Foiling the Girl

So, Sarah climbs stairs quite well.  Sarah climbs the stairs quickly.  She's only fallen down them once!  Fortunately, when she fell she didn't do much damage except to get a knot on her head.  For a couple of weeks after the fall, she was nervous about climbing the stairs.  But now she's decided she's an old pro at this stair climbing thing, and is up them every time she has a chance.

But she has NO clue how to get back down.  We've worked with her on it, but she just hasn't gotten the hang of it.  And that is unnerving. Furthermore, when she sneaks upstairs she usually finds a door or 2 open and tends to get into undesirable things until someone finds her.

So ideally, she would only go upstairs under supervision.

We have a nice stairwell, but it doesn't work to have a gate on it.

Sigh.

So we've been trying to find creative ways to keep her downstairs.  The last few weeks, I was attaching a blanket across the bottom stair, and using clips to keep it in place.  Sarah has been working at getting around THAT for several weeks, and yesterday she showed she is too smart for that to work anymore.

So now I've moved onto a new way of blocking the stairway ... I have a pack and play and box wedged into position.  She is, momentarily at least, foiled.

Stay tuned for the next episode; I have no doubt Sarah will figure out a way around this barrier as well.

I wish I had sound effects for this picture. She was squealing indignantly like a banshee.