Lookout Duty

I've been on lookout duty during nap for a few days now.  The girls have each been climbing out of their cribs on occasion.  We are waiting on a video monitor to keep an eye on them, one with two way sound so we can talk to them too.  But in the meantime, I crouch at the top of the stairs into their room with the door cracked a bit and yell at them through the door.  While sitting there, I've noticed some interesting behaviors.

Yesterday, Caroline was trying to get Julia to play.  She would say things like "Jewa (how she says Julia) play bop bop game?"  This is a game where they jump up and down in the their cribs and yell "bop bop, aye aye aye aye".  She would also say "Jewa super five, ok Jewa?"  Or "Jewa knuckle bump, ok Jewa?"  There were also a few "pull hair Jewa" and then Caroline proceeded to pull her own hair (some of it out I'm sure).  I also heard a few times, "climb out of crib Jewa?"  Sounded like a little peer pressure to me.  Although today I heard her say "No climb out Jewa.  Time out Jewa."  Unfortunately Julia did not listen to her sister today.

Julia is not so vocal to her sister during nap.  I did catch her lining up her "friends" (stuffed animals in her crib) and start saying hi to them all today.  It was pretty cute and made me forgive her for climbing out of her crib and making me sit at the top of dark stairs for 25 minutes.

We have done some toddler proofing, including:

1. child-proof knobs on the doors to keep them in the room if they climb out of the crib

2. a shelf to keep some of the messy/dangerous diaper changing items out of reach

3. I also finally fixed their closet door so it would actually click shut and added a child-proof knob there

4. I made a crib modification to allow the mattress to be lowered another couple of inches, that was the best I could do without giving them an exit route under the railing.  After watching Julia today, two inches doesn't make a difference.

5. the last thing is to add latches to the dresser drawers to keep them closed (it is already strapped to the wall)

I'm looking forward to a video monitor so I can at least watch them from the comfort of the couch.  So far, watching and telling them to "stay in their crib" or that "mom/dad can see you" seems to be our best option for buying a few more months in crib.  I'm not looking forward to the bed transition, but I'm sure that a video monitor and these two girls should provide some good watching.