How sweet it is!

Carson has always been a bit of a challenge when it comes to sleeping. For the longest time he would only take two 30 minute naps a day. He would wake up several times a night. We had to walk around the room, bouncing him and singing to him to get him to go to sleep (and it was always easier for Chad). I made excuses for his lack of sleeping...he's hungry, he's gassey, he's teething, then we found out about the milk intolerance so his stomach was upset.... Then I finally just began to accept that he doesn't need much sleep because he was generally pretty happy throughout the day. We had tried before to get him to go to sleep on his own but he would cry and cry and cry really hard for 20 minutes (that is as long as I could stand it). Maybe I just needed to be more consistent with it.

I thought we had a good bed time routine but in Jan. we decided something needed to change! I was so tired of trying to get him to take naps and tired of getting up with him at night. We added a few things to his routine. After his bath we always had him say goodnight to Andrew and us. Then we started reading him the same two books every night, Snuggle Puppy & Goodnight Moon. We had him say good night to this wall hanging in his closet with different animals on it that he seems to really like and then he gets to turn off his light. We hug him and lay him down with his Curious George. And he now goes to sleep on his own. The first couple times were a little rough but after that he has done really well. He even plays in his crib sometimes now...before if he was in his crib he was either asleep or crying. He now sleeps through the night about 50% of the time and takes one afternoon nap anywhere from 1-2 hours. How wonderful!

During the time that we were trying to get him to go to sleep on his own, I would lay Curious George in his bed, give him one of Carson's pacifiers and cover him up with a blanket. Carson and I would tell him good night. I thought maybe this would make him more comfortable with his bed and that it wasn't such a bad place to be. (hey, I was desperate!) So now when he wakes up from a nap and I come to get him, he often will lay George down, give him his pacifier and point at the blanket for me to cover him up.