A gated community

Remember the pretty gate I made Jeff buy back when Biscuit first started crawling?

Well, a few weeks ago, we took it down.

I had a talk with Biscuit and explained that we were going to take it down, but he was under strict orders to never, ever, ever, EVER go up or down the stairs without letting me or Jeff know.

He's done pretty well with it. I'd say there have been about three or four times since we took it down that he has tried to head up or down on his own. Every time, we've busted him.

At the top of the stairs, there's an open loft area that serves as Jeff's movie room. Biscuit's train table is up there, so he has decided on a couple of occasions that he wanted to go up and play ... without letting us know. Biscuit's room is also up there, so one time, he said he needed to go up and get a book that was in his room.

The first time it happened, I broke poor Biscuit's heart. I caught him about halfway up, and I made him come back down. He wailed like life as he knows it had ended. He pouted. He whined. But I told him that because he didn't tell me or Jeff that he was going up, he had to stay downstairs and play. Ninety percent of Biscuit's toys are downstairs, so if he had thought about it, making him stay downstairs to play wasn't a horrible thing. The problem was that he wasn't getting to do what he wanted to do.

It took me a good two weeks to get used to seeing the naked stairs. It seemed like the gate had been there forever, and because it was so bulky, it being gone has completely changed the look of the bottom of the staircase.

We still use a gate in Biscuit's bedroom doorway. Well, we usually use a gate.

Biscuit fell asleep on my shoulder last night, so I took him upstairs to his bed. It's getting harder to make it to the top with that sack o' taters on my shoulder. He's a lot bigger than he used to be.

I put him in his bed, tucked Puppy under his arm, pulled up the covers, turned on his noise machine (ocean waves), then headed back downstairs to go to bed myself. The one thing I forgot? I didn't put the gate up in his doorway.

Biscuit woke up this morning and was calling for Jeff. I was already awake, so I headed out to get him. I got to to the bottom of the stairs and looked up to say "good morning." Then I saw that the gate was down.

"Biscuit! Did you take that gate down?" I asked him.

"No, Mom," Biscuit said. "I didn't take it down."

It took me a second to decide whether Biscuit was telling the truth or not. Then I replayed my actions last night and realized that I never put the gate up.

I told Biscuit how much I appreciated him staying in his room and calling for his Dad instead of heading down the stairs on his own.

"You say not to go on the stairs without telling you and Dad," he said to me.

I realize the day will come where it's not so easy to get him to mind what I say. But for now, I'm just going to enjoy my sweet boy.