The Hardest Thing I Do All Day Is Not Catch Her

Mom watching toddler climb boulder — risky play and natural consequences in action

She was at the top of a boulder at the edge of the playground — not a big-for-a-toddler pebble, a real one, taller than she is and then some, with a flat top she’d hauled herself onto using footholds she’d worked out on her own. I could see her knees shaking from a few feet … Read more

I Counted: A New Walker Falls About 17 Times an Hour On Purpose

Toddler learning to walk and falling — how babies learn locomotion

Seventeen. That’s the number I kept landing on when I went down a full rabbit hole about how toddlers learn to walk one night after my youngest had what felt like her four hundredth tumble before lunch. Seventeen falls per hour. And that’s not the number for a kid who is struggling, or tired, or … Read more