Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Happy birthday sweet Declan!

Yes, our little big boy turned 4 today. We had a low-key, but good day. Declan was in fairly good spirits as far as he goes. I think I only had to threaten a swat twice. Pretty decent!! All he could express he wanted was cake, so he had cake for supper. Oh, and ice cream. Well balanced, I'd say!

And I'm just documenting here...it's been 2 nights in a row that we haven't given Avery melatonin before bed. So far, so good...

Thursday, January 12, 2012

Apparently, it's broke.

You know how I said earlier we like the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" rule? Well it appears to have broken sometime this week. Last night we had Avery AND Declan in our bed - Avery complaining of acute tummy pain and Declan following her to our room from his bed where they had been sleeping. Then not 30 minutes later Caden came down and had to secure a spot on our bedroom floor. So when James left for work I had the 3 big kids in our room. And of course they were sleeping soundly when it was time to get up and get ready for school.

I'm thinking we need to go in reverse. I'm thinking the big kids need to be back in cribs.

Wednesday, January 04, 2012

Sleeping arrangements...

We have always adhered to the rule: "If it isn't broke, don't fix it." This has been especially true in terms of where our children sleep.

Caden is sort of our wild card because he has stayed so much younger than most children due to his special needs. Caden was in a modified crib/gate crib (yes we rigged something straight into the walls around a mattress on the floor, looked horrid but it worked!) until he was almost 8 if memory serves me correctly. He had been sharing a room with Declan (who was also in a crib) so we needed to keep them separated. When Caden moved upstairs into his new bedroom he went into a twin bed and has done amazing.

Take Avery. She was still in a crib until she was over 4 years old. No, there's nothing about her that "warrants" that but she was sharing a room with Caden at the time and they were both in cribs so it worked. They were sleeping, we were sleeping. It was bliss. She went straight to a full bed and has done amazing.

Then there's Declan. You may have heard me talk about him before (LOL). Declan so far was our earliest to move out of a crib at just a few months over 3 years old, but sleeping has always been a bit of a power struggle for him. Avery and Declan really enjoy sleeping in the same bed, so we have allowed that on weekends. When Avery was off school for Christmas break we allowed it every night and guess who cannot change out of that mode? We have found Declan sleeping outside our bedroom door for the past 2 nights now. For what it's worth, right outside our bedroom door is concrete flooring. He's either desperate or quite ridiculous, but I am not allowed to be the judge and jury on that one.

So I talked with James about it (and a good friend, thanks Val!) and we agreed - why do we have to conform to what "everyone" says about where/how kids should sleep? Why can't we continue to do what we have been doing which is listen to what our kids want/need and adapt to fit our family's life? So it's a school night tonight and Declan is tucked cozily into Avery's bed. They're both sleeping and were out very quickly. They KNOW the rule is: you horse around, the sleepover ends. And they are very good about it! We plan to keep this going as long as they both want to do it. I PRAY that Declan's ready to quit before Avery is. Otherwise, does anyone have an air mattress he can lug about the house after midnight??

Sunday, January 01, 2012

Theater success

So the last thing I wrote was not exactly upbeat (but thank you again for the support). In my praying I have decided that I need to view Caden in new and different ways. I need to assume he'll rise to the occasion and not just assume things won't go well.

I put myself to the test Thursday night. I wanted to do the typical "fun mom" stuff with my 3 oldest kids. I decided I was going to take them (on my own) to the new Chipmunks movie in the theater. Two of them had never been to the theater, and the one who had been didn't like the movie she saw several years prior. I did the whole thing up, popcorn, drinks, yep. We got into our row and I was helping everyone get their seats down and get seated (those seats do not stay down when you weigh less than 50 pounds apparently) and sir Caden dropped his entire thing of popcorn to the ground. I shared some of mine with him - crisis #1 averted. We were all settled in...they didn't understand that the previews WEREN'T the movie and spent a great deal of time asking me WHY I'd taken them to THIS and WHERE was Alvin the Chipmunk? The movie started and all.3.kids.did.amazing. Caden stayed seated. Caden laughed at completely appropriate times (actually he cracked up rather hilariously at a few places and made the guy next to us chuckle more - Caden loves parts where people get hurt. Methinks The Three Stooges should be next?). Caden used a whisper voice to ask questions. Caden noticed character's emotions on the screen and asked me about them. CADEN DID AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was just so fun to do something with my "big kids" and to really, really enjoy it. I wish we could go every week!!