With all the goings on, I've been bad about getting posts up on the topic of getting our toddler into a big bed, but here's a little catch up.

After my last post, we took a vacay weekend to visit Opa in Carmel.  After a fun day, Opa and Shelley watched the boys while Roger and I had a night out on the town {ahhh, so nice!}. 

We've traveled with Rowan before and always bring a Pack N Play for him to sleep in.  Everything was going great until about 2:30am, when he began to SCREAM at the top of his lungs, until we would get up and lay him back down.  Right as we crawled back in bed, there he went again.  This lasted until about 4:30 or 5:00 am.  UUUUUGH.  It was a long night.  Luckily, he only kept us up.

The next day was all about a bunch of fun in the pool :)

When we got home, we mentally prepared for another rough night in the toddler bed, but Rowan slept great all night!

Over the last few nights, there have been very few bedtime battles.  Soooo, I think that means we got this phase down.  Check.

Next up, getting Rowan in a BIG bed so we can convert the toddler bed back to a crib for Cid.

Big Boy Bed Days 4 and 5....

Day 4:

Very similar to Day 3, except that Rowan woke up about 8...yes, EIGHT! times in the middle of the night.  A couple of the times he was just crying in his bed.  All times, he easily went back to sleep.  We were in somewhat of a delirious stupor after a long day and waking up so much, so we muddled through it without remembering much.

{on a side note, Cid slept for 9 hrs straight again!...now if they could just both do that at the same time...}

Day 5:

Okay....here's where it turned into more of what we thought we'd be in for.

Around 7:30pm we did the nighttime routine as usual with a bedtime story
5 minutes later, guess who was up.  Roger took him back to bed.
1 minute later, again

and again...

and again...

and again...
and again...
   Then the game started.  The one where he peeks out, runs squealing back towards his bed as Mom or Dad come down the hall, waits for us at the edge of the bed, and turns towards us grinning ear to ear.
This happened over...
and over...
and over...
and over..
   For about an hour and a half, and until his funny tricks were wearing us out. Each time we calmly and firmly put him back, but let's face it, the calmly part was diminishing with each subsequent round.

Meanwhile, Cid was demanding his share of attention, AND we were trying to get some things in order so that the next morning wasn't as crazy as this one was getting everyone out the door in time.

With an end to the game nowhere in sight we resorted to putting a childproof doorknob cover on Rowan's bedroom door to put a stop to it.  I was severely against having one of these on the door from the beginning, but with patience wearing thin, I couldn't come up with anything better.

When Rowan realized that he couldn't open his door, all Hell broke loose.  The screams and banging started.  We gave him 5 minutes and waited for a pause in the tantrum to go back in and remind him that it's bed time and he has to go to sleep in his bed, tucking him in, and closing the door behind us.

Not more than two minutes later, he was at it again.  We gave him another 5 mins. before walked him back to his bed again, tucked him in, said goodnight and closed the door.

Not another peep.

I did demand that we remove the childproof doorknob before we went to bed.  I feel like he should be able o get out if he has to.

At 2:15 am he started this again, but it only took a couple times before he went back to sleep.

Then at 6am he woke up.

I must've jinxed us when I said this was working out great...but we're gonna stick it out for a while.  I'm having a little guilt over pushing him too early.  I have a feeling, though, that we'd face this getting up problem no matter what age he takes to the toddler bed.

HAPPY FRIDAY!!

Happy 4th of July!

This day always reminds me of The Sandlot...hehe. I LOVE 4th of July picnics and I also love the fireworks.  But this year, we're mostly skipping that stuff.  We did go to a picnic last Saturday, for which I baked and apple pie {I never got to try it though, since we had to leave early 'cos Rowan's molars were bothering him} and today, we hit up Ikea to check out toddler beds, and we'll have a small picnic in the park.  No fireworks this year, because we can't leave Domino at home alone with the works going on and we never made any other arrangements.

How are you spending your Independence Day?

We didn't come back from Ikea with a bed because our car was too small to fit everything.  But I think we decided to go ahead and get the Kura. Some friends of ours use this, so I've had it in mind, and Rowan had a blast testing it out today. 

Rowan's first day/night in the converted crib went uh-MAZING!  It was pretty unbelievable, so we were...and still are...somewhat skeptical.

However, so far so good.  Except one weird thing....in the morning after his first night, Rowan DEMANDED a bottle.  Not a sippy cup, not a cup with a straw, a BOTTLE.  Before Cid was born, he hadn't had a bottle in a few months.  When he first saw Cid drinking from a bottle, he wanted one too, but we gave him a slow nipple.  It took him for-ever to get his milk and he never asked for one again...until now.  I gave it to him because I thought he might be searching for something familiar in the midst of this bed change-a-roo.

Day 2:

-Rowan spent the day at day care, so we didn't get any nap "test runs"
-Nighttime - We followed the usual bedtime routine, except that we re-introduced a bedtime story.  Never heard a peep until 7:15am!{woot woot!}

Seriously too good to be true.

