jailbreak

Question: How do you keep 2 runners in check?

Yes, folks, I have runners. Not walkers. No, they never walked - they went straight from crawling to running. Running all over the house. Pulling down lamps, tables, chairs, licking dishwashers, refrigerators, windows, hiding under tables, behind chairs and shutting themselves in closets where I hear a sad little cry. Running.

So, how do you control that, I ask?

Here's the answer:

A state of the art (antique?) baby gate.

This gate was generously given to us by friends of my in-laws. They had twins and passed the gate on to another couple with twins, so on and so forth. Now with our twins, we are the lucky recipients.

It's a pretty old gate, but 1) it was free! 2) in good condition and 3) it's HUGE. I mean this gate goes across our whole living room with gate to spare and tuck behind the couch. It also stretches from our staircase to the fridge, so we can have many levels of safety/roaming capabilities. I couldn't find a gate quite that big unless I looked online and that was $160! No way I'm paying that if I have a free one at my house, so that's that.

So, the gate. Or should I say "The Gate".

We bungeed the gate to the staircase on Jan. 3. It was a sad day for the boys. Fun running-all-over-the-house time was over and they screamed their heads off the whole first day - mad about "The Gate".

They eventually came to like it, especially throwing toys over it. However, if Mom or Dad dared attempt to go to the other side of "The Gate" forget it. It was a screaming match. Which kind of defeated the purpose of "The Gate" containing them if I was going to cook supper (which by the way, is within eyesight of the "Gated" area.

So, they weren't sure about "The Gate".

One day I had to stay home with the boys. This was last week, Wednesday, Jan. 13. 10 days post "Gate" installation. I left the boys in "The Gate" and turned my back for 15 seconds to get a drink of water, which was approximately 15 feet from edge of said "Gate". I heard giggling behind me and looked back to see this:

And this:

Sorry to say, at this time "The Gate" is retired to the closet. We have other gates up for safety on stairs, but nothing so nice as to keep them in one small area. The boys are much happier, and we will try "The Gate" later when they are able to be reasoned with a little better. For now, they can go under "The Gate", over "The Gate", around "The Gate" and knock down "The Gate", so we'll hold off for a little while.
Is this what I'm in for??