Ages and Stages

One thing I have figured out about my kids, is that just when I think I have them figured out - something changes.

I guess I so quickly forget how fast they change, and the various stages they go through, that when it happens it just smacks me in the face and says "wake up - your kids are growing up, right in front of you!"

Unfortunately, the age we're going through with Connor now is a new bedtime phase. This used to be our "lay me down and please just leave me alone" baby. Seriously. When he was tired, he just wanted to be left alone, put in his bed, where he would literally play with his aquarium or Baby Tad for a half hour or so before he'd doze off to sleep. Not now.

He screams, he throws things out of his crib, and will literally have a fit for what seems like hours (okay, it's never longer than a half hour - but it might as well be hours!) because he is so MAD that you actually put him to bed. At first I thought, "oh, he must just need to be settled down", to where I would go in, pick him up, and rock him to sleep.

Let me make this clear - I LOVE rocking him to sleep! Although, I loved rocking Tyler to sleep as well, until I passed the point of no return. If you have kids, you know that point. The point where they are old enough to know that if they either cry long enough, you'll come get them, and if they cry, you will rock them to sleep. And then no matter how long you rock them, when you set them down - the imaginary button on their back gets pushed and they bolt up. Then you rock again, and set them down, they sit up, then you rock again and put them down, then they sit up. Repeat 64 times until you are insanely tired and losing your marbles. I think that is where we are at with Connor. We did those steps 64 times with Tyler, and I nearly checked myself into an institution.

Last night he was awake 3 times in the middle of the night. This is very odd for Connor - although he does have a little cold - nothing to wake him up. What he wanted every time was for one of us to rock him back to sleep - because I rocked him to sleep after he woke up at 8:30 last night. I'm a firm believer in "however they fall asleep, is how they will want to be put BACK to sleep if they wake up".

Now here we are. I've unknowingly created a monster, and I have a miserable 16 month old that only wants to be rocked to sleep. Although each of the stages my kids go through are always interesting and usually a surprise, in some of them, they can't be over soon enough.