Big Girl Bed

Thomas has decided that he wants to keep growing, which means he is quickly outgrowing his bassinet. I wanted to avoid buying a second crib, and although I feel like Eva is still a baby, I decided to try to switch her to a toddler bed.

My great friend found me this adorable toddler bed at a consignment store and we got it for a steal. Eva loved her bed right away. She wanted to play on it all day. Her first night on her bed went amazing. She slept well and stayed in her bed all night. I was pretty sure this was going to be an easy-breezy switch.

Naptime was a little harder. For the first few days we would go through her nap time routine, but as soon as I left the room I would hear her get out of her bed and walk around the room. She would turn the monitor on and off, she would look out her window, she would literally pull of every book from her bookshelf and read to herself. That girl entertained herself for two hours straight! I kept thinking she would pass out, but she never did. After 3 days of this, I started getting scared. I was not ready for her to give up nap time.

I decided to try to intervene. Whenever I heard her get out of her bed I went in and put her back into her bed. I did this over and over again. After a couple days of this, I started to get desperate. I decided maybe Eva wasn't ready for the switch. I decided I would try one more time and if it didn't work, I wasn't going to push her. I would put her back in her crib and put Thomas in the pack n play.

I don't know how it happened, but the next day I was putting her down for her nap, and I told her "Eva, don't get out of your bed. Stay in your bed" She looked at me and smiled. I left the room and waited for her to jump out of bed. Amazingly enough, that never happened! She stayed in her toddler bed and slept! I should have known that I needed to set my expectations, that is one thing you learn right away in teaching. If you want the students to do things correctly, set clear expectations. Eva just needed me to tell her what I expected her to do in her new bed, and she did it. She is such a sweet girl who wants to do the right thing.

Her favorite thing is for me to come in after nap or bed time and ask her "Did you stay in your bed the whole time?" and she will sheepishly tell me yes before running into my arms. I tell her "you did awesome! You did awesome for staying in your bed!" Now before bed time/nap time it's become part of our routine for her to ask "Out?" and I say "No, you do awesome. You stay in bed." And she will smile and laugh and say "awesome!".