Toddler Bed

John has never been what most would call a "good sleeper". From the time he was born I have learned to deal with nightly interruptions, cat naps, and going to bed late then waking up early! After I got back from Texas things took a turn for the worse when instead of laying in his bed talking to himself before falling asleep he would scream at the top of his lungs for at least an hour every night before he would finally cry himself to sleep. I was at my wits end not knowing what to do or how to handle the situation. We tried staying in there with him, playing soft music, putting him to bed earlier, letting him stay up later, I even tried rocking him to sleep one night to see if it would help. Nothing. Exhausted I was at my last straw and asked my neighbor for some help. She is a family therapist and gave me some really good advice. One thing we weren't very consistent in was a set routine every night. That night we tried having a set routine and he ended up falling asleep in the living room while I was getting his bed ready (see above picture). The next night we went through the whole routine again and when we took him into his room to put him in bed he refused to go into his crib. He immediately jumped onto his toddler bed and wouldn't move. We thought it was just a fluke but he stayed quiet so we weren't complaining. He got up a few times and tried to come through to see what we were doing but he went back to bed just fine without a fit or problem. The next night he did the same thing! So we pretty much ended up taking down the crib and letting him sleep in his toddler bed every night. It has been AMAZING!!!! No more screaming, no more fits and he has been sleeping through the night until 7:30 sometimes 8:30 ever morning so far. We have about a 10 min battle with him each night to make him stay in bed but after that no problems at all. I am proud to say that my son sleeps from 9:30pm to 7:30am!!! This is a huge breakthrough for our family and I'm glad I have a few months of actual sleep before this new baby comes and we start this whole cycle again!!


This is how we found him the other night when we came through to check on him. No, we did NOT set this picture up! This really is literally how we found him! :)


It was really dark in the room when we took it too. The flash on my camera is amazing! :)


This is him the next morning with his cute little "Chunky Monkey". He is so attached to that monkey. He makes sure that we kiss Chunky Monkey goodnight before he can go to sleep. The other day he insisted on taking him with us when we went shopping. He carried him all around Trader Jo's and even tried to feed him some of the cookie sample he got from the nice lady at the little cafe inside.

He sure loves his Chunky Monkey. Thank you Auntie Misty for the best Christmas present EVER!!