Big Boy Bed

Another big transition for Finn was implemented last night. To make lodging at my parents' house over the Christmas holiday easier, we decided to move Finn out of his crib now, even though the new baby won't be using it for a good 5 months or so. Two weeks ago, we bought a twin-sized mattress and box spring and had it delivered last week. Anticipating some sleepless nights, we decided to wait for this long weekend to make the leap so we wouldn't have to go to work incredibly sleep deprived.

Operation Big Boy Bed was initiated last night, at around 6 pm. We all marched upstairs to struggle with furniture rearrangement and bed-making. Finn's bedroom is tiny, so there was no way to have the bed and crib in there at the same time to ease the transition. The crib was moved out - in pieces (disassembling it was remarkably easy, but we will definitely need to dig out those instructions before reassembling it!). Also to go was Finn's "rocking chair" (the IKEA Poang chair that has been standing in as our all purpose bedtime story and middle of the night rocking-to-sleep venue), and the stereo system that has been hiding in his closet unused. Without the chair and the tall crib, the room definitely looks bigger and FAR less like a nursery. Which of course gives me lots of little "oh my god, my baby is growing up!" pangs.

We set up the bed (minus the frame to make it a little lower to the ground), and struggled with the necessary but evil bed rail. I put the sports themed sheets on the bed that Finn picked out himself, including his very first pillow. Macy (our cat) set up shop immediately, and made herself right at home.

After all the excitement, we gave Finn a bath to calm him down. Then it was time to attempt our bedtime routine in the new environment. Finn did OK until it was time to turn off his light and sing our bedtime song. Normally he drapes himself on one of us in the rocking chair for this part - not such an easy task in a bed where I was trying not to lie down myself. There was much moving around to get comfortable, and some tears from Finn. More tears, many more tears, came when it was time for me to say goodnight. I tried calming him down, but he kept crying and trying to stand up in the bed. Eventually, I just left and shut the door, hovering outside to monitor whether or not he got out of the bed. Luckily, he seemed to think that he could not get out of the bed himself, and after about 2 minutes of intense crying, all was quiet in his room. We peeked in about an hour later, and found him lying on his blankie near the foot of his bed (essentially outside the range of the bed rail and in serious "fall off the bed" territory). Not under the covers, not lying on the pillow. Oh well, one thing at a time, right?

We moved Finn a little more in range of the bed rail and put up a gate outside his bedroom door just to make sure he couldn't wake up and wander the house at midnight. He didn't stir until about 5:30 am! I went and laid down with him, got him back to sleep, and he managed to sleep until 7:00 am. Overall, a very good first night with the bed. I am not so hopeful that our first nap will go as well today, but I'm grateful that M. and I are not walking zombies as we prepare our Thanksgiving Feast today. Hopefully tonight will go as well, as we will need our strength to tackle Black Friday shopping.

We of course forgot to take "before" pictures, but here are a couple of shots of Finn's new big boy room:







Bonus pic - a Happy Thanksgiving picture of our adorable but not-so-politically-correct toddler: