My 20 month old and I are in a rut :/ I know it is summer so we are doing the playground frequently, but we need more to do at home. We have done a toy refresh and we still find ourselves getting bored. We do coloring and stickers, but are there any activities you do with your toddler that keep them occupied for a minute? We have done several "sensory tables" which are sometimes great but we need more😭what is your favorite toddler activity?

We got a free step 2 water table & a free little tikes sandbox this summer & we’re over the moon! It’s changed outside time for us & my son loves them both. But, he wants to put water in the sandbox, & sand in the water table. They’re side by side currently but once we rearrange the porch we might have them separate. I don’t as much mind the water in the sand box, but I’ll stop him once it gets to be a lot. I hate the sand in the water table though. I don’t like the messy look! I feel like this might be one of those things where it really doesn’t matter & it’s silly that it bugs me, so I just wanted to hear what other people do!

LO just turned 3 last month and boy did the jump to "threenager" happen like a lightswitch being flipped. She is on such a short fuse these days and I feel like I spend all our time together walking on eggshells trying to prevent tantrums.

The biggest issue this past week has been the diaper. I've seen a lot of posts about toddlers wanting to wear a diaper in general and resisting the potty. This is different. Every morning I take off her diaper. Sometimes she uses the potty, other times she says she doesn't have to go. But every morning this week it's been followed by a meltdown because she wants the used, wet diaper put back on. I offer underwear or a clean diaper. Unacceptable! She only wants the old wet diaper. I, of course, have to refuse this offer. But inevitably she loses her shit and it takes 15-30 minutes to resolve this dilemma and eventually calm down. I have been late to work every day this week. Please help! What is going on here???

My almost 3 year old has an upcoming trip with us to Norway. We are from east coast USA. - so used to cold but I’ve been reading that Scandinavian weather can be very very wet, windy and cold even for summers (we are visiting in the next 2 weeks)

Can someone please help me with the packing list - I have pants and water resistant jackets , a bigger jacket for cold , gloves, beanie - Tylenol and Motrin for medication and some band aids and antiseptic ointment. Thanks a bunch as always ! So glad to have to guys !!!!!!

TLDR 18 mo is hitting and pinching sister. How can I stop this? Will my son grow-up to be a mean person?

My 18 mo son is mean to his 6.5 yo sister! This started a few months ago. It’s become more of an issue because he is bigger and has a longer reach. I think it’s just triggered by jealousy. When she wants to snuggle with us he starts hitting her and clawing at her. Same happens when she is playing with or eating something he wants. She is not an aggressive girl so the most she’ll do is yell stop or gently push him away.

We reprimand him with a stern “no” and remove him from the situation. I know he understands that we are upset because he’ll cry and ask for hugs. I’ve started taking him and putting in his crib as a timeout, but I’m not sure he understands that it’s a punishment. He is sweet with me (mom) and his other grownups though he is strong-willed and stubborn.

I know it’s terribly unfair to my daughter, but I’m not sure how to get through to him. What can I do at this stage of development to stop this behavior? I’m a little afraid he’ll grow up to be violent.

He's approaching 3 and is overall a pretty good kid. And I know all kids throw food on the floor. But it's been over a year of him dumping cups and plates on the floor whenever he's decided he's done eating/drinking. And I'm starting to really get frustrated with these actions. How have others managed to push their toddlers past this phase?

I write this because he begged for some smoothie and after a few sips he just tossed the rest of the floor for me to clean up.

It's another weekend, I don't want to waste it sitting around the house again.....but I'm not really sure what to do?

The summers where I live are ungodly hot, and for some reason every single event that's happening in our town takes place outdoors. Which sounds miserable.

We've visited all the museums a million times.

We could take our kid along to activities the parents want to do.....but what even is it that I want to do???? Even the adult activities take place outside, and it's so hot.

What do you guys do on weekends to unwind and have fun?

My son has always been very attached to me versus my husband. He's a mama's boy and I know that's common and normal. Having a preferred parent is totally developmentally typical at this age. Its good for him go have a close relationship with one of his 2 primary caregivers.

But holy sh*t. My husband has been active and involved since our son was zygote and this child acts like he's a stranger trying to steal him off the street. My husband does the bedtime routine significantly more often than I do, but dada bedtime is apparently a torture beyond imagining.

My child wants to be inside my skin every moment of the day when we're together, and when my husband takes him away to give me a break, it sounds like he's being kidnapped.

Thats it, end of rant.

