The Hillian Collection

It's only 10:15, and. Sammy's fallen asleep half way along our walk. I guess this means I won't have a relaxing naptime today. Sweet thing.

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Sammy used to take the best, most glorious three-hour naps that have even been had by a sweet.little.angel.baby on this earth. But when we started nap training--earlier, even--he, for some reason would consistently wake after an hour or so into his nap, and sometimes, he could be lulled back into sleep but sometimes not. Sigh. It really cuts into my productivity to have to stop what I'm doing to go in and soothe him back to sleep every single nap. And yes, we tried letting him try to soothe himself back to sleep (we're talking giving him hours to soothe cry himself back to sleep extreme wakefulness); it was unsuccessful.

So we hoped that by going to him as soon as he wakes mid-nap for the past week, while he's not fully aware of everything yet, and trying to soothe him with our hand over his tummy, we could get him used to sleeping through three full hours again. And today he did it. Hallelujah! Let's hope this becomes a consistent habit again by the time little Seanson comes. That would be glorious, indeed.

Here's Sean going in to rescue Sammy today. Sweet snuggly little thing.

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It's kind of hard to tell, but he's got two in one hand, one in another and one in his mouth. There's another two floating somewhere in the crib. Oh man, this kid makes me laugh.

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It took about 45 minutes until he finally laid his head down tonight, but only because he propped himself in a sitting position for the longest time (think 30 minutes), with his little head nodding off and snapping back up. There was hardly any crying once the door was closed on him, but he was very, very sad during Sean's entire reading/singing/lights-out routine. All in all, I'd say this has been a delightfully successful endeavor. Now I'm off to read as many chapters of The Count of Monte Cristo as my eyes will allow me tonight. Sleep tight, little Sammy.

(You'll notice I moved the monitor today to a more effective vantage point.)

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because Sammy fell asleep on his own tonight for the first time in his 16.5 months of life. Not in my arms. Not in his carseat. Not in his stroller. But in his crib, with lights out and door closed.

I have been giving Sean excuse after excuse for the past two months as to why he needed to let me no-cry sleep train Sammy gradually; but I never could suffer letting him fuss when I put him down sleepy-not-asleep, so my methods were nearly completely ineffective. Especially after letting him co-sleep with us when he got sick in Disney World, we took quite a few large steps backward in any progress we had made since early August when our co-sleeping ended. Since then, it would take me as long as an hour to rock him to sleep at night as well as him some nights waking every.single.hour until I zombie-like carried him into bed with us for the rest if the night (most nights were not this bad, but we knew we couldn't allow this with a new baby coming soon).

Tonight, Sean told me it was time. Mommy was not putting Sammy to bed. Sean read to him. Sung to him. Said goodnight. And closed the door. Screaming ensued. Oh yes, screaming ensued. For a good 20 minutes Sammy was crying and screaming harder than I've ever heard before, moving desperately from one side of the crib to the other. I fully expected this to last for a couple hours at least, and I'll admit that I was quite a mess in the other room, watching him on the baby monitor. But it only lasted for those 20 (terrible) minutes. He started standing in one corner off the crib for about 10 minutes. Then he lowered his little body and went to sleep. 30 minutes! That's all. We truly are grateful to our Heavenly Father who grants us even the blessing of a self-soothing toddler despite our neglect to even ask him for such a blessing.

(Sammy's head is in the center of the screen, peaking out over the crib railing.)

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If Sammy didn't take good naps, I'm not quite sure what I'd do. You'd probably know a very different Megan.

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We've been cosleeping with Sammy since day one, and I've loved it. However, the head of our household is ready for his bed back, so it's bye-bye Sammy. So now he's got his very own jail crib for his naptime and nighttime adventures. Okay, okay, he's still in the bed with me at night. I'm not ready to let go.

We also inherited the high chair that my aunt, uncle, mother, cousin, all my siblings and I used when we were young. It dates back to the late 40s. Let me tell you: they made some quality furniture back then. The only alteration we made was to put a car booster seat underneath so that Sammy could use the tray more easily. Sammy seems to enjoy it, or maybe it's just playing with the food that he finds so intriguing.

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I know most of you moms reading this may think, "What's the big deal? Babies fall asleep in the car all the time." Well, not this baby. He hasn't fallen asleep in his carseat since probably month two. I feel like we're constantly in a battle against time to get home before he explodes.

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