Goodbye Crib

Saturday we went shopping for Jude's new bed. While we had a convertible crib, able to stage up from crib to toddler bed to full then twin, the conversion kits were crazy expensive for what they were. For example, the conversion kit from crib to toddler bed was literally two 12" pieces of wood. Cheapest we could find it available was for $80. For perspective a brand new toddler bed, containing not two but several pieces of wood would have cost us $60-70. What? Yeah, no. I'm not paying $10-20 more for less, that's ridiculous.

At first I was just going to get him a toddler bed, but then we considered how big he is already and realized: if we got him a toddler bed this year, next year we'd need to get him a full bed anyway. Why not just save the cost long term? So we went mattress store hunting and then took a journey around to see what we could get and who would give us the best deal. Ultimately we wound up getting him a twin size bed, which he can use for a long time with a Sealy mattress. I'm a little jealous -- it's REALLY comfortable!

Then we went and got him all the bedding he'd need, including multiple sets of sheets because, potty training isn't far off in the future and I'm sure having more than one set of sheets is going to come in handy. We went with a Batman theme, so Batman sheets/comforter/pillowcase, and his Grandma found a really cute Batman plush which Jude took to right away. He spent the entire shopping trip talking to it and hugging it while sitting in the cart. It was really precious.

So, last night was Jude's last night sleeping in his crib. It's actually a little sad to think about. When did my Little Duck get so big that he could climb out of his crib? He's like three feet tall, half my size! How?! It feels like just last week he was sleeping (barely) in a bassinet, now he's got his own bed. Like, an actual real bed. He'll probably sleep in this bed all through his childhood. He'll use it to make blanket forts. He'll hide beneath it during games of hide and seek. He and his friends will probably jump on it together much to our chagrin. Let's face it, the rocking chair is primarily their for my comfort now -- long gone all the nights of cozily nursing in the dark and then laying him gently to sleep in his crib.

This morning we dismantled his crib. This afternoon they delivered his new bed and we made it all up for him. Tonight will be his first night sleeping in a real bed (aside from when he co-slept with me as an infant). He's already shown us that he can climb in and out of it himself, so hopefully the transition goes smoothly. I expect there will be some additional sleep regression, but we've been dealing with that since he learned he could get up whenever he wanted, day or night. So hopefully it isn't any worse than that.