how many of your toddlers were climbers?

[MarieCurie]

I have 1/2 that's a climber. You might think it's my boy that's, but no it's my girl. Although he seems to be learning from his sister now.

[Murphy101]

13 minutes ago, MarieCurie said:

I have 1/2 that's a climber. You might think it's my boy that's, but no it's my girl. Although he seems to be learning from his sister now.

 

Everyone always comments on how hair raising 7 sons must be for me. And sure, I’m not going to lie, I’ve earned every white hair I’ve got, but...

Know who has broken bones, knocked out two adult front teeth, fell off a tree and landed back first on a wooden fence, caught the house on fire, got a concussion, swallowed a bee, or impaled a foot?

Not a single one of my sons.

[Rachel]

18 hours ago, SKL said:

I don't believe I ever had to tell one of my kids not to climb.  Which I think is weird.  Like many of you, it seems like all tots should be trying to climb.  I was sort of looking forward to it.

Other things my kids never tried to do - getting into cabinets and stuff.  I told them which cupboards they were allowed to dig through and which they weren't, and that was that.  Also they never tried to play with the Christmas tree ornaments because I told them once not to do it.  They never tried to open the door and go outside alone.  Never got curious about the electrical wires.  All these things I thought every warm-blooded human child would do, my kids didn't.

This sounds a lot like my kids. We never childproofed our house and I never felt like we needed to. The only time we had trouble with Christmas ornaments was when we actually decorated the tree and they would drop them as they tried to hang them. I solved that by telling which ones they could hang themselves. 

I do have a couple strong willed children and we do have struggles but they weren’t with climbing or getting into cabinets. 

[MarieCurie]

4 hours ago, Murphy101 said:

 

Everyone always comments on how hair raising 7 sons must be for me. And sure, I’m not going to lie, I’ve earned every white hair I’ve got, but...

Know who has broken bones, knocked out two adult front teeth, fell off a tree and landed back first on a wooden fence, caught the house on fire, got a concussion, swallowed a bee, or impaled a foot?

Not a single one of my sons.

And I came home today to find out my daughter has a fat lip from a fall.

[EKS]

1 out of 2, thank goodness!  He was also a runner.  He totally exhausted me, and it's a miracle that he has a brother!

Every morning before he came downstairs, I would rearrange the furniture to discourage climbing.  His crib was tented.  I also had a leash and used it.

[ktgrok]

14 hours ago, Rachel said:

This sounds a lot like my kids. We never childproofed our house and I never felt like we needed to. The only time we had trouble with Christmas ornaments was when we actually decorated the tree and they would drop them as they tried to hang them. I solved that by telling which ones they could hang themselves. 

I do have a couple strong willed children and we do have struggles but they weren’t with climbing or getting into cabinets. 

I get that you are speaking English, but do not understand what you are saying, lol. Does not compute. Your children didn't open the cabinets and pull everything out? Didn't open drawers and dump everything out? What is this madness? What black magic do I need to practice to get this????? My DD literally spends her ENTIRE DAY  trying to get into things she shouldn't. It's her only goal in life. If she is supposed to play with it it isn't interesting. Dad's drawer of toxic and sharp stuff? Fascinating. Cabinets, drawers, shelves, etc. She will empty them in a heartbeat. We have ALMOST all of the ones in the house childproofed but still she spends a good part of every day trying to get into the ones that are not. 

Oh, and the trash cans. 

And the toilet brush.

And the plunger.

And the litter box.

And the dog food (which she eats).

The only thing she doesn't trash (and I'm sure I'm jinxing it now) that the others did is the book shelves. She pulls off some each day but sticks to the children's books. My other kids, especially the oldest, pulled them all off so I had to keep them really wedged in there. She just goes after the one shelf that is mostly board books so I'm okay with that, I just pick them up a few times a day.

But otherwise she's a ball of destruction, who spends the day trying to destroy my house and herself. I think she's probably the worst of them as far as destruction, other than the first. Not the worst climber, oldest got that title, but close. 

