“Standing” is the new “planking” … at least in our home.

It started about two weeks ago.  I left Emmy in the livingroom for ten long seconds so I could go grab a tissue to wipe her nose, and came back to find her striking a “I’m king of the worrrrld!” pose atop her little mini sofa chair. Of course I immediately walked over to Em and started  to negotiate with her. It was like one of those movie scenes , where the good cop is trying to get the suicidal woman to NOT throw herself off a ledge. I didn’t want to get too close for fear she would jump.

“Emmy, come on, sit down. Chairs are for sitting, not for standing.”

Em sat down for two seconds before popping right back up into standing position.

“Emmy, mama doesn’t want you to go boomps and get an owie. Sit down”

See Emmy sit. See Emmy stand. Stand, Emmy, Stand!

“Emmy, you’re still young. You have your whole life in front of you. Don’t throw it all away. Sit. Down.”

To which, shaking her head vigorously, Emmy replied “nononononononononononoooooooo” (her favorite words these days.)

So much for negotiations! I removed Emmy and made myself comfortable in her little mini-sofa, with her sitting in my lap.

Sidenote: It’s  actually a really comfortable chair, even for adults. My husband and I have discussed getting rid of all of our adult-sized furniture and replacing them with mini-versions.  It would free up a lot of space in our living room.  And if upholstery gets stained with crayon marks or blueberry juice, we could just throw that piece out and buy another for sixty bucks at Toys R Us. AND it would make me feel like Alice in Wonderland, which would be super-fun, at least until the novelty wore off.

Anyway, I showed Em, by example, that chairs are for sitting, not for standing.  Situation averted.

Until the next day, when Em decided it would be really awesome to try standing up on the seat of her toddler-sized car. While it was moving.

And the following day, when I was folding laundry and had my back to Em. I turned around to find her standing on our coffee table. Totally proud/sneaky look on her face.

In the days that have followed, the objects that Emmy has attempted standing on include but are not limited to: her Elmo doll, her music table, her little play kitchen, a laundry basket , her highchair, a bottle of squeezable yogurt, a random cardboard box, her Elmo drums, and a large kitchen pot.

I know that as a fifteen month old, Em is just exploring her world and figuring out how to interact with all the objects around her. But I also think our daughter may secretly be taking pictures of herself standing in various precarious positions and uploading them to Youtube.  If babies around the globe start taking pictures of themselves standing on weird and dangerous objects, it’s probably our fault.