crib that night. Nothing unusual or spectacular, just ordinary happenings on an ordinary day. But it’s a tape he’s watched over and over during the past 17 years.
So today, we’re making “A Day in the Life of Ryan”, trying to capture all the wonderful little moments that we see every day. But naturally, he’s not quite having his usual day today. For example, nearly every morning he wakes up at 6:30 or 7 and sings and plays in his crib for half an hour or so before going back to sleep for another hour or two. So Herb had the video camera ready outside the nursery so he could sneak down the hall at Ryan’s first peep and capture those moments before he went back to sleep again. And at about 6:30, we heard a little peep and Herb immediately slipped down the hall to grab some footage. But the little stinker didn’t sing or play or even wake up! He just went right back to sleep! So we stayed in bed for a couple more hours and then when Ryan STILL didn’t wake up we got ourselves dressed and ready for when he finally did. At 9:15, he finally started to stir a bit, so Herb got some footage of him waking up and playing (a little), but none of his usual singing. Oh, well.
He did cooperate nicely at breakfast, doing his usual staring out the window or across the room while he absent-mindedly opened his mouth so I could stick in the spoon. He was quite distracted by the camera, though, so a lot of his staring across the room was really staring at the camera, but at least that was similar to his typical behavior.
He also cooperated by playing very happily with his toys in his playpen. He pulled himself up and made one of his toys play music by spinning its wheels and whacking the little animals so they would light up and roll balls around. He spent quite a bit of time rolling balls down the ramp of another toy, even chasing after the balls when they rolled into the corners of the playpen and behind other toys. He did a bit of cruising around the playpen wall and grinned rather charmingly (and proudly) at the camera when he finished.
He was somewhat less cooperative when he started climbing the stairs and I called Herb to get some footage. As soon as the camera (and Daddy) appeared, he was much more interested in that than in showing off his stair-climbing prowess. Eventually he was willing to at least stand up and hang off the banister, but it was obvious that stair-climbing was no longer at the top of his interest list. And of course, after hanging on the banister he managed to fall over and clock himself on a side table next to the stairs, so we managed to catch the “drama of the day” on film, as well.
Once he settled down from that little injury (although I suspect the insult to his pride was the larger problem), he was willing to have a bottle and snuggle with Mum for a bit. He was still pretty sniffly so I took him out to sit by the pool and get some fresh air, which always seems to calm him down. I think we may have caught some sweet (if not typical) footage of Mummy singing lullabies to the koala boy. Unfortunately, instead of falling asleep, he got his second wind and then wanted to march around the house again.
After a bit of marching, a bit of crawling, and a bit of ball rolling, he seemed sleepy again, so Daddy took him upstairs for a nap, which is where he is right now. Only he’s not napping, he’s standing against the bars of the crib, chewing the top rail and bouncing up and down. He’s not yelling, though, so I’m not complaining.
So the video we make may not be a typical “day in the life” after all. But then, how often do we really have something that could be called a typical day? Maybe the fact that it’s not a typical day makes it a typical day after all. Just one more of life’s delicious little ironies.

The Puppetmaster

Now that Ryan is “cruising”, he wants to spend as much time as possible marching about with my (or Daddy’s) help. Which means that I spend several hours a day steering him around the basement. Now, we’ve been working on childproofing the basement as much as possible, but there are still some things he can find to get himself into trouble with: the serving dishes on the shelving unit, the drawers in my sewing table, the shelves of books and DVDs, and the pool chemicals in the corner. But the advantage to his needing to hang onto someone while he explores is that I have the power to steer him away from anything he shouldn’t be getting into. I am the Puppetmaster!


It’s kind of a funny feeling to be able to steer him around. He hasn’t completely mastered the art of “one foot in front of the other” so when I steer him in a particular direction, his feet often tangle up and face a completely different direction from the rest of his body. But he doesn’t really resist, and a little nudge in the direction I want him to go in is usually enough to get him heading that way. I’m not sure if he gives up or if he really doesn’t care where he’s going as long as he’s marching along. But it must feel funny to him to be moving along with no control over where he’s going!

I suspect this is a good analogy for a lot of his moving along in life – Daddy and I will do our best to steer him in a particular direction, and early on I’m sure that he will go along without much struggle or fuss. But I’m also sure that the older he gets the more he will want to control his own direction. Hopefully he’ll at least consider Mom and Dad’s nudges, and hopefully our early direction will still be in the back of his head, guiding him. Even if he isn’t willing to admit that our guidance had any influence on his decisions, I know it will. And even when he goes against that guidance (and he will), maybe he’ll remember it when the direction he chooses for himself turns out to be less than wise.

