Crawling and dog-blocking

We're a one-child, two-dog family. It's a good thing, at least if this 2012 Time magazine article is anything to go by. Pavlov and Laika -- aka, The Mutts -- have been wonderful since Alice was born. They give her loads of kisses, they've never once snapped at her, they cuddle up to her on the couch and Pav has even used his butt to get Ali to sleep (as the below pic proves). Laika in particular makes Alice giggle with glee. I can see them being being best mates as Alice gets older.

Not sure what was going on here...but it worked, so I'll let it happen.

On top of this, El Muttos are great at cleaning up. Left over food, smashed. Spillage, sorted. Dirty hands, licked “clean”. If you forgive the two dummies Pavlov has wrecked and the socks, headbands and toys he's gotten hold of, all-in-all, it's been pretty great.

Buuuut, there's been a new development in the household. And the dogs have taken a particular interest in this one.

Alice has started crawling. Well, when she's not getting herself trapped.

"Daaaad. I'm stuck. Stop taking pics and HELP ME!"

Having a child at mutt level has been a challenge. Alice wants to crawl, dogs want to give kisses. Only one of those things can happen at a time. Sadly for Alice, she can't yet out-power a dog. So not only does she have to contend with getting stuck under a cabinet, she also has to contend with two dogs.

Has this stopped her? NO! Ali is a champion and she's getting there nicely. She'll be missioning about with her mutt besties in no time.

No Laika shall prevail against a crawling Alice.

But I can't help but wonder if Alice would've been crawling by now if she wasn't repeatedly dog-blocked when she was starting out. Did we do a bad thing by letting the dogs get in the way? (Yes, parents are ALWAYS questioning their own decisions. Or it's just me. Whatever.)

According to this piece from The Spruce we've got little to worry about. Neither Pavlov nor Laika are showing any of the warning signs; in fact, they seem to be interacting and playing more since she started scooting about at their height. But this is a delicate stage, and I'm sure the dogs will get a little more unsettled once Alice gets more mobile -- until then, though, we'll just let them play!

So, when does a kid begin to crawl? Apparently, nobody actually knows. Today’s Parent reckons that it's usually between months 7 and 9. But some kids will be earlier, others will be later, and others might skip crawling entirely and go straight into pulling themselves up on things and then to full-on walking.

The moral of the story: don't stress. Whatever your kid is doing, it's normal.