Lullaby and Goodnight

This post is for all those sleep-deprived parents out there. I soooo feel your pain! I have two boys, neither of which would I call "a sleeper." Especially as babies. Now, my 4-year-old has very much improved. He still takes a good 2 hour nap on most days, and once he's asleep at night he will normally stay asleep all night and wake up for the day around 6:30 am. However, as an infant he was terrible. Even at 2 years old, there were several months were he would only go to sleep if we laid down with him in the floor and then he'd wake up several times in the night and we'd go back and dutifully lie down in the floor till he fell back asleep and then sneak out (yes, I know, that's crazy!), but we did whatever we had to do to get any sleep.

Well, then we had our second son. Everyone promised "Oh, he'll be the opposite of Owen. He'll definitely be a sleeper. He'll be sooo easy!" Wrong, wrong, wrong. In fact, he's worse. He's now 10 1/2 months old, and we're still lucky if we can piece together 4-5 hours of sleep a night. I've decided my kids are just not sleepers and there's not anything that can be done except to just get through it. So, I decided I'd post a timeline of a typical night at our house. I know that someday my boys will be teenagers and will have to be drug out of bed. So, then I can look back at this and remember how bad it was and appreciate how good I"ll have it then! And, all you parents out there whose kids ARE "sleepers," be thankful and count your blessings!

The Night of June 14, 2010
(Owen-4 years old, Luke-10 1/2 months old)

7:00 pm-Buck takes Luke to his room to give him his bottle and put him to bed.

7:50pm-Buck emerges and declares Luke is finally down for the night (ha!)

8:15pm-I take Owen to his room to read bedtime stories

8:30pm-I leave Owen in his room to play and promise to check on him later.

8:55pm-My first attempt at laying down and going to sleep

9:00-Owen comes and informs me he's ready to be covered up

9:10-Owen is back because he's afraid of monsters. I check for monsters. Then, he needs a drink of water. Then, I cover him up again.

9:20-Owen's back AGAIN to inform me he changed himself into different pajamas. Yeah, yeah, whatever. I instruct him to go back to bed.

9:30-I vaguely recall Owen in our room yet again. I punch Buck and tell him to take care of him this time. I think a stern warning was given, and Owen finally stays in his room and goes to sleep.

10:30pm--I think Buck got up once because Luke was crying on the monitor. Paci was given and Buck returned to bed.

11:55pm-I hear Luke stirring on the monitor and know it's about time for his bottle. (Yes, we still give him a bottle at night. Bad, bad, I know.) I wake Buck up to go check on him and I go fix a bottle. Buck feeds him and I go back to bed.

12:45 am-Buck returns to bed after putting Luke back down.

***Now I'm on "duty" with Luke. Buck takes care of him if he wakes up until 12 or so and then he's mine until 5am.

1:30 am-Luke starts crying. I give him his paci. Readjust covers. Watch to make sure he's okay for a minute and then stumble back to bed.

2:30am--Same thing as before. Paci, covers, back to bed.

3am-Luke sits up in bed and cries looking around the room. Now, I'm in trouble. If he ever, sits up or stands up, he becomes wide awake very quickly and won't go back to sleep. I scoop him up and put him in our bed next to me, where he sleeps blissfully for an hour.

4 am-Luke starts knocking around in our bed and keeps sitting up and saying "Uh, huh, Uh". I scoop him back up again and return to his room, where I rock him for an hour.

5 am--Luke is wide awake. He won't let me rock him anymore. He's now officially up for the day. I wake Buck up, give Luke to him, and return to bed. I sleep till 6:15 am and then have to get up because Buck's got to go to work and both boys are now awake and ready for breakfast.

So, that's a typical night at the Baskins.