Edited to add: the toilet! I forgot to add her obsession with toilet water and playing in it. We are SO vigilant but she still sometimes gets a hand in there while I'm brushing teeth or a kid forgets to close a door. I think she likes having her hands washed so me doing that afterwards is like a reward, making her enjoy the toilet even more. It's so disgusting. 

Edited to add: I may actually cry at the thought of what life might be like with a toddler that just didn't try to destroy themselves and the house all day. Like, how much would I get done???? "baby warden" is pretty much my number one job all day. I have to empty the dishwasher one minute at a time over an hour to keep her from getting into it. While the 8 yr old does school work I'm full time trying to keep the toddler alive...I swear to all that is holy it is like having a hyperactive orangutan in the kitchen while you homeschool. I even found myself giving her "enrichment" activities like they do zoo animals, lol. "here's a bowl with some crushed ice and chopped grapes and a paint brush and some torn paper" "here's some whipped cream in a bowl with a spoon" etc. 

[TheReader]

2 minutes ago, Ktgrok said:

I get that you are speaking English, but do not understand what you are saying, lol. Does not compute. Your children didn't open the cabinets and pull everything out? Didn't open drawers and dump everything out? What is this madness? What black magic do I need to practice to get this????? My DD literally spends her ENTIRE DAY  trying to get into things she shouldn't. It's her only goal in life. If she is supposed to play with it it isn't interesting. Dad's drawer of toxic and sharp stuff? Fascinating. Cabinets, drawers, shelves, etc. She will empty them in a heartbeat. We have ALMOST all of the ones in the house childproofed but still she spends a good part of every day trying to get into the ones that are not. 

Oh, and the trash cans. 

And the toilet brush.

And the plunger.

And the litter box.

And the dog food (which she eats).

The only thing she doesn't trash (and I'm sure I'm jinxing it now) that the others did is the book shelves. She pulls off some each day but sticks to the children's books. My other kids, especially the oldest, pulled them all off so I had to keep them really wedged in there. She just goes after the one shelf that is mostly board books so I'm okay with that, I just pick them up a few times a day.

But otherwise she's a ball of destruction, who spends the day trying to destroy my house and herself. I think she's probably the worst of them as far as destruction, other than the first. Not the worst climber, oldest got that title, but close. 

 

Katie, this was my youngest, too. I actually rearranged all the kitchen cabinets so that everything he couldn't break was in the low cabinets, and everything we didn't want him to get was up high (luckily, with all his climbing, he never thought to climb up and open the upper cabinets). When I'd do school with the big kids, I'd gate him *into* the kitchen, knowing I'd childproofed everything dangerous, and let him empty the cups, bowls, pans, etc. and stack, bang, whatever to his hearts content. (I could only use that trick once/week, though, or it became boring. We also would sit in the bathroom, him in the non-stoppered tub, water on and let him splash. Or put finger paint in the tub for him. And I had a rice box/bean box with toys. And I'd do school at the table and put him in his high chair with pudding and no spoon and let him "finger paint" with the pudding, eat it, etc. .And we'd gate him into the long hallway with "only during school time" toys/objects, and the kids would take turns being in the hall with him while I did school with the other. And.....I don't remember what all else, and that's not the point of this thread anyway, but point is.....I so get what you're saying, mine was that way too, and you'll/she'll get through this mostly in tact.....)

And we just read the ingredients on our dog food and dog treats, bought ones we felt were not going to kill him, and gave up on trying to stop him from eating them. In the grocery store, he'd reach for the box of dog treats in the cart before the bag of goldfish. Not kidding. It was embarrassing, but.....I had no energy, at all, to fight him on anything that wasn't going to do actual harm, because just fighting those battles was hard enough/exhausting enough. 

He's matured and calmed down and a delight now, but I still tense up when I think too hard about his early childhood.....

[Sneezyone]

21 hours ago, Selkie said:

My three all were climbers.

