Bullets of dooooooooom.
July 3, 2010
- Our child care has been on vacation for a bit, so I’ve been staying home with Hank. It’s been loads of fun, but also exhausting (full-time Stay-At-Homers, I salute you).
- I have forgotten that I have my own blog, though I’ve been trying to keep up with yours. One of you is pregnant! One of you is having a birthday today! Many of you are full of advice and commiseration and pity, and I thank you all.
- I need to thank you for your pity because we are doomed. Henry climbed out of his crib yesterday afternoon at approximately 2:30 p.m. Because he didn’t actually take an afternoon nap (too busy flossin’ his climbing skills, apparently) his bedtime would be 6 p.m. That gave me few hours to:
- Wring my hands and wonder WHAT THE FUCK TO DO ABOUT THIS SITUATION
- Do any Internet research, at all. Searches would have included: “16 months toddler bed?” “16 months too young for toddler bed?” “16 MONTHS IS TOOOOOO YOUNG FOR A TODDLER BED!!!!” “value wine tannins headache?”
- Run to Babies R Us and fill the cart with baby proofing supplies
- Determine if any of the gaggle of baby gates we have would work to block off the stairs in the upstairs hallway (we lucked out when Henry was only a few months old and found someone selling 8 (EIGHT!) baby gates on craigslist for $20, of 4 different varieties. I still haven’t figured out how 2 of them work, 1 is pretty beat, but the other 5 have come in handy)
- Disassemble the crib–with an overtired toddler breathing down my neck–and refashion it into a toddler bed
- Locate the bedrail (we used one on our own bed while co-sleeping in the early months) in the towering pyramids of baby shit in our basement (pyramids that are covered in ear wigs, by the way, THANK YOU, BUGGY MIDWEST)
- Cry. Not because my baby is in a big kid’s bed; I’m not very sentimental about such things, and the farther babyhood gets from us the happier I am, frankly. Rather: because we JUST started getting some sleep around here. Henry has been sleeping through the night for only about 2 months, and I just this week (as in, mere days before he climbed out of the crib) got him to actually nap in his crib after 6+ months of having him nap in my lap while nursing. Those few naps he took this week, where I could sit and drink a cup of coffee or do the dishes or just stare at the wall, OH! so lovely! And now…well, his ability to get in an out of bed complicates things. Goodbye, progress, familiarity! Hello, new hurdle!
- So anyway, we rushed out to get some supplies and I rebuilt the crib and…no spoilers. This is an ongoing story. We are in Day 2 of big-kid-bed and it’s way too early to talk strategy (from my end) or predict anything. I will likely write a lengthy post on this in a week or so when I have actually seen how this grand transition really works out.
- That said: Can you please, PLEASE, those of you who have been through this, reflect on it in the comments? I have too many questions to name, so just tell me anything. There are a bunch in my blog circle with kids right around Hank’s age (though they may have a year or more before they actually have to deal with this, depending on the kid) so I’m sure many are just as curious as me.
- Failing that, I need cheap wine recommendations. We have about zero dollars and zero cents to spend on “non-necessities” this summer and I’ve blown my wine budget on baby proofing supplies.
Our son has been in a toddler bed for a few months, now. We didn’t do it until he was over two because he never tried to crawl out. That, said, I think it will be easier for you- we wished we had dome is when he was younger and less headstrong. The first night was comical. Out of bed every twenty seconds for over an hour, then reassembled crib at 10 pm. Two days later I tried again, with new ammo. Baby gate over his door- his room is now his crib. Toys with bells and whistles removed form his reach- he would get out of bed to play. We now have all books out on the hall because he will sit in there and read for hours. Lightbulb removed from ceiling light- he kept flipping on the light. Rigged door so that he cannot lock it- he kept locking bedroom door. Give it 2-3 weeks. Be consistent.
Well, as you know, I have no advice for you, but I am eagerly awaiting advice via comments and for your follow-up post.
As for the wine, I’ve found that Trader Joes makes a knock off BV Coastal called…errr, something “Coastal”. Trader Coastal? I don’t know, but it’s not bad, and it’s like, three or four bucks. Better than Two Buck Chuck, not as good as the array of my beloved seven-dollar wines that I can’t afford right now.
