OK, that's not entirely true. But really, the truth is, i don't worry about it often or for long. Here's why i used to worry, & why i don't anymore.
When my girls were about 18 months old i worried. A co-worker told me his 16 month old was recognizing letters, a friend told me her 22 month old twins could sing the alphabet. My three were barely talking coherently (why do we teach them to talk? more on that later), anyway, at the time it seemed very important. I was convinced my kids were going to be the kids running in circles with buckets over their heads like the little boy in Parenthood (the movie). A couple of months later my fears were put to rest. Did they start spouting sonnets overnight? Start doing equations Sheldon Cooper would be proud of? nope. They took their beds apart.
Lets go back to why they were in beds in the first place. It wasn't because i thought it was time & it certainly wasn't because i was pushing them. On the contrary, i would have kept them in cribs until they were 5 if i could have gotten away with it. It was love that forced the issue. My trio love each other & hate to be separated. I started going in in the morning & finding all 3 in the same crib. At 20 months they had learned to climb out of their cribs & into each others. The Point Of No Return came about a week into this. I put them down for a nap & then watched on my video monitor, as Lori positioned herself on the crib rail with her back to the room & then proceed to slowly rock back. That ended nap-time for the day & the transition from cribs to beds was made immediately. Unfortunately that also meant a transition of bedrooms. The girls had a large, beautiful (freshly painted) nursery, filled with toys & clothes. Suddenly i saw everything in their room as a hazard. If they were going to be in beds, it couldn't be in that room of horrors. Wait for it, cus here's the fun part. I insisted that right then & there, my husband & i switch bedrooms with the girls. We had the smaller bedroom, since we collectively have far less toys & clothes. Dave took 1 side off of each crib, turning them into toddler beds, & i moved our few belonging into what had been the nursery. We now had far more toys & clothes then we had ever wanted. The girls on the other had, had nothing but their beds & a few soft toys (so as not to hit each other to hard).
Then, for further safety, i put toddler bed-rails on all 3 beds. That night, after we put them to bed, we watched - I love my Summer Video Monitor & recommend it to anyone.
And here is why i don't worry anymore.
Right away the girls started surveying their surroundings. They moved together from bed to bed, looking at the rails, climbing in & out from under the beds. Tumbling over the railings & into the beds. About 30 minutes after they went to bed, i was called back to the monitor by a change in noise. Then I watched as my girls removed the bed-rails from their beds. One child lifted the mattress, a second crawled under it & freed the rail, the third pulled the rail out.
It was definitely a well thought out & executed plan. We were amazed at the way they worked together to accomplish a common goal. We knew that once again we had been beaten. I went in & removed the rails from the room, never to be seen again.
So you see, your child may be able to recognize letters & even say them, but my children have shown skills that put my mind at ease for months to come.
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