I've heard soo many stories about toddlers and their quest to escape their cribs and have been warned that one day, chances are one, some or ALL of mine would learn to as well. I thought that maybe, just mayyybe I would get lucky and not have to deal with that part of toddlerhood...ha! A few months ago I went to peek into the girls' room during nap time and saw this...
My heart just about jumped up into my throat at the sight of my little barely 20lb baby girl straddling her crib rail and holding on for dear life. I went in, set her back down in her crib, told her "no" and left the room. Five minutes later I hear a loud THUD followed by crying. Sure enough she had done it again, but had fallen and landed on her head. The first thing that came to my mind was crib tent. I've heard some people say "When they climb out of their crib that means they NEED a toddler bed"... I totally disagree. At this point in time, for our family, toddler beds are out of the question. Luckily, my friend and fellow quad mom Casey Gerwer had a crib tent she was ready to get rid of so we made the trip that afternoon to pick it up. We were prepared to install it that night if our little monkey-girl decided to try it again. To our surprise, she didn't. Since then (December) that crib tent has been waiting patiently in the garage until we were forced to use it. Well, that day came this past Wednesday night.
It was about 7pm, the babies were in bed and Bret and I had just sat down to watch a little American Idol when we heard a little voice say "Mom.........Mom..........Mom....." (first of all MOM? where in the world did she learn to call me Mom?!). Bret and I immediately looked at each other knowing she was not in her crib and was standing very close to her almost but not quite closed door. I peeked around the corner and saw Baxlyn's little body standing at the crack of the door and her little face beaming with pride, I have to admit it was kinda cute! We went to her room, set her back in her crib, had a little talk and left. 2 minutes later...you guessed it...she was out again. Not sure how she did it, but she did indeed figure it out without hurting herself. Bret headed to the garage for the crib tent and he and Baxlyn sat in her room putting it together while Kylee watched.
Once it was ready we had to figure out a way to make the new tent seem fun and cool but not soo fun and cool that the others would want one...let me tell you that is a FINE line! I've heard parents say their kids call them "tents" "princess castles" and other cool things. Baxlyn immediately suggested it was her "tunnel". We set her in her new tunnel, gave her a few blocks and she settled right down for the night!
The next morning the boys went in to see the girls with their daily "Goo Mo-nan!" greeting...their jaws dropped at the sight of the new crib tent and Korbin yelled "Bashi Tunnel!" He thought it was the coolest thing and insisted he and Brody try it out too! For now it's the perfect fix for our little climber. I'm sure it's just a matter of time before there's another one, two, or Heaven forbid three in cages as well!
My twins are the same age as your quads (like within a week or so, I think) and we just started crawling out too this week. I thought the same thing, maybe we were going to skip this whole thing because they had been so good up until this point. This mama isn't ready for toddler beds either!!!!
ReplyDeleteCrib tents are sanity savers. You can't reason with a two year old. Best invention ever!
ReplyDeleteI have had four kiddos each learn to climb out of their cribs well before their time and we have used the crib tents each time- the best invention ever! I say keep them in the crib as long as humanly possible!
ReplyDeleteMy two year old has had a crib tent up for sometime. He thinks it is cool. His sisters have tents on their beds, too. Warning though, he has learned to unzip his. Good thing is that he doesn't upzip it until I go to get him out of bed in the morning.
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