My three year old is a runner

amother

Denim

Sun, Nov 03 2019, 12:23 pm

Rappel wrote:

On Thursday, I set my kids up with music, and went to bathroom. When I came out, I found them both covered in liquid shoe polish, which had been stored on a shelf taller than me. I still don't know how they got up there.

I've given up on barring the kitchen. DS helps me cook, bake, chop salad, use the mixer... And to keep my kitchen kosher, it's now only dairy/parve. He is very curious, and he will happily concoct anything of his own design if I'm not standing right over him. He made our urn dairy on Friday, by plugging it in and shredding a package of cheese into it while I was washing dishes.

I taught him to iron, also. Before then, he just kept stealing the iron, in order to plug it in and study it in private.

He broke into the machsan one day and drilled a hole in our living room floor

He's actually fascinated by all kinds of electricity. His saving grace is that he has to take everything apart to see how it works, so he usually breaks a battery-powered circuit before he gets a shock. Wall plugs scare the daylights out of me. I'm amazed that we've made it to the age of 3 without any real electric damage.

My guy poured cooking oil on my kitchen floor and made an ice skating rink. He took vaseline and made himself into the "statuable" of liberty. He cut his peyos and his sisters hair too many times. He would make concoctions of chocolate syrup and ketchup.

The good news is they grow up and mellow out.

Rappel

Sun, Nov 03 2019, 11:27 pm

dancingqueen wrote:

Wow that sounds challenging. I don’t think you should allow him to go out on errands by himself though, IMHO 3 is way too young for that.

If I take away responsibility entirely from him, then he'll rebel. He lives for responsibility and jobs -- that's his fun, and he's usually quite good at it.

We live right next to the playground, so sometimes I'll send him to bring something to someone out there, or help another kid, and I'll watch from the window. Sending him to the next door neighbor means sending him 30 of his steps over to their house. My kids are always there, and their kids are always here. It's quite normal for us to go over there. He sweeps, he helps me feed the animals, he loves washing the toilet. He picks up all his toys before breakfast. When he has direction and a job, when he feels responsible and important, then he doesn't destroy things. If I treat him like a little kid, though, then everything gets destroyed, thrown about, broken open... He's got a lot more energy than I do, and he's very kinetically intelligent!

That's part of why this is so out of left field. To start micromanaging him means a total break in the system which he's been blossoming under. A complete shift if I start helicoptering his jobs. Yet while I don't think that's going to help him grow and mature, I also want to keep him physically safe.

Rappel

Sun, Nov 03 2019, 11:33 pm

amother [ Denim ] wrote:

Sounds like a great kid!

Did he also have an electricity obsession? What did you do to teach him safety?

DVOM

Mon, Nov 04 2019, 3:35 am

Oh Rappel, your stories are making me laugh!

I have active, creative, independent-minded children. Thankfully they are all, for the most part, past the danger stage. My youngest is 4 and should technically still need eyes-on supervision, but with three older brothers, I can hand him off to them and feel confident that they will include him in their schemes and keep him safe. That was my first thought, reading your posts. You need a 9-11 year old boy who can be a 'big brother' to your kid, who can take him along with him and his friends and keep an eye on him. Is this a possibility? My 4-year-old will sometimes push his boundaries with me, be he wouldn't dare disobey his big brothers.

My very best strategy when they were all little was to include the kids in everything. Sounds like your already doing that. My boys were able to use things like knives, urns, cook at the stove top, use a sodering iron and a circular saw at very young ages. We supervised closely, but there was no keeping them away from that stuff. My husband is Israeli; I find it's a very different mentality when it comes to safety and independence. At age 3 my husband was running errands for his mom; my point is the norms were different. It wasn't about keeping kids as safe as possible, it was about keeping kids only as safe as absolutely necessary.

I don't know if this will help you, because while your in it it feels like this stage is going to last for ever, but this stage will pass. In a year or two, you are going to be able to let him run out the door and only spot check him periodically. In the meantime, hold tight to your sense of humor!

DVOM

Mon, Nov 04 2019, 3:40 am

Rappel wrote:

Sounds like a great kid!

Did he also have an electricity obsession? What did you do to teach him safety?

My oldest was obsessed with electronics and electricity. It was really scary when he was little. We let him plug and unplug appliances at a very young age, taught him to do it safely, because there just was no way to keep him away from them. My husband used to bring home old appliances for him to take to peices, and as he got older taught him how to use a soldering iron and the basics of electrical engineering. My son still absolutly loves this stuff, now is also very interested in coding. He actually just finishing building a game-boy type electronic game from scratch, and he and my husband are starting to work on building his own computer.

urban gypsy

Mon, Nov 04 2019, 7:25 am

Can someone clarify what is the disadvantage of child leashes?
I actually bought one out of exasperation when my youngest daughter (who is 7 and should really know better) purposefully ran into oncoming traffic
I bought it and showed it to her and said that if she will ever do something like that again I will need to leash her when we leave the house... Baruch Hashem she hasn't done it since then but if she does I will use the leash
I can't keep her inside forever and my first priority is to keep her safe and alive

amother

Dodgerblue

Mon, Nov 04 2019, 8:33 am

Creative and determined. Repeat it to yourself. Creative and determined.

Eventually, you stop putting things up high, because he'll get to them anyway and you want to avoid the climbing. It sounds like you've already discovered the secret of making it noisy to get somewhere so at least you hear him. And sometimes it costs you. We had to replace our top bottom fridge with a side by side because he defeated all the locks we could use on the top bottom and the side by side had one that worked. We stopped using a water cooler because he defeated the locks and we would have daily floods that he would just watch. And his tendency to unbuckle his five point harness when we were stuck in traffic and then walk around the van was just scary, as was his ability to get out of a high dead-bolted hotel room and just wander.

