Friday, July 13, 2007

Bardo and Stairs

I've been trying for months to teach Bardo to climb down stairs. He had a long crawling period, so I thought for sure he'd learn before walking, but he just kept on trying to shimmy down head first for a long time. No matter how carefully he shimmied, his efforts would end with me catching him (or me sometimes letting him fall down a couple of steps). This week Pippi used the water balloon technique to get him down the stairs safely. She'd show him how to crawl down backwards and then say, "Come on. Come get the balloon." I've shown him several times how to do this and I've even put his body in the proper position. I never thought to use a water balloon, though.

Note: The water balloon survived the entire trip down the stairs. Phew.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Pippi has great ideas!!!

Prudence said...

What a cute girl. She is so creative and loves her brother so much!

MT Missy said...

Have you ever heard about the truck that was too tall to get through a tunnel? The trucker, underestimating the height of his truck went through anyway, and ended up getting stuck. The fire department, police department, and trucking company were all called in to try and see what they could do to get it free. They were all stumped. No one could think what to do until a five year old child, seeing the problem, suggested that they simply deflate the tires and get it through. They did it and met with success! Sometimes it just takes the creativity and thoughtfulness of a child.