As expected, they played and carried on for over an hour before finally falling asleep together in Julia's bed. Since then, bedtime is fairly uneventful. We might check on them and find Vivian asleep in Julia's bed, but that is nothing compared to what occurs daily during naptime.
Naptime is like unsupervised playtime for them. They are bouncing on the beds, tearing up books, taking anything they can reach off of the nightstand and dresser, yelling and screaming, etc.
The worst was the day they broke the lamp (fixable), disassembled a picture frame, and had the mattress off of Vivian's bed. It was amazing nothing was broken beyond repair and neither of them were hurt. Of course, not taking a nap has taken a toll on their evening behavior. Since then I have been taking Julia out and making her sleep on the floor in the nursery. Then they both sleep. Yea! This was supposed to be punnishment and make Julia want to stay in her bed and ignore Vivi. Unfortunately, she likes it. Darn. Now I'm not quite sure what to do. They need to get used to rooming together, but they also need an afternoon nap.
Any suggestions?
Put the least destructive one on your bed for naptime. I used to do that all the time.
ReplyDeleteOh, I've been there friend! Too may times to recall. I DEFINITELY separated my girls for naptime. Either one was on my bed, or when the babies were tiny and still sleeping in a bassinet etc. one would sleep in the nursery etc. We kept one of our crib mattresses and a few extra sheets just for nap times. I stored it under our bed or under the guest bed etc for handy use. In fact, I STILL inist that everyone find a quiet spot in separate rooms when we do family quiet time because they will get into EVERYTHING if they are together! Also, we did staggered bed times for our girls. Took longer to get them to bed, but I ended up enjoying that because each child went to bed happy and I had time to focus on praying with them and reading a Bible story etc with them. It's hard, I know, but you'll make it! Wow, seven weeks is coming up!!!
ReplyDeleteThanks ladies! Yesterday I put Julia down first then Vivian about 20 minutes later. I still had to go in there 3 times to get Vivi to lay down in her bed, but nothing was destroyed and everyone ended up sleeping. We'll see if that works again today.
ReplyDelete