The Big-Girl Bed

Well, we decided to go for it. With Jiblet due in June, we needed Aubrey out of the crib. And, of course, we wanted to make the transition well before baby boy arrives. After all, we didn't want Aubrey resenting her little brother for stealing her crib, and we had no idea how long it would take to fully transition her. So crazy as it may be, we put our not-yet-two-year-old in a twin-size bed.

Thankfully, she is a fan of all things "big girl" related, so she was very excited about the whole thing before it happened. When her mattress arrived, she jumped and played on it while saying, "My big-girl bed!" (Of course in the video I got, she's eating crackers and refuses to say anything, but hey...)

After all of the separate pieces arrived, we let Aubrey watch the process of putting the bed together. She was very excited. And when I unveiled her sheets and bedspread, she gasped and said, "Hearts! Hearts hearts hearts!" Total win.

There she was, all ready to go. We were hopeful but not delusional; we knew it would be a process. So when she came out of her room less than five minutes later (the stupid door handle was broken, so no problems there), we weren't surprised. Daniel threatened to put her back in the crib (which we left in the room as a safety net), and she said, "Yeah, crib!" This did surprise us, but we decided to acquiesce. 

I don't remember exactly what happened the second night. I think it was something fairly similar. Only we cheated and transferred her from the crib to the bed around 10:30. So then, when she woke up in the big-girl bed the next morning, I praised her for doing such a good job and sleeping in it! She totally bought it, and I think it helped her get over any fears... 'cause she'd already slept in it and been fine, right? See, lying to your kids is totally a good idea. ;)

On the third night, it finally stuck! She cried for us twice, and Daniel had to put her back in bed. But after he put her back the second time, she stayed and fell asleep. Woo!

To aid the whole process (and because our sound-only monitor started crapping out), we bought a cheap video monitor and installed it a few days in. This allowed us to determine some bedtime patterns (and make sure Aubrey wasn't using her new-found freedom to destroy things). 

We discovered that she would pretty much immediately get out of the bed after we left. Case in point:

She mostly spent her time "reading," but there was definitely some toy dumping and wandering around as well. Eventually, she'd climb on the bed--when she was good and ready--like so:

(Creepy that she's totally looking right at the camera, huh? She thinks it's a lamp. Heh.)

Anyway, then she'd lie down on top of the covers and wait to fall asleep. See her open, glowing eyes?

Finally, she'd fall asleep. Isn't she cute? D'awww.

Success! Sure, she played around for awhile instead of sleeping, but she never stayed up too long. And best of all, she slept until 7:00 or so and then played happily in her room until after 8:00. Mommy loves sleeping in. :)

BUT (there's always a "but" with these things), nap time was simply not happening. Which, for Mommy, was simply not okay. I'd try putting her down in the big-girl bed, but she'd be out of it before I even left the room. Attempts to put her back in the bed led to painful (for me) wrestling matches. Lying down with her in the hopes of inspiring her to sleep led to giggles and pacifiers shoved in my face. Leaving her alone to "figure it out" led to, well, this:

So in the end, she kept ending up in her crib for nap time. And one of those times, she was so upset about it that she ended up just crying off and on for an hour anyway--and not napping.

So when we disassembled the crib in a no-turning-back kind of move, nap time got shot to... yeah. It seemed that my only options were to stick Aubrey back in bed every time she got out--which, again, was a wrestling match too intense for this pathetic pregnant chick--or accept that the best I was going to get was quiet time with books in her room. No more nap.

But then, in a last-ditch effort to hold on to nap time, I decided to put Aubrey in bed with some books. "You can read your books," I told her, "but you have to stay in bed." And amazingly, she did. And better yet, she fell asleep in the process! Reading in bed--it makes everyone fall asleep, right? 

So although it's only been two days of successful bed napping, I'm hopeful about the whole thing. She's staying in bed at night (and playing around less and less). She's napping in the afternoon. And in the morning, if she wakes up too early, she can always fall asleep in her chair!

Man, we have the greatest kid.