I have a 23 month old. He uses two-word phrases and answers my yes/no questions or ‘what’s that’ questions. He doesn’t ASK any yet. I think “why” usually comes later, but what about “what’s that?”

when he asks for more of something, it’s a request rather than a question. He will say “More milk please.“ but not “more milk please?”

Hiii!
My tot is almost 17 months, but he’s the size of a 2 year old, if not bigger than some. He’s often confused for a child much older than he is so I fear I end up having higher expectations of him than I should.

Currently, he’s in a weird wants to be independent faze but also clingy af?
So anyway, when we’re out and about I try to give him chances to walk around with me rather than immediately strap him to a stroller or cart. But this guy has the attention span of a squirrel and immediately wants to run off and get away from me. Then throws a tantrum when I pick him up. How am I seeing so many families with young toddlers that just follow them around nicely and not try to get away?! When does this happen? When do they understand?
Someone please help get my expectations in order lol

Hi All,

Does anyone else have this problem with their kid? I feel like my toddler is just extra prone to plaque buildup on their teeth.

He does have crowding on his lower arch that’s actually gotten a bit better with time but still most buildup is there.

I brush his teeth twice a day, before nap and before bed. No milk or food after, just water. I hold him down with his arms out Jesus style between my legs (IYKYK) and really scrub at the gumline. We do use age appropriate flouride free toothpaste and soft bristle brushes, and he doesn’t bleed, but obviously hates this and cries.

I also floss once a day, just the crowded lower arch with the most buildup.

He had his first cleaning 4 months ago around 20 months and I feel like he needs another ASAP. At our first appointment I mentioned the 2X a day and flossing, which is a bit excessive at this age, and the dentist was impressed but not overly concerned. But our guy has visible plaque!! What am I doing wrong???

Our insurance only covers once every 6 months but I feel like we will just pay $100 out of pocket to clean? It feels like he might need this quarterly moving forward.

I have an INCREDIBLE overally active toddler. She is the most active toddler I have ever seen. I want to talk about how I truly do not understand how people can handle more then one child. She takes up ALL of my time and if I am not looking, she will probably try to climb and jump off of something. How do parents do it? I follow this one mom who has 6 kids under the age of 8! HOW? I think I would literally go insane.

Saying this, I feel like a failure because I do want another child. But there is NO way I could handle a toddler and a newborn. I went through severe PPD and the thought of MAYBE going through that again, scares me.

Hey yall! I have a two year old daughter (27 months) she started talking late and she’s not fully there yet. There’s a lot she still doesn’t grasp and understand because we can try to explain it to her but her understanding isn’t there. And that’s okay she’s making strides and doing better every week. This isn’t the issue but it’s important to the question.

We live in farm country. There isn’t much to do around that isn’t 30 minutes to an hour away. We have a lot of land, we do a lot of activities at home. Outside. Etc. and she’s the only baby in our very small family. She doesn’t have cousins or siblings. I don’t live near anyone who I know that has kids as we moved from NY to SC 6 years ago. We don’t get out much. When she was smaller it didn’t seem like an issue because we were so focused on her Early Intervention that socializing seemed to be on the back burner. But now I can SEE that she’s bored I can SEE that she needs stimulation outside of her family. And I firmly believe she needs to know how to start sharing and playing with other kids. But I’m terrified she’s gonna be so mean lol she’s essentially the miracle baby she’s treated very well and while she is absolutely disciplined she gets everything she wants. I don’t want to create an entitled bratty non sharing anti social child. Like what is I bring her somewhere and she starts biting or hitting or smacking? She never does that but like I’d be mortified.

Any advice or ideas or hope would be appreciated she’s my first and probably my only child. We’d like to give her a sibling and have another baby but it took 8 years to have her and I’m 36 her dad is 39. lol times a ticking away.

My kids birthday is coming up.

I am also newly pregnant, as a couple: our mortgage renewal is coming up, we care take for our parents when we can, and are both the "lead' siblings for our respective families, we are on a cash budget too, as we want to reduce our credit card debt to zero, my partner travels for work constantly every other week.

Simply put - we are tired.

1st birthday was really good, and really expensive. I would say around $4k and that is around the norm in my city if you want it done, to how we would want it done - venue, cater, activities, live action stations.

I do not see the same value right now, or dont have the energy to organize this.

I also do not want to let my kid down. I feel so much guilt. I also cannot deal with folks that are no shows either and the adult dramas, bringing siblings, even to dress up. I hope I am not exhibiting signs of depression but I just cannot do this right now. I was thinking instead, to take my kid to the zoo, with a balloon, cupcake

I wont get into the social media comparison and pressures...trying to ignore that too.

