Day 60: crawling in the grass

While we were having our camp-out we noticed that Avery now has no fear of crawling all over the grass.  Her days of sitting calmly on a blanket in the yard are OVER!  She was everywhere in the yard.  She also has no fear of eating whatever happens to be in her path. This is a problem.  Or at least something I need to pay attention to. 

Today while I was doing yard work I wanted to encourage the crawling around and exploring in the yard but not so much the eating of leaves, sticks and well, anything put in front of her.  So I decided to give her crawling a purpose and a safe way for her to chew while she was out there. 

I plopped her down in the middle of the yard and scattered toys all around her. 

This way she could be free to roam the yard but maybe have more interest in chewing on the toys and not so much the other stuff. At this point the toys were not too far away from her since she still is not crawling that far very fast.

You can see how well my plan worked!

She did crawl to the toys, gather them all up and play with them but then quickly went right back to searching out and eating leaves. 

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The Nitty Gritty!

I think this would be a great activity for a newly crawling baby that maybe does not like the feel of grass.  I know there are some babies that really have an aversion to that itchy feeling.  Using some of their favorite toys to entice them you might be able to get them over that hesitation.  Although then you will have the same problem that I do, so maybe not liking grass at this stage is better!

I plan on trying this again with Avery using natural items for her to find and investigate (pine cone, rock, shell, big stick, etc.) but I want to be sure that it is at a time when I can be there with her and not have her eating it all! 

Comments

[Angela]

My little ones never prefered toys to grass. It was always grass, dirt, bark, beetle, etc. Cute photos!
Be well, Angela
PS We found our camping spot near the beach!

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love the grass crawling!! seems like for my little one, once the novelty of being mobile in the grass started to wear off a little, she didn't feel compelled to put every.little.thing in her mouth anymore. now, at 12 months, she still likes to chew on sticks, and i still have to keep a close eye on her, but it feels less "dangerous" to have her out there overall. i guess babies epxlore with their mouths a lot, so maybe once they've explored a place a number of times, the need to mouth everything isn't so strong? great pics, by the way! :)