Guilty…

I’m guilty.  I will be the first to admit I do things that make my life easier that probably aren’t the best for my daughter.  For instance I over child proof.  Emma has clear boundaries in our house.  There are three baby gates and a fence inside our house to keep Emma in those boundaries.  She’s just such a busy kid that I would never get anything done for all of the no-no’s.  It’s easier for her, and best for my relationship with her to keep her within an area that is safe for her.  I built a cabinet to house her multi-part toys, and put child locks on them it, so that we can get one or two of them out at a time.  She has other toys that she can get to all the time.  I just got sick of sorting little people and building blocks and musical instruments, and legos, etc, after they had been dumped all over the living room floor.  She would probably be better served to learn these boundaries without child locks and baby gates, but for now, we  will keep them in place, and we’ll work on it when I can reason with her a bit more.

So this morning I got to thinking…  I know she can drink out of a cup without a lid.  She does a pretty good job of it when she wants to.  She’s often rather drink out of my cup than her own.  Sometimes that is because I have something different to drink (pop).  But other times I’m drinking water just like her, and she’d still rather drink from my cup.   She’s had a touch of a cold, and was having trouble drinking from her sippy cup so I took the lid off of it and gave it back to her to finish her milk.  It took all of 30 seconds for this to happen…

I give up.  We’re keeping the lid on for now.