Mom and Dad can’t play the Puppetmaster forever, nor should we. Pinocchio eventually needs to lose his strings and become a little boy instead of a marionette. But if we play our cards right, our voices will always be a little Jiminy Cricket in his ear.

All Around the Mulberry Bush

When I was little, I thought my cousins had the coolest house in the world because the first floor had a central staircase and you could walk all the way around it. Start in the kitchen, go down the hall into the living room, circle around past the coat closet into the dining room and then back into the kitchen again. Our house had a wall so although you could start at the front door, go into the living room then through the kitchen and down the hallway into my parents’ bedroom, then there was a wall that stopped you from making a complete circuit. I remember loving the circular floor plan, but I didn’t really remember why. Until Ryan discovered that our basement has the same floor plan.

Just this morning I was lamenting to my husband that we don’t have a good, big area where Ryan can just crawl to his heart’s content without running into an obstacle (like a wall). But when I brought him downstairs and let him crawl, he started making circles around the staircase. He’d start at the base of the stairs and crawl toward the laundry room (stopping along the way to hoist himself up on the Coleman cooler, which he then licked repeatedly), then finding the laundry room door closed he’d head down the hall towards the study, stopping to check out the dead computer case and the magnets on the soda fridge before rounding the corner (peeking in the bathroom on the way by), banging on the big radio as he headed for the den and pulling himself up again to creep between the sofa and the playpen, then carefully working his way across the sofa before plopping down at the base of the stairs and starting his rounds all over again. It’s great, because he never has to stop unless he wants to. He doesn’t come to any frustrating obstacles that force him to turn around and explore where he’s already been. And by the time he gets back to his starting place, it becomes new and interesting again! So he can explore for hours without getting bored.

I guess it’s one step up from a hamster wheel – the hamster keeps running and running and never has to stop, and is dumb enough to either not notice or not care that the scenery never changes. Ryan can make a full circuit of the floor before coming back to something he’s already seen, and that’s just long enough for him to either not notice or not care that he’s been there before.

So I’m glad that Ryan is smarter than a hamster. But I’m even gladder that in some ways, he’s not a LOT smarter than a hamster. He’s a lot cuter than a hamster, though – and hamsters are awfully cute.

One Small Step for Baby, One Giant Leap for Babyproofing

I never realized until I had a baby of my own what exactly is entailed in babyproofing. There are actually two components to it. The first, and the one that most people think of when they hear the expression, is all those gadgets: outlet protectors, cabinet locks, baby gates, childproof doorknobs, etc. It’s all the physical stuff you have to install to keep the baby from getting into dangerous places. But the second, and the aspect that changes most over time, is behavioral changes. Not the baby’s behavior; the parents’.

When Ryan was a small infant and hadn’t even learned to roll over yet, I could safely put him down on the floor of the nursery to go answer the phone, or get a fresh pack of diapers, or get an outfit from the dresser, with no doubt that he would be exactly where I left him when I got back. The only danger there was the possibility of him being attacked by a dust rhino. Once he learned to roll over, I could still leave him for a moment to get the phone, I just needed to throw a blanket over the lamp cord and put my coffee cup on the side table instead of the floor before I left. He might try to eat a dust rhino, but that was the only worry. When he learned to crawl, I had to block the front of the crib so he couldn’t crawl underneath it (in pursuit of a dust rhino, of course) and get stuck, throw a blanket over the glider ottoman so he couldn’t get his fingers stuck in the mechanism, and unplug and move the hairdryer out of his reach. And now that he’s pulling himself up on things, if the phone rings, I have no choice but to grab him and bring him with me to get it, because by the time I got back he’d have pulled over the lamp, knocked the radio off the side table, and gotten his fingers stuck in the spring of the crib.

So even though our level of physical babyproofing hasn’t changed, my behavior certainly has. Gone are the days when I could sit on the couch with a cup of coffee and a sewing project, flipping through the TV channels. Back when Ryan was only crawling, I could leave a drink in the cupholder of the easy chair, I could toss the remote on the couch, and I could leave a pair of scissors on a side table without any fear of Ryan getting at them. But his perspective and therefore his level of interest changed from three inches off the ground to three FEET off the ground when he learned to pull himself up and stand up. So anything on the couch is fair game.

