Sleeping Through the Night

I almost feel like I don't even have a baby in the house sometimes. You see, when my son was a baby he NEVER went to bed awake, he hardly ever even slept in his crib (he hated sleeping in the crib), he didn't go to bed until I went to bed, and he didn't sleep through the night until he was at least a year old... maybe older. My daughter is much easier! She always liked napping in her basinnette, but recently outgrew it. We started trying to put her down in her crib about a month ago. At first we would still get up during the night to feed her (once or twice, whenever she cried). Two or three weeks ago we switched her to a faster flow nipple and she started drinking more at night. About a week after that we tried letting her just go to bed awake. It worked! I am amazed at how much sleep I'm getting and how much I'm able to do around the house while she is sleeping. She drinks a bottle around 7pm, I lay her in her bed and she just goes to sleep. She'll sleep until about 6am. I'm not getting to cuddle her as much as I did my son, but I guess that is okay. She seems happier now that she's sleeping through the night (that started happening just as soon as she started going to bed awake with a full tummy). She wakes up just talking to herself and happy. It's just so strange that two kids can have such completely different attitudes, behaviors, towards sleep. My son hated bedtime. We tried the "let him cry it out" but it didn't work. He'd cry for 2 hrs straight and just get mad. He was always a really sweet baby though (and now he is a really sweet kid!) and he just wanted to be held. That was fine with me. I am glad that she will go to her bed though... because with two kids I do need her to do that so that I'll have time to help him with his schoolwork and have some time to play with him, too. When my son was a baby I probably got about 4 hrs sleep/night... now I'm getting at least 7 hrs. I am just amazed... I never understood how those other parents got their kids to sleep like that-- I guess it just depends on the kid!