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Monday, August 27, 2012

She’s Gone and Done It Again

It seems to be that when it comes to making transitions, I work myself up for them far more than is necessary. I was as nervous as can be when it came to transitioning Evalyn from only child to big sister. And we all know that those worries were in vain.

Of course, I had many similar worries when it came to moving Evalyn to a new house, a new room, and (gasp) a new bed. I went back and forth in the weeks before moving over whether or not we should keep Evalyn in the crib in the new house or attempt to switch to her big girl bed right away. I feared throwing too much at her at once – new baby, new house, new bed. But, I also new it may be counter productive to move to the new house and put her into the crib here – knowing it wouldn’t be long until Gwen needed the crib.

Eventually, we decided to set up the nursery with the crib and furniture as “Gwen’s room” and set up Evalyn’s big girl bed with her new bed and new furniture. We decided we’d put her in the crib when we moved and hope that she would choose on her own to move to her new, big room. Then, just a week or more before we moved I started to question this. We had been talking about the move so much. She knew which house in the new house was her “big girl room” and we talked about her big bed all the time. She would even tell you that the crib was Gwennie’s and Gwennie was sharing it with Eva.

Because it seemed she had a pretty good grasp on what was going to go down, we decided to attempt the switch cold turkey. Again, at first I said that if it didn’t go well, I’d just pop her back into the crib. Then when we went to set the crib up, I told them to set it up on the highest setting – so clearly, it would not be Eva’s anymore. After that, I switched my plan to being that if it didn’t work out in the bed, I would put the play pen up in her room and she would have the choice between her bed and the playpen. I figured it wouldn’t be long until she’d choose bed because she has never been a huge fan of the playpen.

I also decided I would keep the door to Gwen’s room closed for the first few weeks, until Evalyn got used to things. I thought that Evalyn has never seen the crib at the new house, so why would she think it should be there? I figured if she saw it, there was more likelihood that she would decide it was hers. The plan to keep the nursery door shut lasted about 5 seconds after we got into the house. So that plan was shot.

But, to be completely honest, all of these ideas and plans and what-ifs? None of them were necessary.

We brought the girls here on Sunday afternoon, after the weekend had been spent moving in and organizing necessities. She immediately ran into her room, told everyone it was her Big Girl room and said, “Oh yook. Ders my big girl bed”.

That night when bedtime rolled around, we wondered what would happen. And guess what happened? She laid down and went to sleep. Just like that.

The next day when nap time rolled around I knew that’s when it would come crashing down. Surely nap would be way more difficult. But, again? Guess what happened? I had to pop my head in twice to tell her to get back in but, but she was asleep within 10 minutes of first being put to bed.

She has fallen out of bed a few times, but it has never hurt her or really bothered her, in fact, the first time she fell out was 3 hours after going in the first night and she didn’t even wake up. The first day when we set up her bed, I realized I bought the wrong bed rails, so we have just made a nice little cushion of blankets all around the floor on her bed and, in fact, sometimes she has gotten herself out of the bed and laid down to fall asleep on the floor. I exchanged the rails for the kind we wanted but by then, she had stopped falling out so we have yet to even put them on and she seems fine.

The first few days she was waking up 15-45 minutes earlier than normal in the morning and the same thing was happening with naps. Most of these times, I just made her stay in her room quietly until night night time was all done. Within four or five days, she was back to normal and has actually been sleeping later in the morning most days.

And that is honestly all that there’s been to it. Her transition to the big girl bed has been seamless. She has never once said the crib was hers or shown any interest in going back in it. Some days/nights we do have to remind her she needs to stay in bed, and we’ve had a few episodes where the dresser has been empties or diapers have been strewn across the room - but other than that? It’s been great.

She’s gone and done it again.

When will I learn that all my worrying about these things is completely unnecessary?

8 comments:

Lynsey said...

This gives me hope for when we do finally decide to transition Mason. He is such a wild sleeper that I'm delaying it as long as possible! Good job E!!!

{annie_loo} @ The Farrar Four said...

We mommys are worry warts by nature! It's ok!

So proud of E and her new big girl bed! I keep telling myself we'll wait till the new house to put E in his new bed too...but we've got about 6 more months to go. Lets hope he likes his crib that much longer! ;)

Jaclyn_Rose said...

Just like Finn. I worried so much about moving him to a big bed and getting rid of the soother... I had played out hundreds of scenarios in my head and he just went and did both without any problems (although the getting out if bed hit a snag around a month later... But just be consistent and persistent and you'll get through it)

Jen + Jeff said...

I wonder sometimes if I didn't worry would the world stop?!? Sometimes worrying is the only thing to get me through a transition. I like to think of it as being extra prepared. ;)

Crystal Seed said...

That's exactly how Chloe was with her transition to her big girl bed! She's loved it and has been an absolute dream!!

Meagan said...

I was just wondering about this today. I'm so nervous that Chase will start climbing out of his crib and we will have to transition to big boy bed. Our plan is to do the room next door since the nursery is a weird room and works much better with a crib in it. I'm sure he'll be fine.

Perfectly Imperfect said...

E has always faced every transition head on too and I've been going back and forth on setting up the crib at the new house, or just setting up her big girl bed. This post may have just given me the boost I needed to set up the big girl bed. Gulp. Wish us luck!

Ashley said...

Way to go, Eva!! This gives me hope. In anticipation of the new baby in December, we went ahead and moved our 17 mo old into his big boy bed. We're on night #4, and it's been up and down so far. He did go down easily and sleep through the night without falling out of bed on night #2, so I know this is possible!!