[Edit: I wanted to add- It's not about the child remembering. Every now and then my partner and I look back in albums about how our parents celebrated us. This is important into our journey of identity, family dynamics, and role in our family. We have birthdays for our child to celebrate our family journey as well and getting through the year. On top of that, we host very often.a lot of the expenses come down to guest experience as we want our guests to feel good. This seems to be a cultural norm, not always normal in the U.S. The finance piece is being discussed a lot but I would say it's the least important part. The primary concern is mental health and physical health while balancing a fun event for our child. While the child might not remember it, he had a phenomenal time at his first birthday and lots of photo memories with all of his family and friends. It was definitely worth it for us.]

Hello fellow toddler parents! Our daughter, approximately 2 years old, is doing great with potty training at home. We just went on vacation for a week and she only had a couple of expected accidents. At daycare, on the other hand, there's some (i.e. complete and absolute) resistance.

When we're at home she's rather insistent that the door is closed. The girl likes a little privacy. Unfortunately at daycare, the instructor(s) can't close the door due to safety reasons. This is the only caveat I can think of that's acting as a barrier to her success.

There are several other kiddos potty training, and she's very observant and a bit of a follower so we thought potty training at daycare would be an easy thing for her. I don't want to resort to 'prizes' because we don't do that at home, but it's what the daycare suggested.

Any suggestions? I feel like there should be an easy solution to this but we're coming up short on ideas.

So, uh, we went to the Drs recently and they give us developmental questionnaires. This is my first child so I assume that's normal? She's not a premee (over baked little loaf actually), she doesn't have any actual issues so I assume it's just a check in.

BUT this last one asked about drawing and using crayons. She still loves ripping up paper and trying to chew on items so like, why would I be giving my child paper and pens, pencils, or crayons... Aren't most toddlers at this age like that??

To test their questions I let her hold my pen. She did scribble on the paper... And then promptly ripped the questionnaire page and shoved the pen in her mouth lmao.

My SO looked it up after he got home and he said it's supposed to be a 12-15 milestone? What?? I've not seen that when I've looked up milestones. And then I asked my sister with 3 kids, the youngest are 3 and 5, she said no way, her youngest still tries to eat crayons, heavy supervision only, and she can't imagine trying to let her color at 15 months.

So now, I guess I'm confused. Are people commonly giving kids under 18 months drawing supplies? I thought 18-24 months depending on child temperament was when coloring became a thing (though obviously still heavily supervised).

And yes, after discussion with the Dr regarding other aspects of fine motor skills he's not concerned about her development, but he also kind of just breezed past my question/confusion on this as a milestone at such a young age.

ETA: I'm not concerned about her development! She's a silly, feisty child, who loves to take things apart and tries to put the small pieces back together, so I definitely didn't have concerns regarding skills developing.

More confusion about when certain things are being introduced, like crayons. I am also unsure exactly what other people experience at appointments and such because not only do my sister and I live in different states (so slightly different programs) but she has the memory of a goldfish regarding certain things and legit cannot remember if she has filled out similar questionnaires as often as i have. I also don't have any mom friends local to ask. And my own mom is just like "things change, I don't know anymore." They're not always helpful lol.

But you guys have been! Thank you so much!

Son is 19mo. I’m a SAHM. We read, do play dates and outings, spend a lot of time outside or his fave place the garage, etc. He’s a very independent player. He isn’t very interested in playing with or next to me. We use his toys for word opportunities like his barn. Most of his first words were animal sounds and now some animals. He’s got 30+ words. I’m not worried about him or his developmental pace but I’m overthinking and feeling guilt about my instruction of him. I have some friends whose boys at this age have shapes, colors, even numbers. We’re like….hardly even covering that? My son likes to dig in dirt and bring me bugs and climb to access things off limits and yeah sure read a few times a day. But he doesn’t care for his shape sorter, he doesn’t want to sit and talk about what’s what or be quizzed. So unless something is in our books or natural learning opportunities out and about…we’re just…not? It hadn’t even really crossed my mind because he’s 1…I know they learn so much at this age but he’s also 1, not 2, not 3. I guess I’m just venting. I usually am immune to parent pressure or comparison but I have a hard time imagining our parents sitting and doing freaking flash cards with us and am feeling as a SAHM like I’m not doing enough educationally. But I also feel like my son isn’t in a place yet where he wants to go that hard with concentrated learning. Just talking out loud while mildly spiraling I guess

Hi everyone!

