My little Monkey

My little monkey loves the story, "5 Little Monkeys." I think she knew it by heart by 15 months. She thinks it is funny to climb onto a bed, any bed and yell "Monkey jump on bed!" My husband and I always say, "Remember what happened to the poor little monkeys!" And we make her sit down or get down, like any reasonable parent would.

Now, my story isn't quite about a monkey jumping on a bed, however, it is about a little monkey. A couple of weekends ago, my daughter (aka the monkey) decided that if my husband and I didn't come in and get her when she was ready, she was going to start climbing out of her crib. Ahh, a parents (ok, maybe first-time parents) nightmare. Of course we have the savvy video monitor set-up to catch her in these dare-devil acts and we instantly tried to nip-it-in-the-bud. No such luck. After losing much sleep, we decided it was time for a "big-girl" bed. I went online and purchased the largest bed-rail from OneStep Ahead (I love that store!) and anxiously awaited its arrival.

We had the bed set-up, sheets and all. Finally, on Thursday the bed-rail arrived and we chose to wait until the weekend to set it up. Big mistake.

I put my little monkey down that night and no sooner did I walk out of her room, she climbed right out and I heard a loud crash and scream. I ran into her room, with my bionic woman powers, ripped-off the gate at the door and ran to my child lying on the floor next to her bed. I picked her up, held her, shushing her, and saying "it's ok, mommy's here." That is when she pulled away from me and vomited. I started screaming for my husband.

After consulting with the doctor's office and watching our little monkey for 72 hours - she is doing well...and as for the parents...we are still not sleeping. They never said the monkey would stay in the bed! But, she can now climb out safely.