Before I moved Alanna into her twin bed a few weeks ago, she was taking 2-3 hour naps no problem. Then when I moved her, her naps started to get shorter. She was only taking a 45 minute to 1 hour nap usually. I was so frustrated by this because it leaves me with less time to get my "daily to-do list" done. I hate letting my babies cry for longer than 1.5 seconds but I also felt she should be sleeping more. I tried letting her cry it out for 15-30 minutes with me going in every 5 minutes and sweetly telling her to go back to sleep. But even after two weeks of that, she still never went back to sleep once she woke up. I was frustrated and when I get frustrated I always remember what my oldest sister (and one of my greatest friends) told me one time.
"If you are frustrated with your child then you need to change something. Either your expectations are too high and you need to lower them, or they are to low and you need to raise them."
So I started thinking about that one day and wondering..."Am I being unrealistic that she should sleep 2-3 hours? Does she need that much sleep? Could she really not be tired even though she is not even 2 years old yet? Am I crazy to want to have time to get things done from 2-4PM every day? Do I need to lower my expectations of her?
After pondering on all these things I decided to talk to my sister about it and see what she though. My sister has 8 kids so I value her opinion a lot. She's had a few more years and kids on me to try out different approaches on things. After talking with her about the situation and thinking about how Alanna sleeps 11-13 hours straight through the night, maybe 45 minutes to an hour really was all the sleep she needed. However, my sister told me I was not crazy to want her in her room from 2-4PM whether she was sleeping or not, so she suggested that I try letting her have a quiet time before her nap on her bed with a cup of milk and some things to read or play with. Then when her quiet time was over, lay her down for a nap. This would still allow me to have 2 hours of time during the afternoon to get my things done.
So yesterday I decided to try it out for the first time and see how she would do. I was going to try quiet time for an hour but it seemed like a really long time to start with for such a little one so I decided on 30 minutes. She got a cup of chocolate milk and I gave her some books and puzzles and explained to her what was going on. She was perfectly happy for 25 minutes until Liam came running out of his room from his quiet time because he needed to tell me that he wanted a pencil sharpened. He had been getting into Ruy's desk when he wasn't supposed to so I had to get him all settled back into quiet time. Once she heard me talking to Liam she started crying. I figured it had been so close to 30 minutes and she had done so well I'd go ahead and put her down for a nap. I praised her for how well she had done and then cleaned up her bed and rocked her. She fell asleep to me rocking and singing to her and then napped for 1 hour & 40 minutes! It was a great first day of quiet time & napping.
Today I did the same routine with her...cup of milk, books and some toys. However, she was much less thrilled about the idea today. She up until today has not been able to climb out of her twin bed on her own but I was sitting at my computer paying bills when I heard the tap tap tap of cute little feet behind me. I turned around to see her standing there holding her blankie and smiling at me so sweetly. It's hard to get upset with that sweet face looking up at you like that :) But I took her back to her room and told her she had to stay on her bed for a little while longer. And that's how the rest of her quiet time went...her climbing out of her bed every few minutes and me sitting her back down on it. After 30 minutes I cleaned up her stuff and put her to bed. She slept for 1.5 hours today. So even though she had a hard time with quiet time today, she still slept very well. I'm not sure if the milk and just having time alone in her room is relaxing to her and helps her sleep but whatever it is...I hope it continues :) Her getting out of bed over and over today was not the most fun thing but within a week or two of consistently putting her back on her bed, I believe she will learn and obey.
I think her learning to have a quiet time before Jude gets here is really important as well. She is SO active and all over the place and hates sitting still for the most part, so I think it will be good for her to learn to be calm and stay in one place. I've also been working with her on sitting at the table and playing with puzzles, reading books, playing play-doh, or coloring while I cook or do school with the boys. I want her plenty used to these changes before Jude gets here so that life is just a little less crazy....Yes life with an 8 year old,4 year old , almost 2 year old & a newborn will probably be a little bit crazy at times! But I'm so super excited about it and can't wait to add another little one to our family.
Anyways...that's all I have for tonight.
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