Xander’s Big Night Out

10/11/2005

Hello All,

I know some of you got some Xander photos recently; hope this isn’t overload but I wanted to write it all down before all the details escaped my brain.

Sometime starting last summer, Alexander was able to escape his crib, much to Wendi’s shock. She put him in the crib and then went to fold clothes in our bedroom. She turns around and there he was. Yikes! Stuff like that always happens in cheesy horror movies. And now in Silverdale, too.

Our only consolation was that he was not in his Sleep Sac. No way he could make the leap to freedom encased in his bright yellow sleeper. Or so we thought.

On Sunday, I get home from Ross Lake to learn our little boy is growing up, at least in terms of physical prowess and deviousness. He CAN get out when he wants to and he wanted to. The baby monitor was just too great a target. I go up to check on why things are suddenly quiet (Yes, I know: Too Quiet.)  and there he is, hallway over the rail, looking at me with a big “I’m just too cute to punish” expression. Yes, he did look terribly cute but this was his 3rd flight to freedom of the evening. We tried putting him into the playpen downstairs and creating a sleeping area in the Family Room where Wendi and I were. Neither experiment had the desired effect of helping him drop off. We just ended up rocking him to sleep. (Not a habit we encourage.)

Last night, it was more of the same. Amazingly, my heartfelt lectures on the importance of keeping to your assigned station had no effect on him. One amusing occurrence was when Wendi and I were downstairs watching TV and we hear the sound of the music box come over the monitor. (Not really a “box” but more of a musical, light emitting saucer-thingy) The music box that was most definitely NOT left in Xander’s crib so I zip up there to his room and what should I find but Xander sitting calmly in his crib with a big smile on his face, music box exactly where we put it. (Again, thank goodness we don’t live in a cheesy movie!)

So after the wife and I discussed it, we decided to accept reality. The crib went. Okay, only went across the room because the %$#@! thing wouldn’t fit through the door without some major deconstruction. At least more than we felt like doing at 9:00 at night. But, on October 10th, 2005, our little boy slept sans crib.

At first he thought it great fun watching Mommy and Daddy change things around in his bedroom. Out came the vacuum cleaner, away went the toys in the closet. What was the flat thing on the floor? Now this was intriguing….

However, it soon dawned upon him that things were radically changed! This was an imposter bed! And after 10 seconds of lying there…..

…..he decided he didn’t like it! He didn’t like it VERY MUCH!

It’s a hard lesson but after an hour or two of crying at the door, along with having his parents come in now and then to rock him a little or just be with him, our much-abused child finally fell asleep.

My sense of order won out over my common sense and I put him back on his bed. To my complete and utter non-shock this morning, I saw it didn’t stick.

Well, added to our “To Do” list for this weekend will be to tear down the crib, investigate whether that crib really can convert to a bed as advertised or possibly shop for a real toddler bed. Something classy like a race car.

That’s our exciting adventure. I can only assume this is some sort of cosmic karma for all the abuse I put my parents though. (As Wendi [and sometimes Tina] reminds me all the time, SHE was the perfect child.)

Sigh…The jobs of parenthood.

Much tired.

Brian and Wendi.