Climbers

[MuckingFuddle]

I have nearly 2 year old twins. One of them is a climber, he climbs up everything - the fireguard, sofas, doors, up on to the windowsill then on to a chest of drawers. His brother encourages him which dosnt help.
Some of the places he gets up to are quite dangerous and he tends to throw things down to his brother - pictures off the wall, phones and a laptop off the cupboard.

At the moment I tell him it's dangerous he could hurt himself and to get down, but I dont think that means much to him.
We go out to soft play and the park as much as possible so he can climb there.

How is the best way to deal with it ? He tends to see no as a challenge so I dont want to make a massive issue out of it.

Climbers are such fun! I thought DS1 was bad until I had DS2 and then DS3 has been even worse!

It is just a phase and I think it seems to be a real 'need' to get higher! I found DS1 sitting on a window sil upstairs with the window open and paving slabs below - I nearly had a heart attack. Straight after that we had locks on all our upstairs windows so they can only open a small amount.

I try and make climbing very boring. Firstly I reorganise the room and stuff in it so that there is nothing interesting to climb up to. This meant our mantlepiece ended up empty as that was what DS3 was climbing to to get the photos to throw at DS1 and DS2 (who were laughing wildly at the time)

When DS climb (when they are under 3ish) I generally ignore it unless it is very dangerous - older than this they do understand and respond to no much better and then I set some rules about what they are allowed to climb on.

It is just a phase and after they have got bored of climbing I gradually put things back in the places I like them and see what happens. If the climbing starts again then everything goes away again - if not then I wait and see what their new challenge is going to be!

I think you are doing the right thing in taking him lots of places to climb. Both DS2 and DS3 are very good climbers with excellent balance and keeping them challenged is great.

Thanks lorisparkle, excellent advice I will be reorganising our living room tomorrow.

Ha, I'm in the same boat. It's especially bad when my 19mo climber gets itchy feet whilst I'm feeding my 4mo baby. I've tried to block the climbing 'hot spots'. He can't get to the shelves because there's an armchair in the way. I take all the cushions off the sofa (the ones you sit on) and pile them on the floor so it turns the room into a soft play. He clambers onto the arm rest of the sofa but then tends to dive-bomb onto the sofa itself rather than seek to go higher as I think that's more fun.
I also go to the park every day TWICE a day (I'm lucky; there are 4 nearby) until he gets bored of the climbing frame in the hope that it'll get it out of his system for the day!
Have you got a playpen? That's my one saving grace for tricky moments although I don't use it for 'punishment' as I want him to enjoy being in there and I try and vary the toys. We picked it up on eBay but you can use a travel cot too.

Thanks craving, we are getting them garden toys and a climbing frame for their birthday so hopefully that will help.

They can both climb out of their travel cots [groan]

Your really luck to have so many parks near you we only have the one and it is right next to a main road. TBH I struggle with going to the park becuase they both go off in seperate directions in front of swings out of the gate etc and I tend to run around doing a meercat impression. So we try to go when it is not busy. We even go out when it is raining because I know no one else will be there.

The dive bombing off the sofa sounds like great fun - will try it when they wake up