The big boy cot fiasco

Otherwise known as the day we broke the cot. As you can tell by this title, things have not gone smoothly in this transition period.

Three nights ago Charlie learnt to take his sleepbag off by himself. It's taken him 30 months to do this and at two and a half I guess I'm lucky he didn't do it any earlier.

Without the bag he can climb out of the cot and I didn't want him to fall, so we had a couple of nights of him waking up at 2am and 3am and not wanting to sleep.

Because he was upset I couldn't leave him to climb out and fall, so he ended up in our bed, squeezing up against my legs, tummy, on my face and eventually sleeping down by my feet.

So last night enough was enough, I didn't want to worry about him falling or end up with three in a bed and no sleep. So I got out the tool kit and took the side off his cot. It took longer then I thought and bedtime was delayed by 20 mins, but he loved it. Yes he was up and down a few times, testing our resolve, jumping on the pillows we'd put down to cushion the floor and generally loving the fact that he could close his door by himself and get back into bed. After 30 mins Daddy bear decided he needed a calm down talk and tuck in, which all went fine, through the monitor I heard them sing, rub noses, say night night then CRACK followed by "Mummy we need you".

With trepidation I went in and turned on the light. There was the little man sitting cross legged and at an angle with Daddy holding up the mattress. It transpired that when he went to get up, Tom had leant on the mattress, which made the plinths beneath, already weakend by me removing the side, snap in half.

Daddy took the boy through to read a story whilst Mummy set about fixing the bed. It was very splintered, wouldn't go back neatly and is now held together with gaffer tape. I tucked him back in and within 10 mins he was fast asleep with his blanket over him. I checked on him before I went to bed, he was fast asleep on the floor cushions. I scooped him up, tucked him in and he slept on. An hour later just after T came to bed he was back on the floor and refusing to get into bed. I took over, scooped him up, had a hug and put him back in. And that was it, I got a terrible night's sleep listening out for any noises or a wandering boy, but none came, he slept through until 6am and was excited to wake up in his big boy bed.

Tomorrow we will have a brand new toddler bed delivered and hopefully that will all go smoothly.