How We Sleep At Night

We've been helping Luke learn how to put himself to sleep. What this means is this: he now thinks bedtime is AWESOME. Since I had no interest in the close-the-door-and-let-the-kid-cry-til-he-falls-asleep method, we instead chose the completely ludicrous leave-the-door-open-and-see-how-many-times-your-kid-comes-running-out method. Yeah. (I'm pretty sure that Method 1 would have yielded faster results, but it would've provided far less humor for me and McMoose.)

We're on Day 6 of this foolishness. On Day 1, he came out 127 times. One. Hundred. And. Twenty. Seven. No joke. It took a total of 2 hours, but it was a lot less frustrating than it sounds because my kid? He's kind of hilarious. At least to me and McMoose, and since we were the ones returning him to his room 127 times, we're really the only ones who NEED to find him hilarious. So the first dozen times, he just ran out and giggled. And then, he started sloooooowly crawling out. And then, he jumped and twirled and danced and sang his way out. And then, he brought out various pillows, blankets, and books...I'm pretty sure he was trying to bribe us into letting him stay awake. And then, he tried lying down in the hallway just outside his door. Etc.

On Day 2, he came out 83 times. Still took two hours, he just spent a couple minutes by the window each time before running out. Day 3: 48 times and 1.5 hours. Day 4: 37 times and 1.5 hours. Day 5: 17 times and 25 minutes, which was only because we were out so late that by the time we got home, he was BEGGING to go to bed. And here we are. Day 6. 31 times. Less than an hour. I guess this ridiculous method is working after all, especially considering the fact that until 6 days ago, this child had never, ever fallen asleep in a room by himself before.

But McMoose and I are having our own difficulties adjusting. I'll admit, I miss the bedtime snuggles. (I don't miss sitting on a beanbag chair for an hour, patting a Small One while an Even Smaller One jumped around on my bladder, however.) Just tonight, we had this conversation:

Me: You think he's asleep yet?
McMoose: Yeah.
Me: Ok, I'll go check on him.
McMoose: Ok. *Gets up and starts walking to Luke's room.*
Me: I said that I was going to check on him.
McMoose: You just checked on him last night!
Me: So? I can check on him twice in a row.
McMoose: No. You can check on him after me.

Can I just say, if checking on our sleeping toddler is the highlight of our Friday night, we are sad, sad people who need to get a life.