Caleb and I are trying to get Makayla to go to sleep in her crib without us having to rock her to sleep at night. I know what you are thinking she is 10 and 1/2 months old and we still rock her to sleep at night! Well it really wasn't a big deal to me to just rock her to sleep when we first put her down, but for the past two weeks it hasn't only been when we first put her down. Caleb, yes I did say Caleb, has been up almost every hour from 2 to 7 having to rock her back to sleep after she wakes up in the middle of the night. What a great husband I have, but he and I are both pretty tired in the morning and it is starting to take a toll on us. We tried to let her cry herself to sleep a few weeks ago, but it would just brake my heart to let her cry. We would let her go for like 20 min. and nothing would happen and I would give in and rock her to sleep. Well last night she fell asleep in the car, so we put her in bed and when she woke up 30 min. later we decided to be strong and not go in and pick her up. I have been reading helpful hints on the Internet and something I read said that to just let a child cry all alone in their room sometimes doesn't work. Some children just need to have their parents presence for a little while until they get use to it. That was the route we decided to take. We sat by her crib and talked calmly to her and after a little bit she finally went to sleep. She did wake up again and it was amazing how easily she went back to sleep with just me putting her binky back in her mouth and then she slept for a solid 5 hours or so which is a big improvement for her.
So this afternoon we decided to try again to just lay her down for her afternoon nap. Lets just say it wasn't pretty. She didn't like the idea of being put in that crib again. We stayed with her again, because she screams so loud when we leave, but just whimpers when we are in there. She was so tried it was so sad and funny. We started to sing to her to try and clam her down and both Caleb and I couldn't stop laughing at her. She was just staring at us and almost falling over as she was trying not to fall asleep. We couldn't even get through the song we were singing we were laughing so hard. Just look at the picture!
Need I say anymore?
She is so cute even when she is so tired! Needless to say she finally went to sleep. This is not a fun part of being a parent! We just hope we are doing it the right way to get her to start falling asleep on her own.