It adds a certain level of complication to anything I do with him in the room. This morning he was happily playing with a toy on the floor, so I decided to sit on the couch where I could keep an eye on him and stick labels onto some CDs I’d burned. Well, no sooner had I settled in with my pile of labels, my pile of CDs, my pile of envelopes, and my “CD Stomper”, but Mr. Curious had to come over and see what I was doing. And naturally, all my “toys” were much more interesting than his toys. I managed to maneuver myself so my legs were against the side of his playpen, blocking his access to the side of the couch with all my stuff on it, but he was determined and practically clawed his way up into my lap in order to get at it. I finally had to give up, put my things away, and wait until his naptime to finish my project.

So the term “babyproofing” is much more of an ongoing process than the one-time event I had imagined it to be. I’m also wondering if anyone has invented a cupholder that you can stick to a wall about 5 feet up off the floor. Yeah, five feet ought to buy me another couple of months…

My Son, Tarzan

I knew it would happen eventually. A couple of days ago, when I caught him pulling himself up on a chair, I knew it would happen soon. But I didn’t expect it would happen today. We had just gone grocery shopping and Ryan seemed to be running out of steam a bit, so as soon as we got home I popped him in his crib with the fan on him in the hope that he’d take a nap before our company arrived this afternoon. I unloaded the groceries from the car then headed upstairs to the nursery to see how he was doing. As I walked in the door, I saw him kneeling against the side of the crib, and as I watched, he pulled himself up to his full height (head and shoulders over the side rail, even with the mattress in its lowest position) and let out a long, loud, Tarzan-worthy yell. And then gave me the biggest, proudest grin I’d ever seen.

It’s true: my son has turned into Tarzan. Only a few days ago he was safely earthbound, and now he’s climbing up everything that’s not nailed down. He’ll pull himself up on the side of the playpen, the side of the crib, the edge of our bed, the couch, the ottoman, a kitchen chair, a deck chair, the leg of any unsuspecting bysitter. If he can grab onto it, he’s hauling himself up on it. And of course, the triumphant yell merely completes the Tarzan image.

I’m not sure if Edgar Rice Burroughs described Tarzan’s yell in particular detail in his books, but whether or not he did, I have to think that Ron Ely (or whoever may have played an earlier version of Lord Greystoke) based the famous sound of his movie yell on the proud yodel of a baby who had just mastered standing on his own. It’s a sound that is proud and triumphant, a call for attention – and also a call for help. Ryan’s yell is certainly a call for anyone in listening range to come and admire and praise his accomplishment – but with an undertone of calling for help. Getting up is still easier than getting down, and although he generally thuds down onto his well-padded backside without too much anxiety or pain, he seems to prefer some assistance in cushioning his fall.

I have no doubt, however, that the need for assistance will disappear as quickly as the ability to pull himself up appeared. In just a few days I will probably be wishing that he’d yell when he stands up, or even that he’d fall back on his backside – because in a few days, he’ll probably have also figured out how to get himself up and over all those fences and rails and pieces of furniture that he’s currently scaling.

Anyone have a few dozen extra sofa cushions I could borrow for a couple of months??

The Paradox of the Mobile Baby

As Ryan is getting the hang of crawling and as he learns to pull himself up on things and stand up on his own, I am looking forward with both delight and trepidation to his “mobile months”.

I am delighted that with his mobility comes a much greater ability to amuse himself. Now that he can get to toys that he wants and doesn’t get himself stuck sitting on his own feet, he can happily entertain himself for hours without needing me hovering over him to get him playthings or rescue him from himself. He’ll sit in front of his ball tower and contentedly roll ball after ball down the ramp, or sit in front of the TV cabinet tugging determinedly at the knobs (which Daddy has tied together so the doors won’t open) trying to get inside, or fwap at his big inflatable ball and giggle at the vibrations. He’ll spin the wheels of his truck for a while, then crawl over to his beads and chew on them for a bit, then scoot over to one of his beloved spitrags and lie on the floor chewing on that and kicking his feet up in the air. Or he’ll kneel in front of the playpen wall and laboriously pull himself up with both hands, then let go with one hand and swing back and forth like a gate until he falls on his backside – then he’ll start the process all over again.

