The Greatest Crib Ever!

The first huge furniture purchase Marc and I ever made was Mason's nursery furniture. I did the most research for months to find the sturdiest, safest, longest-lasting, highest-quality furniture for our son. We use hand-me-downs for our living room furniture, a dining room table from Goodwill, and a $200 Ikea dresser for our bedroom, but when it comes to Mason we only wanted the BEST for our firstborn! We found this beautiful Munire Essex set at USA Baby in Franklin, TN, and with the help of Marc's parents we were able to order it. We could not believe how much was being spent on this furniture, but knew it would last forever... and that's because we got a convertible crib! That's right folks, the crib that converts to a toddler bed and then eventually a full-sized bed! So, in other words, Mason is stuck with it til he's 18, oh and I'm sure his wife would just love it if he even decides to take it with him when he moves out of the house and gets married. Thank you.

After almost 2 1/2 years sleeping soundly in his crib, we decided to go ahead and change it to the toddler bed in order to A) transition him into the full-sized bed by getting him used to not having a railing or "protection" going all the way around; B) give him more room to spread out and not feel as "claustrophobic" since he's getting taller every day, and C) just all the changes that come along with getting a baby sister! On September 2, 2010, Mason's DaDa spent countless hours converting the crib to the most perfect toddler bed for his son. Well, not really hours... maybe an hour or so. Mason LOVED it, to say the least, and jumped right in that bed with his juice and posed away for that camera. For the first few weeks we would put him to bed at naptime & night and he would stay in the bed, not even attempting to escape. Even though it had the most obvious open space and would have been the easiest!! Well, the day in October I was hosting a baby shower for my friend, Stephanie, Mason decided he was done with his nap and wanted to join in the excitement of the party. So, he hopped right out of that bed and came running into the living room and plopped himself smack dab in the middle of the kids who were playing. I walked into the living room and was the most confused as to how he got out there. Some ladies told me they saw him hop right out of that bed. So that's when it began. The very challenging phase of the 2 1/2 year old! Mason has always been an "easy" child until we started dealing with this sleeping issue.

On December 4, 2010, Marc convered Mason's bed to the final stage: the FULL-SIZED BED! And of course, the sleeping issue went even more downhill! Mason definitely wouldn't stay in his bed then. For the first couple of weeks one of us would have to lay down with him in bed for at least 45 minutes to help him fall asleep. We would pat his tummy, scratch his back, sing to him, read to him, etc... whatever we could do to get him to fall asleep. Then, we would very carefully sneak out of his bed and out of his room. Well, Mason wouldn't let that happen. He would immediate wake up, start crying, and motioning for us to come back to bed. So, then we would either make the decision to sleep the whole night in his bed, or bring him to our bed where we would be the most comfortable. We FINALLY got our child to sleep in bed with us! I know, I know.. a strange goal. But, for 2 1/2 years Marc and I dreamed of the day that Mason would cuddle up in our bed with us. Hmm... when that day did come, we wanted to take back our dream! Ha! :) Yes, we love Mason cuddling up with us, but we honestly cannot sleep when he is in bed with us. On top of the fact that we don't want him to get into this habit and still be wanting to sleep with us when Mallory gets here. We can't have 2 kiddos in bed with us! Mallory will be sleeping in a bassinet in our room for a while since her room is so far away. So, Mason will definitely want to get in on the action then! Anyway, after a couple of weeks of us having to sleep in Mason's bed or put him in bed with us, we decided to take control of the situation and NOT allow him to sleep in our bed. So, now we just take turns trying to put him to sleep in his own bed and then resting with him for a while until we tiptoe back into our room. It always works until about 3 am, and then Mason gets up and runs into our room begging for one of us to go back to "Mason's crib." Well, at least we're kinda conquering the "Mason sleeps only in his own bed" part of the situation.

Oh, and as for naps... you may as well forget it! And one more thing, at least all of this situation makes for some cute pictures! Thank you.

Last picture of Mason's sweet crib :(

Trying out his toddler bed for the very first time
Asleep within 5 minutes... it's hard work helping your DaDa fix you up a "big boy bed"!
Poor baby looked so uncomfortable & cold in that toddler bed, so we had to add a blanket.
Woke up on the wrong side of the bed already!

Day 2 in the Toddler Bed!

Already pushing his limits by trying out out the things that are "no no"!

Little stinker with his Capri Sun

Oh, let's try one of these things we call a "pillow"... I've never slept with one of these before! Hmm.... let me think about it...

And it can go this way...

Oh, this way should be interesting!

Oh, forget it! I'm getting rid of this thang!

He finally gave up messing with the pillow and fell fast asleep!

Okay, enough of that... Three months later: the final stage!

Da Da hard at work... again!

I just had to include this of Mason's special little Christmas tree. It's been in his room every year so that we can put his special ornaments on there that people gave us when we found out he was a boy Dec. 08 and some that I bought as soon as we found out. We need to get him a bigger tree for next year since he's a big boy now!

The finished product and Mason trying out his big bed for the first time! I promise, it was not an easy task to get him to fall asleep in it! This was only after lots of book reading, singing, discussing, arguing, getting up 500 times and turning the light on & off, etc. But then of course looks like a perfect little angel when he's sleeping! :)
We used his crib bumpers the first few days to kinda protect him from falling out of the bed or hitting his head against the wall. We now have bed rails that we're borrowing from a friend but haven't tried them out yet.

We had a full-sized bed we kept in Mason's nursery in Nashville since that room had to also still serve as our guest room. Target happened to have this bedding set that matched Mason's crib bedding perfectly, so I bought it for that full bed. I'm so glad I did cuz now I have something cute to put on his big boy bed that isn't too babyish. I really didn't want to have to go out now and buy him a new bedspread, and I ended up not having to spend a dime on this "transition." Maybe in a few years I'll let him pick out some new fun theme!

He woke up and had a brief spat with his monkey... I love in the pic above how you see the sweet little monkey asleep next to his big friend!

All snuggled up with his monkey & "special blankie"... he finally has found some items that he would like to sleep with. He has never really had a "lovey" so I'm glad he has one now cuz hopefully they'll help him feel a little more secure in his big boy bed.