Tables and chairs

I've been wanting to get a kid-size table and chairs for Dominic for a while. I have delightful maternal fancies of having tea parties (possibly with teddy bears) and sitting with Dom to do arts and crafts. However, the main obstacle seemed to be Dominic's complete reluctance to ever sit still on a chair. Even at other kids' birthday parties when the other kids would sit up nicely at small plastic tables to eat their food, Dom would grab the food and then clamber down and make a break for it at full-speed.

My hopes of a getting Dom to sit on a chair for longer than five seconds without being tied to it were rekindled this weekend at Baby City. Whilst we were perusing for a replacement cup (his cow cup is starting to look worse for wear these days as he has nibbled extra holes in the nozzle), Dom took himself over to a shiny Winnie-the-Pooh wooden table and chairs. With gleeful blubrling he climbed up and sat nicely in the Tigger-backed chair and slapped his hands on the table with delight, pointing at his favourite characters. Disney has already got their evil merchandising hooks into my young boy it seems. Not content with reading Pooh books and watching the Pooh DVD, he now wants his furniture plastered with the characters.

I was thrilled and insisted on getting the table and chairs there and then. The sales assistant claimed it was the last one in stock.

We got the furniture home and Dom was eager to play with it further. I sat down with him and we shared a bit of brownie and apple.



Yummy brownie mess.



To my joy and rapture, Dom would sit in the chair even later when there wasn't food present.



He was happy to sit and point to the pictures of Pooh and friends.



We could read him books and still he remained seated in the chair.



Another happy storytime at the table.

However, in less than twenty four hours, Dominic showed us that there is nothing he cannot turn into a dangerous extreme sport. To him, tables and chairs were not merely items of furniture on which you had docile storytimes and indulged your mother's desires for playing tea party games.

No, tables and chairs were like mountains, they needed to be scaled.



Dominic makes his way up the perilous Mt Pooh table.



Once at the summit, the intrepid climber enjoys a quick story or two.