Evicted

There has been lots of changes to the sleeping arrangements at our house lately.

Xavier and Wesley are now sharing what was X's room. Things are going ok. We ditched the idea of moving Wes into a twin bed and just put his crib in X's room. He just isn't ready and sleeps so well in the crib. And frankly, we have enough sleep issues on our hands that I'd be stupid to add one more. Unfortunately if you put them in there together to go to sleep though, they just think it's a party, talk talk talk, and take forever to fall asleep. So, we put them in separately. If one person is already asleep the other has no motivation to stay awake and be loud :)

Almost the day he turned 4 (just recently) X moved away from naps. He'll sometimes still take one, but won't go to bed until 10pm then. NOT HAPPENIN! So, we've been skipping the nap most days and he goes to sleep very quickly at 7pm. MUCH BETTER! This is good too because then Wes naps alone in their room and sleeps longer that way.

We broke down and bought a second crib for Elliott. I didn't want to do this, but now I'm happy we did. I got it from a friend for a good deal and as a bonus, it actually matches the dresser in the nursery perfectly. We NEED Elliott out of the pack n play and out of our room. I love him, but I'm with him sooo much and I just need a little distance at night :) Plus I'm hoping that maybe he'll sleep better if he's away from everyone else. I set it up today in the nursery (Wes' former room) and E has been sleeping in it for 1.5 hours. We'll see how long he goes tonight!

When I set up the crib I immediately moved all his clothes into the nursery and took down the pack n play in our room. I'm loving the empty corner! The clutter was really getting to me :)
 
A little update on E's sleeping:
He went weeks (like over 2 months!) doing only 2 hour stretches of sleep at night. It was KILLING me. And it's really not good for his development. People NEED good long restorative sleep. You would think by the 3rd kid I would have this figured out, but NO. I've been reading more sleep books (I like to read a bunch and then take bits and pieces of what I like) and came up with a new plan. I'm not a "need to schedule my baby every 3 seconds" kind of parent. But I was realizing that E needed more of a predictable routine. This is hard when you have 2 other children that have their own need for a different routine. But sleep begets sleep, and he just wasn't doin it! So for about a week now I've been focused.

The idea is sleep is a 24 hour cycle, not just a night time thing. Good daytime naps are key to helping the nights go better. I'm happy to say it's going well. It's not a miracle by any means. He still doesn't sleep all night, or even half the night, but he's doing 3 1/2  or 4 hour stretches which feels like such a HUGE difference than 2 hours at a time. He's also taking longer naps so on the whole he is sleeping more. And I'm working on getting him to self soothe better. Its a lot of work and I won't lie, I'm sooo jealous of friends who's babies this age sleep all night with ease (which feels like everyone but my kid lately). But we are making progress!


Ok, I'm off to bed in my room that DOESN'T have a baby in it for the first time in almost 6 months. Hopefully I'll get to stay in there a couple hours :)

PS -- I have much more to blog about, Christmas, X's 4 year update, etc... but it's probably gonna be awhile before I get my act together and my pics downloaded in an orderly fashion. This is just my life right now.....