When I was a toddler, I had a tall dresser and was climbing up the drawers when the whole thing fell over on top of me.

My Catahoula dog climbs more than my kids did. He is always climbing up on counters and tables and plopping down for a nap. When I work at my desk, he climbs up and lays right next to what I'm working on.

 

DH just sent me a msg saying my dog is in timeout. He left the room to move laundry and came back to our mini pin standing on the (empty) dining room table.?

[ktgrok]

23 minutes ago, TheReader said:

 

K..I so get what you're saying, mine was that way too, and you'll/she'll get through this mostly in tact.....)

And we just read the ingredients on our dog food and dog treats, bought ones we felt were not going to kill him, and gave up on trying to stop him from eating them. In the grocery store, he'd reach for the box of dog treats in the cart before the bag of goldfish. Not kidding. It was embarrassing, but.....I had no energy, at all, to fight him on anything that wasn't going to do actual harm, because just fighting those battles was hard enough/exhausting enough. 

He's matured and calmed down and a delight now, but I still tense up when I think too hard about his early childhood.....

Thank you, that does make me feel better. Honestly until this thread I thought ALL babies were like this, all of mine have been. I was doing okay with it until I read that some were not, and the thought of NOT spending all day on defense kind of hit me hard, lol. Like, wow...what would I DO all day, lol??

[BooksandBoys]

2 of 3, but DS3 was nothing after surviving the climbing/running/escaping/yes, even escaping the house or the car/cabinet emptying/everything else that was DS2. :-) 

Katie, DS3 was a cat food eater. I tried everything to stop him. Since he had a wheat sensitivity (very nasty eczema), I was rather desperate, but I still failed. I bought gluten-free food for the cat to fix the problem because I couldn’t stop my kid. :-)

 

 

[Xahm]

I'm not sure how to classify my kids. I guess they are careful climbers? They are always giving other parents heart attacks, climbing to the top of playground equipment and furniture, but never jumping from more than about their own height and we've (so far) not had any injuries beyond minor scrapes and bruises. I have friends whose kids get into much, much more, some of whom get injured and some of whom don't, as well as friends whose kids don't climb but some how get concussions from falling of the bench they were sitting on. 

All I know is, kids are weird mixtures of nature, nurture, and something in the air.

[Rachel]

7 hours ago, Ktgrok said:

I get that you are speaking English, but do not understand what you are saying, lol. Does not compute. Your children didn't open the cabinets and pull everything out? Didn't open drawers and dump everything out? What is this madness? What black magic do I need to practice to get this?????

 

I wish I could send some magic your way!

When my older two were toddlers we had an old tiny house, there just wasn’t much to get into. There was one cabinet with Tupperware type stuff they were allowed to play in. Our table was bar height and they never tried to climb the chairs. They had a couple tubs of toys and that’s it. Maybe that’s the key, not having much stuff?

My third child was pretty chill. He never really put toys in his mouth and was kind of lazy as a baby and toddler. He didn’t even try to walk until 15ish months while the older two walked around 10 months. Once he passed toddlerhood he is no longer chill but maybe we just missed that crazy toddler stage?

[Rachel]

5 minutes ago, Rachel said:

I wish I could send some magic your way!

When my older two were toddlers we had an old tiny house, there just wasn’t much to get into. There was one cabinet with Tupperware type stuff they were allowed to play in. Our table was bar height and they never tried to climb the chairs. They had a couple tubs of toys and that’s it. Maybe that’s the key, not having much stuff?

My third child was pretty chill. He never really put toys in his mouth and was kind of lazy as a baby and toddler. He didn’t even try to walk until 15ish months while the older two walked around 10 months. Once he passed toddlerhood he is no longer chill but maybe we just missed that crazy toddler stage?

It’s not that my kids never got into stuff or climbed, it just wasn’t a constant battle the way some of you describe. We had battles, they were just different battles. 

