climbing the wall

A new milestone has been reached today by both girls. For the past year, Mabel and Stella have watched longingly as other Hotchkiss faculty kids and students get to climb and sit on the wall between the main building and the front circle drive. The wall is between 3 and 4 feet high and in the interest of safety I decided that I did not want them up there. I figured that when they were capable enough to climb up on their own, then they would be less likely to fall off and get hurt. They are so small that I thought we were another year away from this even being an issue. I underestimated them. Stella looked at the wall and hauled herself right up and was very pleased with herself. She was beaming as she walked across it. Mabel wanted it too, but she had to work a little bit for it. She tried a couple of times with no luck and then pleaded with me to help her up. When that didn't work, Stella came over and tried to give her a boost but it still wasn't working for her. I figured that we'd give it a try some other day, but Mabel does not give up easily. She walked to the end of the wall and tried grabbing both sides of the wall and hooking her ankle up over the corner. She was so excited when she had made it to the top that she gave a little hop and said "I did it!" and then started running (ah!) down the wall to the other side.