Nathan's Big Boy Bed

Last Saturday (March 16th) we converted Nathan's crib into a toddler bed.  I was ready for the transition for many reasons, but first among them was that I wanted to be able to put Nathan to bed again!  My growing belly was preventing me from getting him into his crib after I rocked him to sleep.  And no, he's not sleep trained...don't get me started.  We also wanted him to transition to a "big boy bed" well before baby sister got here so he could see that she was a baby in a crib and he was a big boy in a bed.

We decided to go ahead and get him new bedding as an early birthday present so that there would be a bigger difference between his crib and bed (since effectively only the front of the crib was coming off). That turned out to be a great idea and he loves his new "lion" bedding.  Jimmy picked out a great jungle theme with bold bright colors that isn't too "busy."  Despite the fact that it has a monkey on it, I really love it and it is of good, soft quality.

After we got the bed made up he hopped right on and was excited to have pillows (even though he doesn't sleep with them at night yet). Joule also jumped the gate to his room and joined in the assembly fun.  She eventually ended up under the bed and Nathan decided he needed to investigate.

Now with a big boy bed we have a slightly new bedtime routine (or at least, we are working on one). Instead of reading and rocking to fall asleep, after we put on Nathan's pajamas he picks out a book and climbs in bed.  Then we (attempt to) read the book while he lays down.  At this point he wants to hold the book and turn the pages, which is difficult to do while laying down, so he ends up squirming and rolling around instead of laying still.  He also thinks it is a game to stand up and get us to lay him back down and sings songs at the top of his lungs while laying down to keep himself awake.  Typical toddler and I'm still trying to figure out how to get around some of these behaviors.

The first night we didn't put a guard rail up on his bed because one of the pieces to the one we bought was defective (of course). He only rolled out 3 times but stayed asleep on the floor without waking up.  We had put pillows down to soften his fall in case he did fall out, so of course he didn't get hurt.  The falling out seemed to bother Jimmy way more than Nathan and he went into Nathan's room to put him back in bed twice.  The third time he rolled out I woke up and noticed but Jimmy didn't, so I left him asleep on the floor until he eventually rolled out of view of the video monitor (several hours). Since that first night we've had a mix of nights where he sleeps all night long and nights where he wakes up once or twice.  The nice change is that instead of sitting in bed crying he gets out, opens his door and quietly stands at the gate until we come.  He might call for us, but most often he just shakes the gate and that is what actually wakes us up.

I'm considering the first week in a big boy bed a success.  Eventually he'll learn to calm down quicker when he gets in bed and we won't have a 30 minute bounce and wiggle-fest. Until that day.....