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Wednesday, September 23, 2015

The joys of baby-proofing.

These days with Rhonda are quite an adventure.

I've already told you that she's started learning at double speed, which has emotional implications, but the physical consequences are a little more exhausting. 

The other day we were out on a picnic with neighbors and a woman put a plate of food down on the picnic blanket, not two feet away from where her newborn baby was lying. I could hardly believe Rhonda had ever been so helpless and immobile. 

Nowadays, she's all about ripping off my jewelry, pulling books and DVDs off shelves, tearing up magazines, and putting electrical cords in her mouth. It's exciting that she's so curious and clever (I'm trying to focus on positivity here), but it's all I can do to keep up with her.


Baby-proofing used to seem like a pretty simple task, consisting mainly of putting up baby gates, fastening child locks to doors, and putting those little doohickeys in electrical sockets. 

Not so, people. NOT SO. 

It started with my efforts to protect her from electrical cords, which are probably her favorite things in the world. (What's so exciting about a stupid cord, I ask you?!) Unfortunately, since my husband is an electronics junkie, we have cords lining every wall. My solution was to lay blankets on top of the cords, but I have no idea how long that brilliant idea is going to last. 

It only escalated from there. I've tried to protect the bookcases by putting various furniture and her old infant car seat in front of them. (It sort of works, but she's becoming quite deft at getting around the obstacles.) I tucked a blanket around a particular electronic that she couldn't leave alone, and it seems to have tricked her into thinking it's not there anymore. When I suddenly found her on the third step of our stairs, it was time for a baby gate--the first truly obvious solution to a baby-proofing problem. 

So my living room is a lovely mess of strewn blankets and caddywompous furniture and baby toys. 

It's not because I don't clean. It's because it's the only way to keep this child safe.

With an infant fast turning into a toddler, I'm starting to think that having a pretty house isn't within the realm of possibility.

Well, since becoming a mom, it's not like I've had a lot of time to decorate anyway. 

1 comment:

  1. Do you know that there are plastic tube-type things that are meant to contain cords? You can use them for baby-proofing (and just generally making tangled cords look neater) if the cords are attached to electronics that just sit in one place all the time. You slip the cords into the tube and stick the tube to the wall with adhesive.

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