But the trepidation part comes when I realize that despite the fact that he no longer needs me to keep him entertained all the time, he does need me to protect him from himself now! When he’s in the Pack & Play or the playpen, the worst he can do to himself is pinch his finger with a toy or fall over and kosh his noggin. But in the living room, or the nursery, or the yard, I can’t take my eyes off him for a second or he’ll be unplugging a lamp, strangling himself with an extension cord, knocking over a chair, or a hundred other unimaginable accidents. Even with the best babyproofing in the world, a big, strong, curious baby like Ryan will find trouble to get into anywhere. We can put outlet protectors on every socket and wind power cords onto little plastic reels, but Ryan is strong enough to knock over nearly any piece of furniture in the house and take those power cords with it. He’s fascinated by anything electronic with lights and buttons so the computer CPUs, the air conditioners, an unattended digital camera or phone or remote control, all such toys are subject to search and seizure by the little man. And any door or cabinet or secret cupboard must and WILL be opened and explored.

And such curiosity is to be encouraged – as long as it can be done safely. Which is why I will have to keep careful watch on him every waking moment. He may not need me as a playmate right now, but he certainly needs me as a security guard!

Monkey See, Monkey Do

Ryan has been on the verge of crawling “properly” for weeks now. He could roll, he could inchworm, he could commando crawl, he could go backwards on his hands and knees, he could even lurch forward one “real” crawl at a time. But no true, up on hands and knees, moving across the room at a steady rate, crawl. Herb joked several times that if we just put him in a room with a baby who could crawl, he’d figure it out in a heartbeat. After all, he had all the steps, he just hadn’t put them together in the right order yet.

Well, we had that opportunity to have him in a room with a crawling baby this past weekend at Cannon Mountain. We took the aerial tram to the peak, then had our picnic lunch in the little cafeteria there. And while we were finishing our lunch and waiting for the next tram back down the mountain, we met another family with a couple of little ones. The little girl, Lily, was 2-1/2 and weighed 5 pounds less than Ryan. The little boy, Russell, was 13 months old and about half Ryan’s size (height AND weight). Ryan was fascinated by both of them. He and Russell sat on the floor and stared at each other for a few moments, Ryan with his slack-jawed, furrowed brow expression, and Russell with a binky in his mouth and his big dark eyes wide, both taking in the situation. After a moment or two, they both reached out and pawed at each other a bit, then Russell apparently got bored, leaned over, and crawled right over Ryan’s foot to the other side of the room at about a million miles an hour. Ryan just stared after him, as if to say, “How does he DO that??” He watched both older kids zooming around the room from his seated position, flapping his arms and craning his neck with excitement and interest. We wondered just how much he was taking in.

Yesterday, we found out. It was so hot that we played in the pool for quite a while in the afternoon, and when we got out I left Ryan in his damp swimsuit, thinking he’d stay cooler that way. But I didn’t want to bring him inside still that damp, so I laid out a big towel on the pool deck, plopped myself in a chair between him and the pool, and plunked him on the towel with a few toys. He sat there, looking at the toys for a minute or two, then very determinedly and deliberately pulled himself up on his hands and knees, crawled the whole length of the towel towards me without stopping, and proceeded to grab on to the side of my chair, haul himself up into a kneeling position, and try to pull his knees up to get his feet underneath him! Astonished, I gave him a bit of a boost and he proudly grabbed the arm of the chair, swaying drunkenly but very much standing on his own two feet!

Naturally, I immediately made him do it again, just to be sure I wasn’t seeing things. And immediately after THAT, I set up the video monitor and e-mailed Herb to come check out Ryan’s new tricks! Of course once the camera was on he was much more interested in other things, but when Daddy came home he did crawl across the bedroom floor and pull himself up on the side of the bed.

This is a very exciting development! But of course, it comes with a price. This morning I dropped his crib mattress down to the lowest position – since he’s so tall, if he tries to pull himself up on the side of the crib with the mattress in its previous position, he’d go right over the side! Even with the mattress dropped all the way down, it won’t be long before he can climb out of the crib, I expect. And this lightning fast crawling means I can’t take my eyes off him for a second. No more leaving him on the nursery floor for 15 seconds to grab the phone in the other room, no more leaving him downstairs while I take a bathroom break, no more letting him explore the kitchen floor while I make dinner. I suspect that the Pack & Play and the free-standing playpen will start to get a lot more use all of a sudden!

Not to mention, I’ll be doing a lot more racing to reach something forbidden before he does, pulling him down off chairs and couches and bookcases, picking him up from under toys and cushions and other random objects that he’ll manage to pull down on himself. Good thing my biceps are already in pretty good shape – they’ll need to be!