[T2Mum]

The boys are about to crawl. I can't imagine how I am going to manage two crawling babies!

Advice please? Particularly interested to hear if you used a playpen (or not). We also have a 27 month old to juggle at the same time.

Some days I think I will put myself in the playpen with a bottle of wine and let the kids run amok...

[mad madam mim]

We didn't use a playpen but we did use a baby gate and gated off the lounge room, the lounge is where they played all day, we had a 3 year old, the gate we got had a foot pedal so he was able to open it himself so we weren't having to be up and down constantly letting him in and out. We didn't have any issues with them crawling (but hide your DVDs lol, it's the one thing we forgot to do ). Once they were walking it made things sooooooooooooo much easier, I didn't have to lug two kids around anymore, so see this as a step towards that

[newyearbaby]

I've declared a 'baby zone' in the lounge room and use a long pregnancy pillow, the swing and the car capsules to make a wall. It's easy enough for us all to walk over, but the babies are locked in. For now....

Both mine are on the move but not fully crawling. One should achieve it this weekend he is trying so hard. When this happens I will be making the 'baby zone' bigger and expanding it to incorporate the dining room too. I'll then need to use a baby gate at the bottom of the stairs and close the gate to the kitchen (stable door plantation).

I've started training my 27 month old to not put any toys other than baby safe toys in the 'baby zone'. They have to remain on the other side of the wall. So far so good. Not sure how he will go when the dining room gets barred too. But we'll see...

Good luck!

[newyearbaby]

Oh and I meant to say that I've heard bad things about play pens and twins. Like one twin lifting it up for the other to go under. Probably older than 7 months of course. But also about toddlers letting them out etc. I decided it was too hard for me to supervise all the time, and think its easier to just train the toddler and others from day one about respecting the 'baby zone'.

[handsfull]

Once they start crawling is new found freedom to them soon they start to pull up so be careful of all things within arms length for them to pull down on them.

We used a babypen but around the TV cabinet to make it out of boundaries so they didn't try to climb it.

We had a long cabinet so bought two wooden ones and broke them down to make longer side and shorter sides. Worked a treat. Nowhere was out of bounds if the doors were open, therefore you closed bedroom doors, laundry doors or installed gates. Worked well for us.

Other than that kept the floors clean and tidy and was pretty on top of the no getting on the lounge ie. swinging legs up to climb.

We never had a problem with them climbing. There were great crawlers and learnt to pull themselves up not too long after that.

Have fun!

[regandrog]

Two crawling babies are so cute! My two had different techniques for awhile, one did the standard crawl and the other did what we called a caterpiller crawl.

We gated the kitchen and laundry once they crawled. Basically because it became too difficult to do things in the laundry and kitchen as they would just follow me in there and get underfoot, empty drawers and cupboards and mess up laundry piles etc. It also made me feel safer when cooking.

I had a playpen and also used a portacot. So if I was hanging washing up, having a shower, I would put them each in one, otherwise they would climb things and get into stuff they shouldn't, if they went in together they would hair pull or fight.

The playpen got the most use as a retreat for my 2yo DD. She could play with her toys or do some drawing in the playpen without the babies wrecking it.

We made our playpen had a foam mat which was attached to the bottom with a cotton cover, so it couldn't be lifted or pushed around.

[T2Mum]

Thanks for the good advice. I am reading this daily and trying to think what I can do to get ready!

Hadn't even thought about the babies attacking each other in the one playpen, but as soon as I read it I knew that would be right. Already they inadvertently eye gouge, pinch, wrestle each other!

We have a playpen contraption that we can reconfigure into a pen of any size or shape (or two different pens). At the moment I am starting to think about one pen downstairs and one upstairs as I can only carry them up the stairs one at a time, so the other one gets left temporarily and I need somewhere safe to leave them.

PS NYB - please explain to me how you are getting your 27 month old to respect the baby zone! I can't get my 27 month old to respect anything!!!

[newyearbaby]

Literally in the past month he has really started talking heaps, so I think something along with this has been triggered in his brain, and he now listens about 60% of the time. It's seriously gone from 10% to 60% since mid December.

He also likes to be helpful, so I use this to persuade him where possible. He quite likes the babies too, which is helping a lot. Plus my 4 year old has a power over him like I've never seen, so he listens to the 4 year old quite a lot.