Two Boots

Abigail had this habit of getting up after going to bed – repeatedly – until we went to bed.

You’d put her down, say good night, close the door, then five minutes later she’d come out and see what was going on.

Put her back, then fifteen minutes later there’d she be.

You could yell (“JUST GO TO SLEEP!”), ignore, whatever, but it went on forever.

Then it stopped.

No longer did she periodically pop out.

No more fighting, yelling, or misbehaving.

So what happened?

At some point we started cracking her door (i.e. leaving it open), when we put her to bed. From there it lead to “Can you use two boots to keep the door open?”, which we did but with stipulations.

If you come out for any reason other than to go to the bathroom, you lose a boot – we close the door slightly more.

And just like that it worked. She stopped coming out. Every night she goes to bed with her door held open by my motorcycle boots, but she goes to bed – no fuss no muss.

Who knew?

– b

ps. we recently converted Lauren’s crib to a toddler bed so that she can get in and out of her bed on her own. Guess who repeatedly came strolling into the kitchen after going to bed last night?