Baby-proofing Shakespeare
In the small amounts of time that I have between working, nursing, and sleeping, I try to get things done around the house to keep some semblance of order. I really want to take on the FlyLady‘s procedures, but I haven’t found a way to make this happen yet. I’ve done bits and pieces, but nothing as awesome as her site suggests.
But, I have had some opportunities to do things around the house to organize, clean, babyproof, etc. I wanted to share.
Yesterday, the Animal and I “played” on the floor in the kitchen while I organized our pots and pans cabinet. This cabinet is always obnoxious, so while he banged around on them and screamed his battle-cry scream, I decided to get rid of some items, move unused ones to the back, and stack in front the pots and pans we use on a regular basis.
A couple of days ago, I was finishing all the cleaning from Christmas decorations. I really enjoy the emptiness of the house after the decorations are down. It feels like a fresh start or canvas. I stared at one of our shelves in the living room, and I decided that instead of littering it with knick knacks, I would simply put some of my English literature and teaching books there. I think it turned out really nicely as it gives a clean look to that portion of the room.
With the books in mind – and since I have a ton (being an English major/teacher/book lover will do that to you) – I considered the built-in shelf on the other side of the living room. This is the shelf that the Animal uses to pull up and scream (he really likes screaming these days – maybe I should change his name to Braveheart?). The problem with him pulling up on this particular shelf is that the bottom of it houses books.
I remembered that either my mom or my mother-in-law had said something about how nice it was that I had the books lined up so tightly that he couldn’t pull on them and thus pull them out. That was the optical illusion that I had created, but the Animal had found a way to pull Shakespeare’s entire works out and thumb through it a couple of times. I have no problem with him reading the classics, but the pages are very thin, and his sticky little hands accidentally tear on a regular basis.
So, I’m back to my consideration. Making the books line up so tight that he can’t move them is an awesome idea (one that someone thought I’d already come up with). I spent the rest of the morning figuring out how to fit books there just so that he’d be able to use them to pull up but wouldn’t have the strength to pull them out.
Voila! I created the perfect baby-proofed book shelf – – for now. Here is a picture of the Animal trying to pull Shakespeare and my Holocaust Chronicle out.
