The Big Bed

The big bed, all set up and ready to go!

Last night we moved the little man to his big boy bed. I've been itching to do this for quite a while, but we were waiting on some safety gates to go through approval for funding/ delivery/ etc. Took ages. Very annoying. But the first one arrived yesterday with our EI worker, God bless her. After all that effort though, it turns out that the one I ordered needs to be screwed into the walls - something I didn't realise when I chose it. So we couldn't use it after all. Now I need to seek approval from our landlord to attach it to the walls. I believe that if it is required for disability purposes, they cannot say no, but they may charge us for plastering the holes and repainting the entire wall when we vacate. I really hope they don't, but I guess that's a risk we need to take.

Anyway, back to the subject at hand!!

I set up his big bed with cute new dinosaur linens, and placed two pillows by the edge near him in case he fell out during the night. We couldn't use the new safety gate, so hubby dismantled part of the playpen and wedged it into the doorway so the boy couldn't get out. One of my primary concerns is him waking in the night and roaming the house unsupervised, which is why we need the safety gates. We didn't have this problem when the boy was in his cot, because he was never interested in climbing out if I wasn't there (part of his pattern).

This is what we have upgraded from.

So anyway, I took his blanky and his dummy from the cot and put them in his new bed to help him with the transition. I put the little man into his big bed for sleep. He didn't protest and didn't seem upset. But he did take a loooooooong time to settle. I could hear the doorknob being fiddled with (he hasn't worked out how to open them yet, haha!), and the lights flicking on and off. After some time, things went quiet so I stuck my head in to have a peek. I expected him to have fallen asleep already. He didn't have his afternoon nap, you see, so he should have been exhausted. Instead I find him lying awake in his bed with the light on. Nooo! Mentally kicking myself for disturbing him, I resettled him and left. Eventually - like 3 hours later - he did fall asleep.

Fell asleep in the corner with his blanky and the lights on.

At about 6am, hubby woke me to inform me that the little man was up. My hubby wakes early most mornings and is out the door before we are even up. When he had come out to the kitchen, he found the little man standing at the barrier with the lights on, hissing to himself (he likes to make 'fffffffff' and 'sssssshhhhh' and 'sssssssss' sounds. I call it hissing LOL). We didn't know how long he had been awake for. At this point, I put him back into his cot with his blanky and dummy and closed the door again. I didn't want to resort to that, but with hubby up and about, I seriously doubted he would go back to sleep with the door open and free access around the room.

So I fully expected the little man to be extremely tired and prone to the grumps today, because of his late night and early morning. But so far, he has been more than pleasant! I've just put him down into his big bed for a (hopefully) short nap to help him get through the day, but I have no idea if he will actually sleep or not. This new bed will take some getting used to, but if we want to make this transition, the distinction needs to be as clear and as consistent as possible. So I might have to put up with a tired grumpy boy for a few days while the change settles in. But honestly, he has, so far, handled himself very well. I am so blessed.



xx