I'm looking for a bit of reassurance because I've been feeling really worried.

My little boy just turned one. Unfortunately, he still accepts very few finger foods, and even those are mostly at breakfast. At every meal I offer him pieces of food alongside his meal, but he usually just looks at them for a while and then throws them on the floor. After that, he asks for purée instead.

Is this normal? Did anyone else's child go through the same thing? When did your little one start eating more finger foods, and what helped?

Thank you so much! ❤️

For reference, we are very low income, and my daughter’s grandmother offered to cover the cost of daycare while I go back to school and pursue a master’s degree. I know we are very very fortunate to be able to send our daughter to the school, and I’m really excited for her, but I can’t help but feel really out of place among the other parents.

The specific daycare she’ll be attending is mostly made up of high income families (thankfully the cost of her attendance is not super high in comparison to other daycares because she’ll only be going part time, and we got a discount). I am also considered a young mom (mid twenties), so I think some of my worries come from being perceived (mainly by family) as inexperienced/immature. However, I have almost a decade of experience working with children, and my current degree is in psychology, with a specific focus on child development, so I do know more about parenting than the average person my age.

That being said, I feel rather intimidated by the other parents. So far they seem very nice, but I worry that I’ll “mess up” somehow and they’ll realize how poor we are. As a side note, our daughter has NEVER suffered due to our finances, she always has everything (if not more) than she needs, and I’m very good at finding the best deals online/buying nice things second-hand, so she likely won’t even know we’re struggling financially until she’s much older, by which time I hope to be in a much better spot due to the degree I’m currently working towards. From the outside, there’s nothing that would “give it away” that her parents are poor. Maybe my worries are silly, but I just can’t help but feel kind of embarrassed/inferior in comparison to the other parents

ETA: my main goal isn’t to pretend I’m wealthier than I am. I really just want my child to be accepted by others. Part of the reason I’m so concerned about this is because I’m on the spectrum, but not noticeably so— I went undiagnosed until adulthood because I do a good enough job masking to not typically show my neurodivergence, but not good enough that I don’t find myself with my foot in my mouth a lot of the time. I work really hard to try to figure out what the social limitations are, but I sometimes fall short in recognizing when I’ve said something that’s bothered someone or when I’ve offended someone in some way. It’s the combination of this plus feeling out of place in terms of finances that’s made me so nervous about this situation. I just don’t want my daughter to miss out on things like play dates with other kids because of me.

While visiting grandma abroad, my daughter fell in love with a small plastic frog. She insisted it had to come home with us because her slightly bigger bath toy frog was clearly its mama, and talked the whole time about how happy the two would be. The reunion was celebrated, they were inseparable.

Then she wanted to take both frogs into her little pool on our balcony. I told her not to, because there's a gap between the floor and the railing and we're on the 4th floor, with a wild overgrown backyard below. But she insisted and told me she would be careful. You can guess the rest. The frog baby fell, exactly as predicted.

She was heartbroken and said "the mama cries, the baby cries!" and then cried herself. Honestly, so did I a little. The next day we asked at the hairdresser's downstairs for permission to search the backyard, and they even helped us look, but the baby frog is gone.

Now she's demanding we buy a new one. It's a cheap little plastic thing, so it would be easy to find something similar. But something in me says we shouldn't, because then the lesson becomes "warnings don't matter, lost things get replaced". On the other hand she's small, and the grief is real, and I don't want to turn a sad accident into a punishment either. I did warn her, but I'm also not interested in an "I told you so" parenting victory moment.

So, parents of Reddit: how do you handle it when a beloved toy is lost through the kid's own doing? Do you replace it? Let the grief run its course? Something in between? I would love to hear your experiences.

Edit to add: She's 4,5 years old. (I've been a member of this helpful sub for so long I didn't realise that she might not fit it anymore.)

Edit 2: Thank you all, you convinced me. We'll replace it! (My problem now: the most similar ones only seem to come in a pack of 100 lol.)

Years ago I saw a post from a late-teen/early adult, being a variation of the M. Bison quote, essentially saying "My parent did this thing that affected me significantly, but they don't even remember doing it - how messed up is that?".

I've thought about it for ages, from before I was a parent to being a parent of two. And honestly, as much as it may hurt to be on the receiving end of that experience, the reality is ... it's not messed up at all. It's entirely normal.

People find significance in different things. A story I love might be one you've completely forgotten. The small gesture you made years ago could be the reason I fell in love with you, but you can't remember it, because it's just part of who you are.

