Uggg.. what a night!

Sunday night was not such a good night. In fact, it was one of the worst nights since Meaghan was up every 2 hours to nurse as a newborn. It was bad. Buoyed by nap time on Sunday, when she happily fell asleep in her big girl bed, I  believed that she would give me her sweet smile, curl up with her blue blankey and fall asleep.

Silly Mama.

No... that didn't happen. At 7:45, she & I went upstairs, put on jammies, and got into bed. Yes. She and I both got into her toddler bed. You know, the one that still the crib mattress in it. She wanted me in there with her. We cuddled, I rubbed her back and hoped she would fall asleep, all the while praying that the mattress wouldn't collapse! The princess was having none of that. In fact, every time she looked sleepy enough for me to get up and leave, she would roll over and grab me with some sort of wrestling move that I am convinced her father must have taught her. So, after about an hour, I gave up. I did a "bad mommy" thing.

I put her in bed with me.

I know... it defeats the entire purpose of her even having her own bed. In my defense, I knew Michael would put her in her bed when he came up to bed. (We've both acknowledged that the 3 of us can't fit in our bed together without someone getting kicked in the head!) And he does when he comes up to bed at 10:30.

All is well until 1 a.m. when Meg awakens and starts crying. So I go and try to get her back in bed. She walks to the stairs and yells "downstairs!" So she and I go down for a cuppy and some tylenol (maybe it was her 2 year molars- they're coming in...) and she refuses to go back to sleep until 15 minutes before my alarm clock. And let me tell you, a toddler is NO FUN in the wee hours of the morning.

Needless to say, I went to work on Monday on 4 hours of sleep. I got the solution at work, from a guy with 3 kids of his own.

Last night, we put up a baby gate in her doorway. We still snuggled in bed, read stories, and then I left. She howled.

And howled.

And it was bad. For about 15 minutes. Then, she got tired and crawled into her bed and fell asleep. And we all slept. Thank God!

Any ideas anyone?