Day 3:

-Again, naps at day care.
-Nighttime - Usual bedtime routine, but Rowan insisted on reading the bedtime story twice.
-About 5 minutes later, I hear his door open.  Went to check it out and Rowan was hurrying back to his bed....hehe.  I tucked him back in and closed the door.
 -Less than 2 minutes, and I hear his door again.  Again, he hurries back to bed.  I tuck him in and close the door.
-I just walked into the living room, peeked out to see the fantastic job Roger was doing mowing the lawn, and before I knew it, Rowan was in the living room rocking Cid in the bassinet.  I lead Rowan back to his bed, but he sat up and signed for milk so I told him I would get him some milk but he had to stay in his bed.  Took me a minute to find a sippy cup and when I turned around, Rowan was coming down the hall.  I got his milk and took him back to bed.  I told him when he was done with his milk he could put it in the corner of his crib and showed him where.  {keep in mind, I have NO idea how much of this Rowan understands.  He seems to get a lot of it though}.
-A couple minutes later, I hear his door open AGAIN {starting to wonder how long this will take...}. Rowan hands me his sippy cup and then heads back to bed, so I go to tuck him in, but he signs that he wants more {is he playing me?} so I told him I would get him more milk but he had to stay here in his bed.  I fully expected him to get up like last time, but he stayed in his bed until I got back with more milk. I gave him his milk, asked him to lay down.
-Cid had a really fussy night and even though he's still in our room, the noise woke Rowan up around 2:30am.  But Rowan went back to sleep fine.
- He woke up one more time last night and had to be brought back to bed.
- Then he finally woke up for good at 6:30am

Day 3 was definitely more what I expected this process to be like.  But it still went reasonable well and after today's practice in Ikea, I'm confident that Rowan will be happy to sleep in the real bed when we get it.

Right now, we're struggling a little with the dilemma of needing to have two babies in one room.

We were kinda hoping that Rowan, {now 18 mos} would be ready to move out of his crib in time for Cid {now 3 mos} to take it over.  But at this point, we've barely even thought about how to handle the sleeping situation and Cid is such a big guy that he's already pretty much breached the limits of the bassinet in our room.  Whether or not any of us are ready, we need to find a solution, pronto!

Just a couple nights ago, Roger and I both agreed that Rowan wasn't quite ready to make the switch to a "Big Boy Bed". We conceded that we would have to suck it up and buy another crib for Cid.  Then Rowan did something that made me think maybe, just maybe, he was ready to upgrade.

He's been having a few rough days/nights of molar pain {poor guy, this is the worst!} and I got up with him in the wee hours one morning to snuggle on the couch.  He laid on the couch with me for a while, then grabbed his blankie, got down, and started off towards his room, motioning me to come with him.  He wanted to go back in his bed.

He's led us to his bed before when he was tired, but I just felt like this was different.  I kind of figured that going to his bed was just the routine that he knew he was supposed to follow.  This time he had been given the opportunity to stay up and do whatever he wanted and what he chose was to go back to bed. I thought, if he would rather be in bed than be up and about, maybe he can handle a bed that doesn't contain him.  

It occurred to me that Rowan's crib converts into a toddler bed and I thought it should be a pretty quick job to take the front panel off and put the two side rails up, so Sunday morning I impulsively began to disassemble.

Rowan is kind of young to be explaining to him the whole "Big Boy Bed" concept, but he was actually very excited about the taking apart of his crib.  He was eager to "help", climb on the crib frame, and jump on the mattress.  He handed me the pieces {that I didn't need quite yet} and "tightened" some of the screws for me.  I thought the assembly would be a lot easier than it was.  I think the mistake I made was reading the directions, which would probably have been better English if they had used Google Translate to create. Plus, the pictures were all wrong!  But after a little sweat and common sense, we had our toddler bed. The very last step was to put the storage drawer back underneath.  Roger and I were struggling a little with this, but before we knew it, Rowan came to our rescue and held up the center while we found the rails on both sides.  And yes, this was actually a big help! Did I mention that sometimes he blows our minds?! Even though it wasn't intentional, I'm glad Rowan got to see and be a part of the conversion because that way, he saw that this was still his bed, just a better version of it! 

Once the conversion was finally complete, I said a little prayer that I wasn't going to have to change the whole thing back right away ;)

Here's the breakdown of Big Boy Bed Day 1:

- Converted the crib to toddler bed with Rowan's help
- 1:00pm Rowan seems a bit sleepy so we start his nap routine and put him in bed.  30 seconds later, we hear his door open and see him peaking out at us.  We didn't force him back in bed because it was still early for his nap and Opa was visiting....not really fair.
- 2:00pm Rowan is pretty tired so we try again.  A couple minutes later, we hear him turning the doorknob so Roger coaxed him back to bed.  He slept there until 3:30pm, when he fell out of the bed onto the {carpeted} floor :(
- Nighttime - Normal routine. He goes right to bed around 7:30pm.  We wake up at 6:30am to someone trying to open his bedroom door ;)

So Day 1 went pretty dang well!  I'd rather wake up to Rowan turning the doorknob than to him crying, which is the usual sitch.

Plus I LOVE that I can give him a kiss when I check on him at night {I couldn't reach with the crib}.

Not sure if this will last, or if he'll suddenly feel like he misses the comfort of the crib confines.

I still think we may have to buy Cid a crib so that Rowan can adjust to his converted crib for a while before he gets a real bed, but I'm thrilled that Rowan took to the conversion so well.

I'll keep you all posted on the steps we take to get the two boys in the same room.