[forty-two]

0/3

I mean, they climbed, but they were cautious and safe about it - never did anything beyond their capacities  (or beyond my capacity to watch ;)).  I always thought they had a good mix of caution and adventure - I didn't have to worry about them hurting themselves, but they would try things and extend their limits.  (I, otoh, had too much caution in me when it comes to physical climbing stuff - fear held me back from things I otherwise wished I would try.)  I did let them climb whatever they wanted - back of couch, table (both coffee and dining), counters, stand on chairs to get stuff (and jump off any of them) - but they never exceeded their abilities or my nerves ;).

They weren't runners, either (they were clingers instead); and they didn't really put strange things in their mouths - I babyproofed pretty thoroughly, but they didn't search out flaws - my initial babyproofing did the trick.

But, otoh, none of them (except the oldest) will go outside alone and none of them will go into the basement alone :rolleyes:.  My two youngest are extremely picky eaters (like me) - the "no strange objects in mouth" extends to food we parents certify safe ;).  There's a lot of anxiety about new things.  And just as some of you can't fathom toddlers who don't regularly perform death-defying stunts, I can't fathom toddlers (or preschoolers) who sleep alone.  (I'm still a little shocked my 6yo mostly spends all night in his own bed without any fuss.)

[SKL]

Yeah, I had plenty of other worries (still do), but not being able to take my eyes off my kids wasn't one of them.

If it makes you feel any better, my generation was plenty bad.  I was on the mellow side, but I still have a scar on my forehead from a bad fall when I was 2yo.  I never quite grew out of it; as a school child I used to climb up the outer walls of the neighborhood schools and hang out from the brickwork several stories up ... walk "tightrope" across the top of the swingsets at the playground ... ride bikes down cliffs ... tried to drown in lakes at least 2x ... was caught on the roof multiple times ... my siblings were worse ... one kept trying to wreck the car when he was 3yo ... one tried walking across the city to Grandma's at age 5, another left preschool to go to another school's playground at 3, a third was out for a stroll in the early morning at age 1 ... one broke her arm 3 times, another was in a body cast for months ... and on and on.  I'm not sure what's more impressive - that we kids survived it or that our parents did.  ?

[ktgrok]

9 hours ago, Arctic Mama said:

Only one of my six has even tried this.  Most would play with toys and dump them out or whatever, but with a few stern corrections and redirection they’d move on.  

Mine don't even play with toys at this age!!! Zero interest, other than sometimes wanting to dump her dolls on my lap for me to feed them. She will ride on ride on toys (and try to stand on them, sigh) but nope. Ignores the cool music toys, blocks, cars, etc etc etc and wants my hole puncher, cans of seltzer, scissors, pencils, etc. Dumps out crayons on the regular, etc. 

Pencils are the big obsession right now. Often clenched, point up, while climbing a chair or trying to get on the table. But...she's SUPER cute so we keep her. This is her a few months ago now, getting busted for climbing up on the stepstool. (It was cute the first time, so I filmed it. It is no longer cute and I now keep the stepstool on top of the counter so she can't do this. Thankfully she hasn't figured out how to scale the drawers yet like the last one.) 

 

 

[TheReader]

Katie, I just now saw your "edited to add" about the caged orangatan during school, LOL! And the adorable video of her. I can so so so relate. I already shared, we did so many of the same things when mine was little like that. We got next-to-no school done from the time he became mobile until he was probably 4 or so. We'd do math the second he took any kind of nap (and he only slept in 20 minute bursts, even as a newborn, so.....) and then reading if he fell asleep again, and anything else we crammed in while trying like mad to keep him alive at the same time and content to not be right next to us (he was so hyper-social/had such separation anxiety, even as a baby, that the ECI folks had us get him a doll to look at so I could leave the room for bathroom breaks; that was before he was mobile). 

I cried reading "The Strong Willed Child" because it described this "horribly, terribly, worst-case-scenario" kid who had to be swatted on the hand and told no *13 whole times* before deciding he didn't really want the whatever it was they didn't want him to touch. I could not fathom, at all, what it would be like to have one listen with only 13 redirections, and realized then that I was totally doomed. (my first two had not been like this, at all, even a little bit, yet the 3rd was so very strong willed that all memory of having once had calm, relatively obedient children had totally evaporated from my brain....). 

