Wednesday 21 March 2007

everyone else is doing it


Everyone I spoke to said that their child stayed in their bed for the entire night when they made the move from the cot. Everyone. So you can imagine my surprise and dismay when our son spent most of his first night out of the Big Boy Bed, putting up a fight every time we tried to return him to it. He settled in just fine but a couple of hours later, we heard a little thud and the pitter patter of toddler feet as they scampered down the hallway to our room several times until 1:30 in the morning. While this wasn't really a big deal because we decided to start this new sleep regime on a Friday (so the lack of sleep wasn't as much of a problem), it did mean a lot of getting up and down, which isn't exactly my forte these days. Thankfully, I have a marvellous husband who did the up and down bit for me. In exchange, he got a lie in. It all balances out, you see.

Jack's nighttime visits scare the life out of me. Until we get used to this, there is something incredibly alarming about being half awake in the middle of the night and seeing something standing at the end of the bed, staring at you and breathing heavily. On night two, he settled quickly and stayed in bed all night - hurrah! On night three, he took most of the evening to settle but did manage to stay in bed until the morning. At one point, I heard him get out of bed on the monitor so I made my way up the stairs. As I reached the top, all I could see was a little fuzzy-haired blur run past me from the office back to his bedroom. Like I wouldn't notice.

In general, he's been pretty good at staying in bed but he's been waking up at silly o'clock in the morning. Yesterday, he staggered out of his room in the wee hours and flopped down on the extra pillow I had next to my side of the bed, at which point Paul promptly returned him to his room. Must remember to look down before I step out of bed in future. I have to admit, I almost burst into tears when I first saw him snuggled up under the duvet in his Big Boy Bed for the first time. He just looked so grown up.

Then again, now I can look forward to those teenage years when our kids will stay in bed until noon on weekends and we can rediscover the concept of sleeping in and lazy mornings. Mmmm.

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