Hi friends! I hope you all had as wonderful of a long weekend as we did. It’s so rare that we have family in town that when we do, it feels downright remarkable! My parents came with a carload (since we’re flying to them for Christmas, they brought L’s holiday presents early), and that brings us to today’s post.
Linden has been walking and on the move since she was 10 months old, and as she’s gotten older and wiser, she’s become more and more interested in being involved around the house—which I love! But, it can be a challenge to keep her safe while she’s helping or watching, especially when things need to be done on the counter. Like cooking dinner, prepping breakfast, or really doing anything else in the kitchen.
Enter the learning tower.
You may have heard of these kid-safe stools, especially if you’ve read any Montessori blogs. I have heard many wonderful things about them. However, despite my interest in their functionality, I was really concerned about having something their size in the middle of our kitchen. And this may make me sound cheap, but with the cost of everything else we’ve purchased for Linden—and the bathroom renovations that we’re halfway through—adding another pricey piece of furniture wasn’t exactly appealing. So when I came across a tutorial to turn a plain Ikea stool into a tower, I jumped at the idea.
And fortunately enough, my parents were as into the idea as I was. My dad built the tower for us, my mom stained it, and they both delivered it last week. It took Linden a few tries to figure out how to get down, since she has to duck under the back dowel, but otherwise, she was instantly attached to it. It’s amazing to be able to have her in the kitchen and not have to stand behind her when she’s on a stool. I love that she can get in and out by herself. And I really like that we didn’t have to change the layout of our kitchen or how we work in the kitchen to accommodate the size of our tower.
All of the information for the tutorial is right here. The only thing we did differently is the finish (we kept it natural). Ours came to about $37 and I am sure that we will use it until Linden outgrows it. And when we’re done with it, we’ll simply unscrew the top part and use it as the stool it originally was.
At just a little over 18 months, Linden is deep into toddlerhood. We’re finding our way through it together—the tantrums are amazingly awful, but the leaps in development such as talking and comprehension are simply astounding—and I can honestly say that she is more fun now than she’s ever been (especially as we’re currently experiencing a little break from the tantrums, knock-on-wood). She has more energy than I knew possible, more room in her belly than I can believe, and she often surprises us with hugs, belly laughs, and kisses. She’s a good one:)