Thursday, August 13, 2009

The Sleep Fairy

The other day I was thinking about how kids are not perfect. There are going to be some things that they are really good with and some that they are really bad with. Besides being loving, warm and caring towards each other, there are many things that my girls are good with that other kids their age are not. For example, they hardly ever fuss to get of strollers or shopping carts when we are shopping. There are no in-store temper tantrums or meltdowns.

I am positive that Emily can climb out of her crib but she doesn't. They never scheme to escape the family room or their high chairs. They know and respect boundaries and that makes our lives so much easier.

Here's a picture from the other day. Although our yard is fenced in, it is quite large and we wanted to make a smaller play area to make it easier to watch them. We purchased this cheap fencing at Home Depot. Do you see how easy it would be for the girls to climb over or under it? They never do though. And if they start messing with it, one look from us and they know to walk away.

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Oh, they also don't flip out when we brush their teeth, comb their hair or spray the handheld shower over the heads to get the shampoo out of their hair.

So what are they bad with? Self-soothing to sleep. Maybe this is our fault for waiting until they were eight months old to let them cry it out. Who knows? Either way, we have been listening to them SCREAM at bedtime every night for months and months and months on end. Every. Night. And it has been getting worse instead of better.

I know I talk a lot about their middle of the night sleeping issues but I suppose that's par for the course. Right? I mean, there are three of them. I have heard of parents dealing with far worse when it comes to sleeping issues and I know that most of their issues go back to the self-soothing problem.

Yesterday, I decided to tell the girls about the sleep fairy. The sleep fairy comes into their room at night and sprinkles sleep dust over them with her wand. She's really little so if they cry, she will be afraid and won't enter their room.

Would you believe that Rich and I left their room and they didn't make a peep? And all it took was a sleep fairy story!!! I felt like throwing up my hands and saying, "Are you kidding me?"

(I'm not going to mention how many hours I spent in their room starting at 11:30. No. That would just ruin it. I do think that Allie is still not feeling 100% and I didn't want her crying for another three hours.)

7 comments:

EngrSandi said...

What a great idea! I hope the sleep fairy keeps coming to visit! Now if only she's make return visits in the middle of the night...

The Beers Family said...

Now thats funny. Whatever works I guess.

Mommy, Esq. said...

A few random thoughts (I love your blog, by the way):

1. Girls are easier about respecting boundaries than boys. I can tell you based on my own personal social experiment.

2. Buy a fairy wand. So if they wake up you tell them the fairy lent you the wand to help them go to sleep.

3. Any thought given to separating them for sleep? We do so for naps and occassionally if we are having fits at night we'll separate them until resolved - pack n' plays stuck wherever. Just something to consider.

Wendy said...

"... and god bless the sleep fairy.
Amen." :P I'm glad they settled down even for one night. That's double awesome that Allie isn't 100% but still slept some! Woo!

Sazz said...

This post really made me laugh. God bless the sleep fairy. I'm glad that you found a way to keep them from crying at night.

Helen said...

Oooh the sleep fairy! Nice! I've heard of the "clean up fairy" too - she steals kids toys if they don't clean them up themselves. LOL!

Sharon Harrison said...

Hi...you don't know me and I have no idea how I clicked on your blog but I am a mom to a almost 21 year old and a 23 year old. My 23 year old had the same sleeping issues...I can so sympathize with you :) She always wanted to come in our room (she did climb out of the crib !!). I sure do enjoy reading your blog and seeing your precious girls...we have friends that have 12 year old triplets...when hers were babies I would go over and just hold a baby for her :) You sound like you guys are amazing parents!!