Anyway, baby warden, etc., I get it. As for school.....we did so very little, for so long (the big kids were 7 and 4 when #3 was born, and for those next 3+ years.....we did almost nothing but keep the baby alive). They recovered; oldest just got an award for being in the top 3% of GPAs at his community college (not even just in his graduating class, but of all students with over 45 credit hours). Even though he didn't really do school from age 7 to 11. My point this time is, there's hope and devoting the time to the baby will pay off in the end. Hang in there! You're doing a great job, even though I know it feels like you're barely holding your head above water. 

[Desert Strawberry]

On 5/24/2018 at 6:20 PM, Ktgrok said:

Honestly, that sounds like what I do, for the most part. I mean, she's made it on the table twice, but immediately been taken off. She's always taken off or made to sit if she stands on a chair (she is allowed to sit on them). She is never out of my eyesight. She is told no and removed every single time, as I've done with all of them. But I honestly think they all just outgrew it, I don't think I was successful. I'm not always in arms length though...sometimes I'm up to my arm pits in laundry/dishwater/raw food and it takes a second to get her. Maybe I just have obstinate children...given my own nature that's possible.

 

Yes, but she has a climber downstairs that she redirects to. The behavior can't be extinguished, only redirected to a more appropriate place. I let mine climb the bunk bed ladder. Up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down. 

[ktgrok]

12 minutes ago, Desert Strawberry said:

Yes, but she has a climber downstairs that she redirects to. The behavior can't be extinguished, only redirected to a more appropriate place. I let mine climb the bunk bed ladder. Up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down. 

Good point. I don't have that , especially in the kitchen where we are doing schoolwork a good part of the day. I just plunk her down with bowls of crushed ice, random kitchen utensils, frozen tubes of yogurt, tupperware, bowls of whipped cream, etc and pray a LOT. 

[SKL]

3 minutes ago, Ktgrok said:

Good point. I don't have that , especially in the kitchen where we are doing schoolwork a good part of the day. I just plunk her down with bowls of crushed ice, random kitchen utensils, frozen tubes of yogurt, tupperware, bowls of whipped cream, etc and pray a LOT. 

My kids at that age used to do a daily inventory of the "good cupboards," especially the one with boxes, bags, and cans of nonperishable food.  ("Good cupboards" were the ones they were allowed to play in all they wanted.  Of course they only contained things safe to play with.)  They would pull everything out, play around with it, and put it back in ... slowly.  Nice way to keep them busy when I needed to do other things.  ?  I even told myself there was probably some intellectual value to whatever they were doing with all the different shapes, weights, etc....

[Ananda]

2/3 are climbers including my current toddler. Ktgrok's description of toddlers resembles all three of mine though.  Childproofing is a just a puzzle to be solved.  With my ds2 the current battle is the carseat.  He would push the chest clip down & then wiggle his upper body out.  Then he rolls down the windows.  We had to buy a fancy inescapable chest clip just to keep him safe.  You look for advice online, and they say "pull over & tell them the car only drives if they are buckled."  You think I didn't try that?  I get it though.  My other two weren't particularly interested in escaping the carseat and only figured it out when they were old enough to be reasoned with.  

[ktgrok]

1 hour ago, Ananda said:

2/3 are climbers including my current toddler. Ktgrok's description of toddlers resembles all three of mine though.  Childproofing is a just a puzzle to be solved.  With my ds2 the current battle is the carseat.  He would push the chest clip down & then wiggle his upper body out.  Then he rolls down the windows.  We had to buy a fancy inescapable chest clip just to keep him safe.  You look for advice online, and they say "pull over & tell them the car only drives if they are buckled."  You think I didn't try that?  I get it though.  My other two weren't particularly interested in escaping the carseat and only figured it out when they were old enough to be reasoned with.  

