Sleeping all by herself!!

After many months (ok years) I finally have Layla sleeping on her own. I got into the really bad habit of laying down with her while she would fall asleep. I didn't mind that part so much. The problem became that she was looking for me all night long and I found myself hopping beds all night which meant crappy sleep for me. I am a pretty tough cookie when it comes to most things regarding Layla but for some reason sleep was my weakness. I decided to suck it up and get her to be able to sleep on her own. It needed to happen before the new baby comes and I am hopping around 3 rooms all night! We went to the Disney Store and I let her pick out a sleep friend. She chose a super soft and cute Minnie Mouse. While we were there she spotted a Tinkerbell suitcase. We came home and made her a sticker chart. She needed to fill it up with stickers from sleeping on her own at naptime and at bedtime to get the Tinkerbell suitcase. She needed 6 stickers (I was hoping to nip this in 3 days).

First day naptime was HORRIBLe. It took over an hour and a half to get her to sleep. She was crying and yelling and just generally freaking out. Then she started apologizing which was the worst part because she thought I wasn't laying by her because she was in trouble for something. Needless to say we were both in tears through this ordeal. I tried to remain calm and just kept taking her back to her bed and telling her it was naptime. At a point I thought I was going to break before her but I kept at it. It totally paid off. That night at bedtime there were a few tears but it wasn't bad at all. Since then it has been very easy. She was so excited to get a sticker whenever she woke up.

After her chart was full we were off to buy the suitcase! As you can probably guess the suitcase came home and she was over it in about an hour, of course. The good part is that the suitcase came with a Tinkerbell pillow and blanket and she loves sleeping with those. And the best part of all is that she is sleeping all night on her own and not looking for me, which means I am sleeping!!

I also let her pick out a pair of pajamas. She wanted this lovely Tangled nightgown. It's a bit too cold for a short sleeved nightgown so we just put it on over her warm jammies. She loves this thing! She even wants to wear it over her clothes during naptime. Hey whatever keeps her happy sleeping!!