This weekend we turned Claire's crib into a big girl bed. This was a long time coming. The little monkey climbed out of her crib at Nana & Pop's when she was 13 mo old. Luckily, that was a one off thing for quite a while. Not so luckily, I repeatedly let both girls play in Claire's crib and Claire was witness to K climbing in and out of the crib too many times to count. She took careful notes and started consistently doing it whenever she didn't feel like sleeping starting about 2 months ago (19mo old). For a while we didn't have a child lock on the inside of her door handle so I would often be out in the kitchen and have her walk up to me after naps with a quiet, matter of fact "Hi Momma." Then about a month ago she started waking up between 5 and 6 every morning and literally BOLTING out of the thing the second her eyes opened and would wander around her room crying (we had since put the locks on so no more solo forays into the house). And then about 2 weeks ago she started her midnight jaunts, climbing out randomly in the middle of the night and going in her closet and putting on her shoes, or climbing in her rocking chair and crying to "rock a bit." It's just been a lovely, lovely few months.
After the first midnight rodeo, I panicked and we converted her crib to a toddler bed on our anniversary (April 17) before church. That was a fun little project, especially because I did it wrong the first time and Scott had to redo it for me. And then we came home and nap was a disaster so I broke the news to him...I had changed my mind and he needed to convert it back to a crib. I think my anniversary present was him not murdering me on the spot.
Since then I've researched crib tents (too expensive and likely to break with the monkey we have on our hands), sedatives (frowned up) and duct tape (even more frowned upon). And so after another 11pm-3am trampoline hour on Mother's Day Eve, we decided to make the switch for good yesterday. Last night went well after her usual demands of "different blankie," "drink," "pee-yo" and "book" were met. Johanna said nap time went well today too. We still have the aerobed on the floor in her room (we put that down in hopes of when it was still a crib, that she would climb out and sleep on that. never happened), and so K got to take a nap in there with her today which is sweet. Scott said tonight that she requested sissy be in there again with her, but she finally went down after a few rounds. As you can see, she requires a lot of items in bed with her. I can't believe this milestone is already here!
