If I had never initiated Emrick’s transition out of a crib, he might still be in one. He seemed happy in his crib and he never tried to climb out of it. Consequently, he was well past his third birthday before we moved him, and even then, we did so only because we felt that we were “supposed to”. The process was generally painless — Emrick displayed only minor resistance, and there were no tears or tantrums, or getting out of bed in the middle of the night — partly because we didn’t push it on him too early, I think. Still, I think he would have been perfectly happy to stay in his crib for another year or two. He really liked it. And it’s funny… I remember looking at cribs at IKEA when I was pregnant with him. I distrusted the wooden slats that are the mattress support on all IKEA cribs because I couldn’t imagine them holding up under the force of a rambunctious, jumping toddler. So I decided against an IKEA crib and picked one out at Babies R Us that had a metal spring mattress base. But as it turned out, Emrick wasn’t a crib jumper. He was a crib chiller, and an IKEA crib would have been just fine.

But Holly. Holly’s crib has a spring base as well, and it’s a good thing because she is a crib jumper — and a crib bouncer, crib climber, and crib escaper. None of this has surprised me, though. When she started scaling walls at eight months old, I knew we would have a whole different kind of situation on our hands crib-wise. I said to Marcus some time in 2014, “I am afraid Holly will climb out of her crib before she’s even two. We’ll be lucky if we make it to eighteen months!” But we did in fact pass the 18-month mark without any actual crib-escaping. Then last July, while visiting my parents in Florida, Holly escaped from her portable crib during nap time. I was sitting in my parents’ living room when I heard a thud come from the guest room. I got up to investigate, but before I could even open the bedroom door, HOLLY opened it from the other side and hugged my legs in greeting. She was 22 months.

When we got home to California, she tried this feat again, but the regular crib wasn’t as easy for her. She made a few attempts, but they always ended with her getting stuck with her belly straddling the railing and then yelling for help. “I stuck! I stuck!” After the third or fourth time this happened, I decided a stern tone was in order. I really didn’t want to try to put her in a bed just yet. It was too early, and I predicted that any attempts to mover her at that time would bring misery to all. So I spoke sternly to her and told her that she was not to climb the railing! My harsh tone stung her, and many months went by before she tried again. In fact, it was just last week that she was emboldened to make another go at climbing out of her crib. It was the same scenario as last summer: She yelled during nap time, and when I went to check on her I found her stuck in the familiar and painful-looking belly straddle across the front railing of the crib. I reminded her again that she was not to do that, and nothing like that has happened since then.

Which brings us to today… and to a little bait and switch. See, this post is not actually about crib climbing. It is about poop. I was sitting at my computer during Holly’s nap time and I could hear her on the monitor, being very active and NOT napping, Eventually I heard her crying, “…’s on the railing… ‘s on the railing.” Oh boy, here we go again, I thought. Holly has gotten herself stuck on the railing! But when I got to her room, she was not stuck on the railing. She was standing in bed, holding one of her hands up and away from the rest of her body. The room was dim, but I could see it: a smudge of poop on her right hand. And then I saw poop on the crib railing. Not just a smudge, but all over. POOP. All. Over. the. Railing. She had stuck her hand down her soupy poopy diaper pants, and then attempted to wipe it all off. On the railing. Wait, where was all that poop? ‘S on the railing.

By the way, a nearly identical thing happened with Emrick when we has this age. Only I didn’t hear him say anything about it on the monitor, and he hadn’t wiped it off on anything. I had gone into his room only because it was time to get him up from his nap, and I found him sitting silently in his crib with his hand way up high in the air. When he saw me, he said, “Mama, clean me up!”

But back to Holly. I lifted her carefully out her crib and laid her on the changing pad, reminding her the whole time not to touch anything. I used three baby wipes to clean all of the nooks and crannies of her littly toddler hand and its five fingers, its chubby, wrinkled knuckles, and its tiny little nail beds. Precision and through-ness are called for here. Sloppy cleaning will not do. After that, I changed her diaper (and her shirt — yeah it was there too), and then I took her to the bathroom for a soap and water hand-washing. After that I turned my attention to the crib railing.

And here’s where things get really unfortunate. Holly’s crib railings are covered in fabric teething protectors. They’re moisture-proof on one side and soft and fleecy on the other side. Holly was a voracious crib-chewer back in her teething days, which I did not even realize until one day (a year and a half ago, probably) I noticed that the white paint on the inside of the front railing (which I don’t usually see) was chipped away in several spots. So actually, I bought these railing covers kind of late. I bought them to prevent further damage to the crib, and to cover the damage already done… and of course, to prevent further paint ingestion by Holly. Anyway, the railing covers are just attached with ties. And not wanting to risk having one of them come loose and create a strangulation hazard, I tied them all very, very TIGHTLY.

And now, of course, it is one of these railing covers — the long one in front with five ties tied TIGHT TIGHT TIGHT — that has Holly’s poop smeared all over it! I tried for several minutes to get even ONE of those ties untied. Holly hadn’t actually napped yet and I was desperate to get her back into bed and asleep! But I couldn’t put her back to bed with a railing cover smeared in poop. So after more straining, and accomplishing nothing more than having my thumbnail bent backwards three times (OWWWW!!), I just cut the dumb thing off (the railing cover, not my thumbnail!). Yes, I grabbed a pair of scissors and snip, snip, snip, snip, snip. Voila! Now the railing cover is effectively ruined. But guess how many fudgecakes I give about that.

Holly even climbs doors.

This is Holly after a different poop incident at Corner Bakery.

If only!