Sweat Dreams...or Not!

It is the end of an era...Colton has learned to climb out of his crib. 

Last night he did not want to go to bed and began to scream the second Dan put him in his crib (an all too frequent occurrence at the moment).  A few seconds later I noticed that his screams seemed louder than usual and Dan went into the room to snuggle him again (hence, the reason he screams but you try to resist it!).  Much to Dan's surprise Colton met him at the door.  Dan looked at the crib and noticed that Colton's menagerie of animals that HAVE to sleep with him and his Magic Blankie had been piled up to give Colton a boost to make the break.  Dan snuggled him for a minute and then removed all of the animals with the exception of one (take that kiddo!) and left the room.  Once again he immediately begins to scream again (Colton not Dan).  Dan comes downstairs to tell me what has transpired and all of the sudden the screams have gotten louder again.  "Uh Oh" we both say with horrified looks on our face.  Sure enough Colton has figured out a way to get out of the crib sans all of those stuffed animals.

Dan and I realize at this point that we are defeated.  Once that boy makes up his mind to do something (or not do something) that's it.  We realize that we could eventually win the battle, if we choose to put him in the crib 500 times that night.  I mean he is sure to tire out eventually, right?  However, I figured that the possibility of him breaking an arm or leg at some point during the next 500 climbs out of the crib was highly likely.  He is a little accident prone.

So Dan took the crib mattress out of the crib and put it on the floor.  Colton slept on the mattress peacefully for the rest of the night.

There are two reasons why this is devastating to me. 

Reason #1: The last little thing that ties him to babyhood (it is so a word!), is his crib.  He has given up bottles, binkies, the high chair, those cute little infant clothes, etc. but the one thing I could hang onto was my sweet little baby in his crib.  I'm not ready to put the crib away...waaaaaahhhh! 

Reason #2:  I am more than a little concerned that my husband and I may never sleep peacefully again.  Colton is...how should I say this?...Curious!  The translation is that he is into everything and tests every single limit and rule that he possibly can.  Let's just say that he keeps us busy.  So now, we are going to have to be sure to super baby proof every single thing in his room because I have no doubt that he will empty all of his drawers, swing from the blinds, jump off of the train table and a whole host of other things that I haven't even thought of but believe me...he WILL think of them! 

Tonight, we will be taking down the crib (sniff, sniff) and tomorrow we are picking up the big boy bed from storage.  Please pray for us!  It's a good thing he is cute...

Sleeping on the mattress on the floor next to the crib