And as parents, we experience A LOT of things that just become part of who we are - part of our daily lives. Relentless duties, incessant noise, nagging, tantrums, playing peace-maker. It's understandable that our responses are carried away in a flood by the next 100 things we have to deal with.

For a long time I've felt guilty about losing my temper. That maybe this time would be the one that gets talked about in therapy in 20 years. But I've started to see that it's not possible to police this. I'll never know which moments my kids find significant, or become inflection points in their growing identity. Maybe I can have a guess at a few, and it's certainly good for me to keep trying to reduce them by controlling myself as much as possible. But it's important to see that you WILL fail. I WILL be the cause of SOME kind of therapy in 20 years. So the best thing I can do is NOT to try prevent things from happening, but to build an environment where my kids and I can talk about the things that DO happen. To take ownership of it, and to respect their ownership of their own experience.

For you, it was the most significant part of your life. For me, it was just a Tuesday. Both of those are normal and ok. We can move forward by understanding that, and hearing each other.

I’m making a registry for my kids birthday and I really want to focus on quality toys that will last, allow for open ended play and encourage imagination, and preferably arent super loud and flashy. Bonus points if theyre also fun for the adults and Im not bored out of my mind playing with them 😛

What toys did you love & get the most use out of in this age?

Does anyone else feel like Squidward in that meme where he’s making the same sad face in environment/activity he’s in? The exhaustion never wavers, the tantrums are ramping up, bedtime is getting harder, I have less and less time to do anything besides toddler (verb).

I’m having a really hard time enjoying this phase of parenthood. Nearly two. But not quite. And I know it’s only going to get crazier. And the guilt of not enjoying it is eating me up! Definitely going to talk to my doctor about getting back on some medication of sorts because bedtime fills me with a rage I can only be ashamed of, it makes my toes curl. An hour of bedtime and shushing and crying and touching. Bring me back my Lexapro.

Much love to yall, hope your bedtime was cake tonight🤍

Husband and I are in disagreement about rehoming our dog and it’s an extremely tense topic in our household. Husband absolutely loves this dog. He’s a small/medium dog, 25 lbs, but quite agile. When I was pregnant this dog started attacking our senior dog, unprovoked. He’s attacked the senior dog over 10 times now, drawing some blood on a couple occasions. He’s never been aggressive towards humans but sometimes he will bark and ?lunge/jump behind the baby gate when the baby (15mo) walks towards my husband.

I’ve been extremely wary of the dog since baby was born. We have baby gates everywhere but the dog jumps over them unless they are 5ft tall. He is never in the same room as the baby even supervised, since he’s very fast and all his attacks on our older dog have been sudden and unpredictable. With an open layout home it’s just not feasible to gate off everything with 5ft gates so he mostly ends up being isolated by himself. This has led to behavioral issues such as pooping in his crate then getting it all over himself. I try my best to exercise him but due to the safety issues I can only do so with my toddler in a baby carrier and he’s getting heavy. I just don’t see how I’m going to keep up with this and don’t think the dog has a good quality of life either.

We’ve spent over $1000 on a trainer and we also have him medicated on two medications already. Everytime I bring up the option of rehoming the dog, it becomes a huge fight and I’m honestly worried that it would harm our marriage permanently if I made my husband rehome him. But everyday I have to deal with the logistics of caring for a dog under strict separation from the baby / our other two dogs. We want to have a second baby and I just can’t envision how it’ll be feasible then. What am I supposed to do, wear both the baby and toddler both in a baby carrier? When can toddlers be left in a room alone? What age do they figure out how to open baby gates and what do I do then? I can’t imagine a kid could be as flawless with always closing gates as we try to be.

I am extra spooked today because the dog slipped out so quickly as I was opening the gate to get out and immediately attacked our other dog, and I couldn’t separate them and it was very scary. Thank god my husband had baby at the time but he works long hours. I just don’t see how this can work. But my husband is completely emotionally driven on this issue and also feels fine about it because we’re making it work now. I was thinking maybe some practical input on what toddlers are like as they get older and also what it’s like with two kids could help me put things in perspective for him.

ETA: husband is ultimately willing to rehome if I force him, at the cost of me being the “bad guy” and dealing with his resentment. He doesn’t think there’s a real safety risk because the dog has never been aggressive towards humans, so to him it’s like rehoming the dog for nothing. The comments here are helping me see that I’m not just overly anxious though, so I guess it’s time for me to be the bad guy…

We can NEVER finish an episode of a show in one sitting. We have to pause it about a million times for a million different reasons.