Mini-Me, gone bad

Ok, so Hannah isn't bad so much as, "spirited" I think they call it. My family used to refer to that type of child as a "tornado". Whatever it is, Hannah is IT. My computer chair gets really lonely some days I think. I can hear the desk try to comfort it. "It's ok, she'll be back. . .someday. . ." On a normal day I can't sit for more than 2 minutes at a time unless she's asleep.

With Hannah being my fourth, I liked to think that I had this parenting thing down. I mean, haven't I already been through most everything? I am a seasoned veteran. I should be able to handle this. And then came Hannah.

I've talked before about how she can be a wee bit strong willed. She likes to do things her way. Well "her way" is turning out to be a child who leaves me flabbergasted most days. I get attitude from her that just leaves me in awe. How can that much of it come from someone so tiny?

And then there is the climbing, oh man, the climbing. Last year I found her on the kitchen table at one point. . .before she could even walk. She now has skills none of my other children have had. She can climb out of both her playpen, and her crib, even though she's still pretty small and we have it on the lowest setting. I am nowhere near ready for her to be a toddler bed, I fear the mass destruction in the house that would cause. We are considering one of those crib tent baby jail things. Although reading the reviews, it seems more determined children can figure out how to break those, which means Hannah would. So even after four kids this leaves me with the humbling feeling of "well what do we do NOW?"

We have a baby gate at the bottom of the stairs, it said on the packaging it was un-climbable. Well, the other day I found Hannah, halfway up it. She hasn't figured out how to get all the way up and over it, but I fear that day isn't far off. And without that gate keeping her away, she will NOT stay off the stairs. And our stairs are made of wood and are really steep. Yet another "well what do we do NOW?" Sigh.

And she has now learned a whole new level of screaming, and she hits, and pinches and kicks. And the second birthday is still almost 3 months away. Frankly, I'm scared.

She is the total opposite of how I was when I was little. I didn't climb, I was a laid back and calm kid. My mom had told me once that I was the type you could stick in a playpen with a stack of books and I'd sit there and look through them for like an hour. If I did that with Hannah, in about 2 minutes, she'd have the books torn up, with the pages strewn all over the floor around the playpen, and she'd have already climbed out and be sitting on the kitchen table drinking one of my pepsi's that she stole.

So she's a totally different personality than me. But, as far as looks go, could she look any more like me??? It's starting to get a little ridiculous.

Me in 1982:


Hannah last month: