Toddler Bed from hell.

Watts in his pathetic bed on the floor.

Yesterday I went to my mom's house to see my brother. My brother is 42 with no kids or girlfriend, and lives a simple life in the city. (He also hates my blog, and thinks I am a crap writer).  He suggested we go out to an irish pub that he likes in Ardmore. I havent taken the boys out to eat in a very long time. It normally ends up with the two year old throwing food or insisting that we go somewhere else like the park, or throwing the silverware at the wait staff... it just makes the hubby and I look at each other with death eyes wondering who came up with this terrible idea.

Anyway, I thought, well if they suck I can blame it on my idiot brother. It turned out that my two year old was a saint. He was quiet, he played nicely, I was so proud. My little 6 month old is always a saint, I never have to worry about him acting like a fool. We actually ate our food slowly and had a nice time.

So while we were at my moms house we grabbed the extra baby crib mattress. It was time to put James into Watt's crib, and it was time for Watt's to get his own toddler bed.
We get home around 4 pm. We had to take the crib apart just to get it out the door and move it into another room for James. This only took an hour. It took about 5 minutes to put it back together. We make it look all pretty, clean sheets, bumbers around the outside, crib skirt, mobile... all of Watt's old stuff but James didn't care.

We place James in his crib... he loves it.  He can't believe how much room he has to crawl around... he loves the mobile, and loves that his favorite toys are in there.... and then it began. Watt's comes pummeling over the side and lands inches from James screaming that it was "his bed." The Hubster and I look at each other wondering how he just got into the crib without the aid of a step ladder. We took him out. boom. He's back in. Gymnastics may be in his future.

We assure him that he has a NEW bed. A Big boy bed of his very own. We take him to his room and there it was... A pathetic little mattress sitting on the floor in the corner of his room. "Look! You even have your very own pillow". (Meanwhile, the pillow case is jammed with two sofa cushions) The kid doesnt even have a pillow. He looks at me like I've lost my mind. I grab the gate that traps him in his room and put it at the head of his bed to make it look more like a bed. It just looks pathetic. Watts lay's in his bed like a coffin and closes his eyes. They open fast. He's not buying it. The hubby and I look at each other...hubby says,  "I can't do it, this goes against all my parenting instincts" ( I have been searching on craigslist for a Thomas the train toddler bed. They are really expensive, and so I wanted to get a used one... to no avail.) We could just buy a cute little wood bed at Walmart for $40. "Ok go and get the boring bed from Wally World" and the hubster puts his cape on and fly's to wally world to get a boring bed.

 An hour later... he's back. It is now 6:45 pm. Remember about schedules and rules... you can't take my kids off their schedule or else it's brim and fire.
Hubster feverishly tries to put this bed together, meanwhile Watts wants to help by playing with the screws, taking the white packing foam and crushing it into millions of tiny pieces and walking on the slats, potentially trying to break the bed before it even comes to life. I'm starting to hyper ventilate from the mess... James wont go to bed, the hubster is getting frustrated with the instructions, Ron the cat wants to nap on the instructions....and now Watts is having a shit storm and throwing his toys down the stairs because we wont let him in his room because he was making a mess... baby is still crying. AND it's 8:00. Time for bed.

Anyway, I finally get both boys bathed, the floor cleaned up, Luke is putting on the finishing touches, I'm reading Watt's a story on the floor while hubster puts the toddler rails on... and then he says it. "Oh no...." "I look up....what.... happened." "I put the footboard and headboard on the wrong sides, so I can't put the toddler rails on, I'm going to have to take this thing apart again, I can't believe I did that! " "Nope... your not going to take it apart, because it's time for this guy to go to sleep.Tape that sucker on and we can finish this tomorrow" So... He takes some of that flexy wire (that holds toys in box's - I save them; they are great... and it always comes in handy)... and we make due. Watt's loves his big boy bed, and I finally get him to sleep by 8:45. Not bad.

AND... James only woke up once during the night because Ron was trying to spoon him.
AND.... When the hubster woke up at 6:45 am he went to find Watts missing. So he followed a small sound coming from downstairs... There was my devil child... Watts in the forbidden kitchen... pouring water from the Kettle into a sports bottle, footprints and water everywhere, PJ's are soaking wet -and working his way over to the vitamin drawer, then the fridge, then under the sink... . And so it started all over again...

only this time at 6:45 am.
Kids.... do you really want them?

Watts climbs into James bed and just barely avoids crushing him.