Sleep baby sleep

Do you see those colors on the wall? Do they look familiar? Where might our baby be? Yes that is Brynna sleeping in her crib in Sevea’s room!!

We moved Brynna’s crib from our room to Sevea’s on Friday March 7th. In order to not push my luck I waited talking about this monumental occasion until I knew for sure it wasn’t a fluke. The crib moving isn’t a huge deal but the fact that we did this means we have a better sleeper on our hands.

I’m going to set the stage to let you know how drastically things have changed. Brynna learned to put herself to sleep at 4 months. Then teething and sickness got in the way and so she learned again at 6 months. At every nap and bedtime we’d lay her down and she’d fall asleep on her own. Sure there are times where she lets out a protest cry but it never lasts long and plenty of times we hear nothing from her. She napped pretty well. It was the nighttime sleep that was our biggest frustration. Ever since the teething/sickness that settled in between 4-5 months Brynna would not sleep longer than 3 hours at night. A good night for us looked like this:

Bedtime 6:30/7:00 Awake & Eat 9:30/10:00 Awake & Eat 12:30/1:00 Awake & Eat 3:30 Awake & Eat 5:30 Wake up time 6:30

She would eat and fall back asleep quickly. As in I was back in bed sometimes within 10 minutes. These nights we began to cherish and pray Brynna would give us a night like these. Instead most of our nights went a little more like this:

Bedtime 6:30/7:00 Awake & Eat 9:30/10:00 Rock 11:30 Awake & Eat 12:30/1:00 Rock 2:00 Awake & Eat 3:30 Awake & Eat 5:30 Rock until wake up time 6:30

We knew she was growing a dependence on us. We started spending more and more time in the rocking chair sleeping with her. We knew she needed to figure out how to put herself back to sleep without the help of us or from nursing to sleep. The only thing we didn’t know was if she was truly hungry. Since she started eating solids a lot better we took the advice of our doctor and started trying to see if she could go without. The week before we moved her crib we spent weaning her feeds in the middle of the night (the 12:30/1:00 & 3:30 ones). Dropping one by one. We ended up spending the entire night rocking her that week but we at least knew she could go without eating. Then came Friday night. We laid her in her crib that night at 7:00 with extra hugs and kisses expecting the worst. She had a little bit of a cold and coughed enough to wake herself up at 9:05 back to sleep by 9:07. Again at 9:09. This time I checked in on her after 5 minutes and back to sleep at 9:16. Total of 7 minutes of crying. That was the most she cried that night. I dream fed her at 10:00 and we heard from her at 1:30, 3:45, and then soft cries off and on from 5:05-5:30. I waited till she was asleep and fed her again at 5:40. She woke up for the day at 7:10. First night was a huge success especially considering how horrible her nights were before. We knew she was ready but she still surprised us at how well she did. That first night set the tone for good nights ever since. She now goes to sleep at 6:30/7:00, dream feed at 10:00 and then sleeps either till I dream feed her before I go to the gym at 5:30 or sleeps until 6:30ish. It is such a huge change. We’ll drop the dream feed at some point but for now we’re fine with the new schedule. She’s even dealt with two new teeth coming like a champ. She can even easily fall back asleep after mommy takes a picture of her and wakes her up with the flash!

Troy and I both wondered if this day would ever come. And now that it is here you would think we feel well rested. Not quite. I think we got so used to the little sleep that what we’re getting now makes us feel more tired. Our nights seem so short not seeing the clock so many times in the night. I do miss falling asleep on the couch almost nightly by 9:00. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining!