Sleeping Like a Baby

Let's flashback to 3 months ago. Those were the nights full of frustration of trying to get John to go to sleep. He would yell his cute little head off as we tried to rock him asleep. He would usually fall asleep in our arms and as soon as we put him in the crib he would wake up and start crying again. We were trying so hard to get him to fall asleep on his own without being rocked for fear that he would get used to being rocked to sleep every night and never learn on his own. Yet, the only way we could get him to go to sleep was to be rocked and gently placed in the crib with a pacifier carefully placed in his mouth. I remember getting so annoyed at a lady at work who gasped and said 'OH NO! Never rock him to sleep! Don't do that!'. What else could I do?!?

Then it was as if something clicked. Well, lots of things clicked. John went to daycare (maybe he got super worn out?) and we started a better night time routine that included a bath and a feeding right before he fell asleep. Ever since then we have had almost no problems putting him to sleep. We were still rocking him to sleep but we could easily put him in his crib and he could fall back asleep if he was jostled awake. Nice.

Back to the present. This week has marked new territories. We do our same night time routine- eat around 6, play until 7ish (until he gets antsy), then bath and pjs and bottle. He is in the rocking chair with Brad by 8 at the latest. Brad whistles for a couple minutes to help John get sleepy (Dad calls it John's punishment after hearing Brad in action last weekend!) but then John gets put in his crib even if he isn't sleeping. And get this...HE FALLS ASLEEP ON HIS OWN! We hear him sqirm around, flip onto his stomach and then he falls asleep. It is quite amazing to be honest! When I think about to 3 months ago, I thought this would never happen.

I am so glad that our nights are a million times easier and I am happpy to know we didn't ruin John by rocking him to sleep. In fact, I would rock my next baby to sleep the same way because he/she won't be a baby for long and I don't want to miss out on anything! John barely even likes to be snuggled anymore unless he is sleeping so I actually miss those nights of him sleeping in my arms! ...minus the screaming...

Of course we need a recent picture of John :) Here he is flirting with Jill at Abbie's baby shower yesterday. Everyone loved him...of course.