lesson learned

Ada loves stairs. We don't have any at home so whenever she finds stairs she climbs up as fast as possible. Over Christmas, while we were traveling she loved airports simply because there were lots of stairs, and moving stairs (escalators) which are just about the coolest thing ever.

So last night when we went to Eric and Monique's house for our Monday dinner, Ada walked in, saw the stairs and wanted up. Elliot followed her up and after I had done some dinner prep I joined them as Ada watched Maia tear through her dress up clothes for something for Ada to wear. Turns out Ada wasn't so much into putting on the dress up clothes and when it became apparent that we had that in mind she bolted to the stairs and started her descent.

We have tried several times to teach Ada to go down stairs backwards. She knows how, but then she sees older kids and adults going down them facing forward and she has determined that she will just skip that little kid process of carefully descending down stairs. She is however smart enough to know that she can't do that all alone, so she will grab one our hands and have us guide her down the stairs.

Back to last night - as she was guiding me down the stairs she took one step slightly before I did and her grasp slipped off my finger and sending her for a tumble. Probably one of the worst things you can see as a parent is your baby tumbling down the stairs. Lucky for me Ada has some size to her and her tumble was only a few stairs. She wasn't hurt - more startled than anything. Of course after I picked her up and comforted her she pointed up the stairs indicating the she wanted right back up on the horse that dumped her. So I carried her up the stairs, and then put her down near the top, this time indicating that she should go down backwards. She was already there with me and went down the entire flight of stairs the proper way for anyone under the age of 2. Turns out Ada knew all along that the safe way to go down stairs was backwards, she was just displaying her Independence and will - until it backfired on her. Makes me wonder what else she is holding out on. I'm guessing she has the nutritional information of cookies vs. broccoli laid out but is just looking for the theoretical "tumble down the stairs" to prove to her that she should go the healthier route.