New Bed Update

Kaine has been sleeping through the night. I completely give credit to the new bed. I knew this would happen but, I was nervous about putting him in such a big bed by himself. I didn't want him to feel out of place or, worse, fall out on his head! I have to say that he only fell out once. He has gotten up a few times. He even took us for an adventure in bedtime play-land. He now goes straight down. Goes to sleep on his own (which he has been good about doing since he was 8 or 9 months old). AND the best part of all, sleeps ALL NIGHT LONG! It is a true miracle. MIRACLE I tell you!

I was hoping and thinking this was going to happen and to my delight, it has! I still have fear that writing in down is going to jinx it. It seemed to last time. After I wrote it on here, it was the worse night of the sleep/play battle! He didn't go to bed until almost 11 pm! That is REALLY late for him! Especially since his bedtime is 8pm! It then fixed it self the next night. He went straight to bed and we, surprisingly, didn't hear another peep from him until morning. He slept until 8:30! It was a great night! Much needed to.

I think I am the only person that has a two year old that has just now started to sleep through the night. Don't get me wrong, there have been nights when he has slept but, never in a row! I always think, when I get up with him, that he would have made a great breast-feeder too. And would probably still be doing it if we would not have had so much trouble and interventions at the beginning. (He was for a while still getting up in the middle of the night for a milk cup. I tried to break him of this habit, but after 2 nights of constant screaming or waking up every hour, I gave in. Especially one night when I went in after him crying for an hour and heard his stomach growling and felt the most horrible guilt in the entire world! I just resolved to take the 5 minutes to give him a cup and hope that one day, he would not need it anymore.)

A new adventure will be starting soon. Potty training. However, I do not plan to do this, probably, for another month or so. I will be reading up on it in the meantime.

Bed Update

Kaine is sleeping better. I have been avoiding using the "sleeping through the night" comment. I am afraid that I will jinx it! I hope writing it doesn't jinx it! I have noticed that he is sleeping better now. This is what I have thought was going to happen.

Here is the downside:

Getting him to go to bed has become the biggest hassle! Sometimes you have to lay with him. Then he slowly drifts away. Sometimes you just have to keep getting up and putting him back in the bed. Tonight, Matt put him down. He even laid with him until he fell asleep. About 30 minutes later, we hear him calling from his room. I go in, he asks for milk. I think all is good. I think another 20-30 minutes goes by and we hear him calling me again. I go in and put him back in bed. I sit on the side of the bed and even turn the night light thing on, sometimes that is all that he needs. I then pretend to fall asleep (this is usually what will get him to go back to bed when he wakes up to early and I put him in bed with me). He gets quieter. I think I was not being patient and thought he was calm enough for me to leave. I tell him goodnight, thinking he is going to stay in bed and go to sleep. I walk away. Two minutes go by and I hear him flick the light on. I go in and pick him up and tell him he needs to lay down and go to sleep. I think I even said, "That is enough!" in a stern, not harsh, voice. I stay outside his room for a minute to make sure he was going to stay in bed. As I write this, it has been about 10 minutes. I think hope he is going to stay in bed this time.

I think, maybe, he has figured out that we stay up past his bedtime now. This is what is making him think he can stay up. Then again, it might just be the fact that he knows he can get out of bed! Plus, there are toys in his room and he can get to them. Not sure. It really isn't that big of a deal. I'm just impatient for it to be settled. I guess I got so used to him laying straight down in the crib and not hearing another peep from him; putting effort into it seems like a hassle! How sad is that? Maybe if he was a more cuddly infant that liked to be rocked to sleep, we would be in a different place. I don't know. Maybe if I was a more cuddly parent we would be in a different place. Of course, we will never know. What is done is done.

I know this will pass too. It has only been a week. I just need to figure out what works and what doesn't. Like everything else when one is parenting! I do so hope the next one sleeps better :).

