My Child, the Vampire Monkey

When Charlotte was a completely helpless infant, I remember thinking on many occasions "I just can't wait until she can move around and do some things for herself". It felt warranted at the time. She couldn't play with any toys on her own, couldn't roll over, couldn't move anywhere, couldn't do anything that she wanted besides cry, sleep and poop.

Well... turns out my kiddo is one of  those "fast track developers".. and has now, at 6 months, perfected crawling (I'm talking crawling up on all 4, not just the army crawl- that lasted about a week before the real deal set in) and she has learned to pull herself up on EVERYTHING. If she can reach it, she will use it to stand.

This is what I asked for right? I thought it would be wonderful. Until she developed these skills prior to developing any fear or "graceful falling" skills... So while I used to have to occasionally roll her over, replace her pacifier or move her from the rock & play to the floor, I had NO reason to EVER wish for her independence.

Yesterday was MADNESS. She was all over. I put a baby gate at the entrance to the living room, closed the bathroom door and put a gate at the bottom of the stairs... Much to my chagrin, she decided that the baby gates are PERFECT for climbing up... We have a fireplace in our living room, she learned to pull herself up on that. She learned to climb the couches, and she learned to climb my legs, back and arms. She pulls herself up using the curtains and piles of pillows... I swear, nothing is safe. So since she can stand using basically anything and has no sense of fear of falling or ability to fall on her bum instead of her head, I spent all day chasing her and putting her back on the ground, in her jumper, on my lap or in her swing all while trying to get her to be interested in her toys instead of climbing back up. Surprise, surprise.. It didn't work.

So to add to the climbing spree she is on, she also is in a teething phase. We already have the two front bottom ones, and they are like little razor blades. Now, it certainly doesn't sound appealing to me, but to her, she is willing to sink her teeth into anything. Today, the new favorites are my legs, arms, feet and cheeks. This wouldn't have been as big of an issue a month ago, or even a week ago, as I could have just sat on the couch and given her teethers to fill her need to chew.. Now that she can climb, there's no safe zone.

Needless to say, I went shopping today for new teethers for her and extra thick socks and sweaters for me. As with all things, we will just weather the vampire monkey storm and do our best to divert her interest to chewing on her teethers and toys, but OYE does this girl have some fangs!

How have you dealt with a biting baby??