Daniel Marino

The Toddler Bed

The toddler bed that we ordered for our son came in yesterday. I rushed over to pick it up because we were excited to get him in it. I got it from the store out to my car, a ’99 Nissan POS (OK, it’s really a Sentra)–not a very big car. I had a lot of trouble getting it to fit, but after 15 minutes of looking like a goof ball and grunting I managed to get it jammed in there pretty good. I ended up having to put down the passenger seat and have it rest on my shoulder, which was really uncomfortable. It was also resting on my steering wheel, which made it a little tricky to drive.

It wasn’t the easiest to set up, especially since my son wanted to help. He would scream and hit every time I took the screwdriver away from him so that I could use it. We weren’t planning on having him sleep in it for a few nights because we wanted him to get used to it first, but he wanted nothing more than to just hang out in it. When we asked if he wanted to sleep in it, he nodded his head yes.

We got him ready for bed and did the usual hustle and bustle (diaper change, get PJs on, and rock him with his stuffed animals). It was time to lay him down and he didn’t really know what to do with himself. I spied on him for a little while from the top of the stairs, and saw him getting out of bed (in the dark), going over to his bookshelf, and bringing books back to his bed. I finally went in to put a stop to this. He must have had at least eight or nine books in his bed. He didn’t like it (aka, more screaming and hitting), but I took him out of bed and ended up having to rock him until he fell asleep.

Several hours later my wife and I decided to go up to our bedroom (which is across from our son’s room) to read for a little bit before we went to bed. A few minutes into reading, we heard a very light thump. We looked at each other, and I said that I would check it out. Our son had fallen out of bed. Luckily he was fine and didn’t wake up. I picked him up and put him back into his bed. I then lined the floor around his bed with stuffed animals and pillows in case this happened again. Luckily, he didn’t fall out of bed again.

He slept in this morning, which means my wife and I got to sleep in too. I actually woke up before him. We heard him stirring and finally wake up. He has an Elmo bed set, and when he woke up he kept saying “Melmo” over and over again. I went in to get him and he was so proud of himself for sleeping in his toddler bed. What can I say, my little boy is growing up.