Bed, Exercise, Party

Kaine fell out of his bed last night. At 2:30 in the morning. Another milestone hit. Matt picked him up and got him to go back to sleep. I got to sleep in until 10. It was heaven.

The only thing missing now is another baby to wake me up 100 times a night and have a 2 year old that still gets up once a night. I think I am coming to terms with that though. Especially if we co-sleep in the beginning like we did with Kaine. I think we will be O-Tay.

I just have to lose the weight now. I can't seem to stick with any sort of diet and want to eat sugar or anything that resembles a cookie and can't seem to pass them up or get them off my mind! I heard once when I was pregnant that sugar cravings are actually a sign that you need more protein. Boiled eggs seem to help, somewhat. Can you really compare boiled eggs to cookies though? No. I need to get serious about this if this baby is ever going to happen though! I have reached what Matt calls parallel when I do squats now. Which is jargon for you are now at a 90 degree parallel to the floor when you are squatting, which is good. I now have to achieve what my son can and does do effortlessly daily, a full squat to get full range of motion. Should be a good warm-up to birth exercises, at least. I just need to do more. That is always the case!

I wish I had someone I could walk with or a safe road to walk on! That would be good. The Gainesville-Hawthorne trail is just a 10 minute drive up the road but, I feel guilty about using the gas. I think I may start running up and down the back steps at nap time, do you think that will work? Hummm...

Anyway...

Kaine's birthday is going to be such fun and is only 6 days away now. We are going to have a small pool, possibly a sprinkler, sand-pool, water balloons, water guns, food a sort of water/sand/boat/workstation toy, pinata, three legged races and lots and lots of fun! I hope the weather is as nice as it was this weekend! Either way, we will figure it out. It rained for like two days straight before his first b-day and it still all worked out! In fact, we came inside to do presents and it let go. It worked perfectly!

Hopefully soon I will be able to post pictures. I have either forgotten how to upload with Picasa or it is just not working! Ughh...I will have to mess around with it some more this week. If I have the time!

New Bed for Kaine

On a whim, I decided to change Kaine's room around. My whim took over his crib! I decided to get him ready for a toddler bed (actually a twin mattress on the floor) because I do not want him to have to get used to a bed and potty training at the same time. I just don't think it is something he would adjust well to.

So, I called Matt into the room, asked him what he thought and within 5 minutes the crib was being taken apart and I was making plans on how to move the room around.  Kaine is standing there not knowing what is going on and starts to protest about the crib being taken apart! OH NO! What do we do now? Matt and his quick thinking says, "Don't you want to sleep in a big bed like Daddy!?" Kaine replies, "Yes!" Problem solved! (Me, I died a little inside, because I had no idea he would react like that!)

Oh crap, now I have to figure out how to get him to sleep in it! I didn't think about that! So, we go about our evening. We play. Watch a little TV. Let Kaine tell us when he is ready for bed (by this I mean, we watch him and see when he is fading. I don't actually wait for him to tell me he wants to go to bed!). He usually has an 8pm bedtime, I just thought it would be better to get him a little more sleepy, for the change in bed. He goes down with no problem, after his tuck in and story. I walk out thinking, "Boy, that was easy! Wish I would have done this months ago!" Five minutes later I hear little hands trying to open the door! I knew this was coming, I calmly walk down the hall, open the door and tell him it is time for bed. He happily says, "Okay!" and climbs back into bed and lets me tuck him in. This goes on 2 more times. On the 3rd time, I find I have been locked out of the room! Opps! Didn't think about that! Ha! Ha! Matt get's into the door (I think he broke the handle but, it still closes). So, we start from square one. He gets up two more times getting books out of the bookshelf we had also just placed in his room. Each time one of us goes in and tells him it is time to go to sleep. He is happy to comply. Before we know it, he is asleep with no yelling or crying or protesting. All of which I expected and was ready to work with. I am so glad he was ready! I so believe that he will sleep so much better on a "real" bed instead of the hard and uninviting crib mattress.

Updates, will follow. Hopefully, it will only get better!