LOL! I had to buy that same chest clip for one of mine! And would have for another but it wasn't invented yet. 

I was thinking of this thread again when I was in the bathroom, and just trying to pee ivolves first her trying to unroll the toilet paper (normally kept out of reach but I had to use it, obviously), play with the toilet brush, play with a plunger, run around in circles on the slippery wet tile of the walk in shower, and get into the trash can. And all that happens every time I pee, lol. 

[LucyStoner]

I thought my first one was a climber.  Then I met his little brother and realized I had no idea what climber even meant.  

[Carrie12345]

I can say all 5, but the youngest two have the first three beat.  They learned to work a a team. I have a picture of one standing on top of the other to reach the top shelf of the fridge, and it's gone way beyond toddlerhood.  They once not only stacked chairs, but tried including books on stacked chairs for added height.

The climbing itself never bothered me.     It was only the things they were trying to reach that drove me nuts.

[fairfarmhand]

On 5/25/2018 at 7:55 AM, TheReader said:

 

Agreed. There is not a darn thing I could have ever done to dissuade my youngest; all the redirection, correction, etc., in the world would not have worked. We even put one of those toddler playscapes in our living room, which he did climb....but not to the sudden exclusion of everything else. But, he was so strong willed that I laughed in sort of a "you've got to be kidding me..." way when I read the book, "The Strong Willed Child," and the example of this really, super strong willed kid used in the book looked like a sweet, compliant little baby next to my son. 

I cried readIng that book too. I was already doing all that was suggested and my kid was still a disaster. And I never was able to wear her down and make her stop doing whatever she wanted to do. Even redirection never worked. She’s still like that.. a dog with a bone.  Eventually she got bored with one challenge and moved on the the next. My friends told me when mine were small. Keep them in a crib till they’re three. With all my kids, I was like, what’s the point? They climb out all the time anyway. My secOnd dd, the tiniest one was the worst.

[73349]

0/1, less of a problem than I was as a kid. (I remember my mom being horrified to find me on the countertop as an elementary kid, but I was completely fine, just getting something that happened to be up high.) Which is good, because he still didn't fall asleep without help or sleep through the night or sleep after 6 AM, and afternoon naps were, um, iffy, and he wanted me within a couple of feet while he played, preferably interacting with him all day except when the TV was on. PBS was a thing at my house a couple of hours a day for a couple of years because I had to cook and do laundry, man.

I put cabinet and drawer latches on, and he found out he couldn't open the cabinets except the one with the pots and pans, so he just banged them together. I called him The Inspector because he did go around checking my baby-proofing. No way would I have a pet and a kid under 4 at the same time. And there's obviously a toddler rule that All Containers Shall Be Empty. But climbing wasn't really an issue. Sleep was the issue.

[ktgrok]

2 hours ago, fairfarmhand said:

I cried readIng that book too. I was already doing all that was suggested and my kid was still a disaster. And I never was able to wear her down and make her stop doing whatever she wanted to do. Even redirection never worked. She’s still like that.. a dog with a bone.  Eventually she got bored with one challenge and moved on the the next. My friends told me when mine were small. Keep them in a crib till they’re three. With all my kids, I was like, what’s the point? They climb out all the time anyway. My secOnd dd, the tiniest one was the worst.

I finally realized that no correction of mine was going to make a difference when oldest was about 6 yrs old. I'd been telling him not to stand on the barstools (kitchen barstools, not in a pub, lol) over and over and over and over. Tried yelling, punishing, explaining he could get hurt. Nothing worked. One day he did it and fell off and broke his elbow. I remember thinking, well, at least he learned his lesson. 

Nope. 12 hours later he was standing on that same darned barstool, in his splint. And I realized, there is NO correction I can give hm that will be more well timed and more appropriate and harsher than breaking his darned elbow falling off. If that didn't stop him, nothing is going to. 

 

[SKL]

When I think "climber," I think up to the tops of the high cabinets, not the counter tops, LOL.