We switched our boy when he was just over 18 months. The first few nights, he didn’t get out of bed and I thought we were golden. Then he started to get up, but we close the door to his bedroom, so he would get up and bang on the door. We put him back to bed a few times, then when it stopped working we let him figure it out and he went back to bed by himself. He cried a bit, but at that point we had learned that he will cry for 5 minutes, then go to sleep, so we let him.
Then a month later he figured out how to open doors and it started all over. For three nights he would get up and come to our bedroom. We had a baby gate to block the stairs. We just put him back to bed a few times and he stopped. Much easier than I feared! But we were lucky, he never got up to play or empty his drawers – or the diaper pail…
You are giving me a bit of a heart attack here. I didn’t even fathom that A was anywhere close to the age of needing a toddler bed until I saw your tweets. A is 15 1/5 months, but she can climb ANYWHERE. I wouldn’t be surprised if she figures out how to get on top of the kitchen table this week. So it is just a matter of time that she figures out how to get out of her crib. Granted, we have her sleeping in a sleep sack still, so it makes it a little more challenging for her. Regardless… note to self: start preparing for this reality. Just when you figure out one challenge….. those little turkeys throw curve balls.
Sheesh. I don’t know what to tell you except that my parents resorted to locking me in my room when I got to Hank’s point and I survived. That and Charles Shaw. Lots and Lots of Charles Shaw.
And when you do figure out a solution, I will be paying attention. With two tiny kids about to share one tiny room in our tiny house, I’m beginning to realize the possibility of disasters previously beyond my imagination. Case in point the recent posting on Shit My Kids ruined where a three-year-old freed her one-year old sister from the confines of a Pack N Play with a pair of scissors. Aye yi yi.
We transitioned Kellen at 15 months, and it’s been great. We set up the toddler bed and put a big bench next to it so that at least he wasn’t falling out. Now he’s in a twin with bed rails. If I could do it over, I would just put him in a twin.
The first night we stayed in his room, silently on the floor. Every time he tried to get out, we just put him right back in and said, “Night night time.” By the third night, he was asleep within 15 minutes. He gets a paci and a stuffed dog, so this helps. He still *rarely* gets out of bed, and usually that’s if we don’t get him on time.
As for nap times, we realized we needed black out curtains. Getting those has been the difference between continued 3 hours naps… and not!
Well, I have no ideas. As far as I’m concerned your kid is SuperToddler and will probably tell you how to get him to nap in another month or so. But if I were facing this problem, I’d probably do what Partial suggested: The Lock-down. Proof his room, give him some sleep options if he gets out of bed (E likes snuggling on a blanket on the floor, for example), and then hope for the best.
Now that E is making the transition to one nap, sometimes he just wants to “rest” in the afternoon. Quiet time is usually enough to keep him from an evening meltdown.
I’m pretty useless as far as advice goes, because Sam is still in his crib and shows no signs of clambering out, even though he scales every other surface, so I guess he just respects the crib? And we transitioned Charlotte to a bed when she was 27 months, at which point she was no longer napping at all, so that wasn’t even part of the equation.
I hope you get some helpful advice from people other than me!
No napping advice from my corner (Lux hasn’t napped since bed transition at 22 months, but she rarely did before). Once I stopped insisting that she stay in her bed during “nap” time, she rarely gets out off bed at night (well, except for three of the past four nights).
In my frantic googling after her tumble out of the crib, I ran across something along the lines of a “crib canopy.” Don’t know if you would want to take a step backwards and assemble the crib again, but Hank might get the day sleep he needs.
I don’t know if this advice is premature — I certainly am not ready yet to use it with my non-climbing toddler — but I had a friend who insisted to her children that they stay in their beds for naptime, but they didn’t have to sleep if they didn’t want to. Staying on the bed was the important part, and generally being restful (reading, for example). And they did frequently nap.
Now that I type that, yeah, that’s probably premature. I mean, Hank does seem to have a lot of language skills, but that might be too subtle a distinction for him.