My DS will be two in about 2 weks time (if I don't throttle him first). I know all 2 year olds are curious and it's a parents job to childproof a house, put valuables etc out of reach. But my son has some kind of superpower ability to destroy things in nano-seconds.
At the moment we're staying at a friend's house while they're away as our house was flooded. They have kids (slightly older) so you'd think things are pretty child friendly. But so far in the 10 days we've been here, my son has:
- smashed a White Company candle (value - £45, just ordered a replacement)
- ripped the covers and broken the boxes of 6 videos
- ripped at least 5 lovely pop up books
- ruined all the make up in my make up bag and in the process covered himself in 3 lipsticks which he then got all over the carpet and bedding (incidentally, what is the best way to get lipstick out of bedding?)
- has peed on the carpeted floors about 5 times (can't really blame him as he's only just potty trained and he is going through disruption in his life)
- just smashed my laptop and broke three keys off it
- dropped a snowglobe and broke it
- broke a plastic garden chair
- opened a bottle of Johnson's Baby bath onto the lounge carpet
- ripped a model paper ship to bits
- Picking all the fruit off their fruit trees and putting it in their composting bin
- general mess with food and toys constantly
- irritating things like pulling towels off the rails when I've just hung them up or unrolling the toilet roll till its all in a pile on the floor
I am at my wits end with him and find myself constantly shouting. I do try to give him attention - admittedly, he doesn't get it all the time for example, while I cook dinner or try to take a shower myself. But he can destroy things in the blink of an eye. I don't know how to make him realise that curiousity is one thing. Complete destruction is quite another.
I thought living in a building site/flood ridden house with two young boys was stressful. That was NOTHING compared to the constant monitoring to make sure he doesn't destroy any more of our friends' stuff. I feel awful. They've been really kind letting us stay here and there is a list a mile long of stuff we need to replace, some of which I'm not sure we can.
Sigh. Help.