Nowhere safe from toddlers

Safe havens for possessions have vanished as toddler grows big enough to reach.

Our safe havens have vanished. After 18 months of gradual encroachment, Astrid can reach previously inaccessible zones around the house. The window ledges, which stand at least one metre from the ground, no longer provide refuge for our possessions. The work surfaces in the kitchen have come within her range. Sanctuaries for our stuff are running out.

I discovered Astrid's extended grasp the day after we came back from holiday. Suddenly she appeared holding my glasses. She was smiling. It was the kind of smile that suggested she knew she shouldn't be doing something, but did it anyway. I was surprised, because I usually put my glasses on the window ledge. Astrid broke my last pair by accident, so I try to put them down beyond her reach. At first I thought I must have left them lying around, so I put them on and forgot about it.

Later she emerged clutching our passports. She likes pointing to the photographs at the back of each passport and doling them out to the correct person - Mummy, Daddy, Astrid. This time I was certain I had left the passports on the window ledge, so I decided to see how she had managed to obtain them.

It was strange: she didn't seem to have grown very much while we were on holiday. Of course, being away from our usual environs, we lacked the yardsticks by which we estimate her incredible and relentless blooming. Nevertheless she could, I imagine, only have grown a few millimetres or a centimetre at most. After all, we were away for less than two weeks.

The key to this new ability, as with many advancements throughout human history, turned out to be physical development allied with the use of tools. Astrid has a small wooden chair, which she pushes into position and steps on. From this vantage point, she can get to most of the window ledge. Important pieces of paper, pens, glasses, watches, phones: all these objects needed a new and safer place to rest.

Astrid uses the same technique in the kitchen, where it brings all manner of dangerous items within her grip. In fact, it has forced us to initiate a new bout of childproofing. The microwave must be turned off at the plug because she can press the buttons. The fridge door must be locked. Sharp knives and scissors must be secreted at the back of a cupboard. Dirty cups and glasses must be pushed to the back of the work surfaces, snug against the wall. Even with these precautions, Astrid has already managed to commandeer a knife and a box of sewing needles.

It's not just that she can reach things, it's that she wants to pick things up. She loves to collect things and move them from one place to another. She has become like a magpie.

This developmental phase, known as "the very annoying phase", turns the world into a fluid and ever-shifting place. Nothing is where you left it. I arrived at work yesterday without my wallet, which I later found behind a chair. Did it fall down there or was it pushed? It is like living with a friendly pickpocket, someone mischievous and energetic, but lacking in purpose or malice.

"The art of losing isn't hard to master," wrote Elizabeth Bishop in a poem called One Art. Until we build a set of shelves well beyond Astrid's reach, just below the ceiling, perhaps, we will have to get accustomed to never expecting to find something where we left it.