My kid brother was frequently found 6 feet up, balancing precariously on a garbage can on a box on a stool on a chair.  This started before he could walk - like about 6 months old.  He also never ever stayed in his crib after that age.

As noted above - this seems to come with hard-headedness.  There was no stopping it short of committing child abuse.

My folks think their kids got it from my dad.  He used to get up early in the morning and climb up and swing from the cabinet doors, then steal the cream from the milk delivery and finally fry himself some eggs for breakfast.  At 2yo.

 

[fairfarmhand]

Yes I have said these words “get off of that barn roof right now!” Yes, the barn roof that made grown men quiver, the one that out of 6-8 guys building it, only two would climb up there to roof it. 

I recieved plenty of stink eyes from other moms when my kids were teaching others to climb to the top of the highest tree. 

[Desert Strawberry]

On 5/28/2018 at 6:43 PM, Ananda said:

2/3 are climbers including my current toddler. Ktgrok's description of toddlers resembles all three of mine though.  Childproofing is a just a puzzle to be solved.  With my ds2 the current battle is the carseat.  He would push the chest clip down & then wiggle his upper body out.  Then he rolls down the windows.  We had to buy a fancy inescapable chest clip just to keep him safe.  You look for advice online, and they say "pull over & tell them the car only drives if they are buckled."  You think I didn't try that?  I get it though.  My other two weren't particularly interested in escaping the carseat and only figured it out when they were old enough to be reasoned with.  

Can I get a link? Luna Moon pushes her clip all the way up or all the way down. I never notice until we stop to get her out.

[ktgrok]

This is not the one I used but looks even better http://www.merrittcarseat.com/escape-proof/

 

the one one I had was actually named the Houdini strap

[caedmyn]

https://www.amazon.com/Safety-1st-Swing-Shut-Toilet/dp/B002W7M6U6/ref=sr_1_10_a_it?ie=UTF8&qid=1528128067&sr=8-10&keywords=childproof+toilet

This has worked great for keeping my toddler out of the toilet.  It's been on for several months and still hasn't been defeated, though he's tried to rip it off by brute force a few times.

All my toddlers but DD were crazy too, some slightly less than others.  The current one ranks right up there with the worst of the bunch though he's not particularly bent on destroying things like his brother was.  It's definitely going to be a huge challenging trying to contain him next year while getting school done.

All of my kids have been terrible sleepers (most still take a long time to fall asleep and get up at the crack of dawn...5:30 am is the toddler's current wake-time), required me to sit beside their bed or outside their room for ages at naptime and bedtime from toddlerhood to 4ish, and taken a solid year to potty-train.  Sometimes I just feel like, "Can not ONE thing in my life ever be easy?"  Apparently not...

 

[TravelingChris]

Only one that I remember.  I mean the other two may have climbed a bit but nothing like the middle one.  She was severe ADHD girl and boy, did she give us scares.  The other two weren't really into climbing though of course, they did climb in playgrounds, etc.

[Condessa]

2/4. My girls were both little monkeys, but dd2 was extreme.  She was constantly up something, from the time she was mobile.  As a crawling baby, she pulled out the bottom kitchen drawer all the way, crawled in it, pulled the next one out most of the way, crawled into it, and so on like stair steps all the way onto the kitchen counter.  At ten months, she was nervous of taking more than a few steps at a time on flat ground, but she was constantly six feet up the nearest bookshelf.  My sister (who had FIVE monkey boys in less than six years!) suggested wrapping the bottom half of the bookshelves with seran wrap.  It worked for a few weeks, until dd discovered she could push her high chair over to the shelf, wriggle up into it from the floor, step up onto the tray, and climb to the top of the bookshelf that way!

This is entirely from my side of the family—dh’s side of the family has unbelievably mild and easygoing toddlers.  Before my kids came along, they always talked about how difficult and crazy that one grandchild was (the average two-year-old).  They looked at my kids like they were some kind of rabid monkey.