I am pro-leash. Your child actually gets more freedom this way than if you hold his hand. Get the backpack one,and it feels better for both of you. We didn't use it all the time, but it was very useful. Also, when holding the hand, don't hold the hand- hold the wrist. Much harder to slip out. Also, get used to taking a cell phone picture of him before you leave the house. You can refer to it to know what he's wearing if you need to find him, and as necessary, share it with others who help you search for him, including police.

FranticFrummie

Mon, Nov 04 2019, 8:47 am

I can only imagine the American posters having heart attacks hearing all the stories from us Israelis!

It took me a while to get used to seeing 4 year olds riding the bus by themselves, or shopping in the corner store.

Hashem should watch over and protect all of our creative, adventurous, intelligent, independent children!

sequoia

Mon, Nov 04 2019, 11:39 am

Rappel wrote:

He sounds like a really intelligent kid and your descriptions are hilarious! More stories, please Smile

Rappel

Tue, Nov 05 2019, 8:13 am

DVOM wrote:

Bless you, DVOM. You've given me hope!

And sequoia, here's from today:

We were playing outside our house, when I had to change DD. As soon as I was done, I went to go find DS... And arrived just in time to see him ride his bicycle down a steep concrete stairway (training wheels and all!). Of course he wiped out at the bottom, and after I brushed him off, I asked him why he decided that was a good idea. So he explained that he had been trying to break a stick by riding over it, but just laying it on the path hadn't worked, so he needed to ride off the steps so he could go faster.

Well, he did go faster! Thank G-d, he's made of granite.

No sticks were harmed in the making of this physics lesson.

TMI

DVOM

Wed, Nov 06 2019, 3:32 am

Rappel wrote:

Ahhh, the logic of little boys!

Here is one of my best stories, from when my now 8 year old was 3:

I was feeding my fussy newborn and the house was suspiciously quiet... I came out of my room to find my three year old busy 'doing laundry': filling a toy shopping cart with clean, folded clothing from his drawers, carting it to the bathroom, filling the toilet with clothing, shaking in some oat bran ('laundry detergent'), flushing, refilling the toy shopping cart with sopping wet, oat bran splattered clothing and carting it to the livingroom, laying each toilet-water sodden item carefully out on the carpet, couch, chairs to dry, and then going back to his room with the empty shopping cart for another load. He had managed to empty most of his and his big brothers drawers and to cover my bathroom, living room, dining room and hallway with toilet water and big soggy blobs of oat bran. Even at the time I couldn't stop laughing. He was so proud of himself. All our plans for that day went out the window. We spent the whole day cleaning up.

DVOM

Wed, Nov 06 2019, 3:35 am

Rappel wrote:

We always say our boys are made of rubber, they don't break, they bounce Wink

.

That having been said, we have had our fair share of stiches and broken bones. I overheard my 7 & 8 year olds boasting to neighbors the other day that they looooove stiches, its sooooo not scary, it tickles, it doesn't hurt at all. And truth be told, I have had a boy march into the kitchen more than once, trailing blood spatter behind them, to calmly announce: mom, I think this one is going to need stiches. There is nothing cuter than the macho attitude of little boys.

FranticFrummie

Wed, Nov 06 2019, 3:41 am

B'H I had a girl! I can handle hormones, tears, and drama, but B'H my sister got the boys. She had to bolt all of he furniture down, either to the floors or walls. (This was before rock climbing parks became thing, but these kids were ahead of the trend!)

When DD was two, she woke me up one morning to tell me that she had washed all the dishes. She pulled up a chair to the sink, got all the dishes down, washed them nicely, and put them in the rack to dry.

Too bad they were all paper plates! LOL

Rappel

Wed, Nov 06 2019, 3:43 am

DVOM wrote:

And you win the best story ever award! LOL

that must have been quite a sight. What a good, helpful lad!

amother

Blue

Wed, Nov 06 2019, 4:37 am

I have girls.
And yes the knives and other dangerous things were locked away. Now she bh doesn't take it anymore.
I kept my door to the laundry room, that them feeds into the garage locked. Hid the key. They found one. Hid it better, they took a q-tip, broke it and used that!!!!!!
They took apart a trampoline that me and dh had to put together by they did it themselves. Oh, before that, they flipped it. It had a net and long tall bars so they flipped it and jumped on the wrong side. Then jumped off... Hashem!!!!
The next day they cracked a dz eggs on the carpet. It's a few days later and we're still trying to get the smell out.
And my kids are 4 and 6. GIRLS.

They are runners too. 2 years ago they walked out of my house will I was in the bathroom. (I brought them in cuz I had to go for a second) and went missing for almost an hour. That was after doing the sane thing the day before. They'll do the crime and do the time. Consequences don't usually work.
This week they ran out of the room at the doctors office. The whole staff was looking for them. After a few minutes we all stayed panicking. Bh we found them.
I don't go shopping in big stores because I only have 2 hands. And 3 children and I also need to take stuff off the shelf....my
Smaller stuff is only emergency items. Like pharmacy out something quick in a grocery.
Mostly it's the 6 yo. The 4 yo follows along.
I'm at my white end.
My baby started crawling at 4.5 months. At 5 months, he's always going for the household stuff rather than toys.
He naps in the swing. The harness to the swing is very dumb. And I can't close it. The kids would sit into the swing and now it's maybe 2" off the floor. So when he wakesnup, he just wiggles out of it and goes his merry way.....
I'm in big TROUBLE.

No advice. Just sympathy.

freilich

Wed, Nov 06 2019, 4:54 am

FranticFrummie wrote:

Can you elaborate, 4 year old riding a bus alone? Public transportation?? You are right... American lady here, having a full fledged panic attack!