A Sticker's Worth

Well, a while back I mentioned our troubles with Marlee's sleep habits. She would go down fine but would wake up every night and come crawl in bed with us. I used a twin blow up mattress and moved her there. She would still crawl into bed with us before morning. I love cuddling with her but honestly, I'm ready for her to sleep in her own room every night. This week I got a poster board, some ABC letters, and some star stickers. She was very inquisitive about the materials. I explained how she was a big girl and needs to sleep in her own bed each night. (Have I mentioned how competitive Marlee is? I'll save that for another post.) Well, I challenged her to start sleeping in her bed all night. If she does, she gets to place a sticker on the poster. Once she collects so many stickers, she can get a surprise. We started out small. She had to earn 3 stickers. And guess what? She's slept in her bed all night for the past three nights. She's even sleeping in a little longer, too!! Yippie!!! She gets so excited about picking out just the right sticker and placing in on the poster. We made a trip to Target this morning to pick out her toy. We're going to stretch out the number of stickers a little at a time and hope that this stops the late night wake ups. Oddly enough, she's been in a really good mood the last few days, too. I wonder if these new sleep changes have anything to do with that?!?!

Cooper's participating too. He is able to earn stickers for going to the potty like a big boy. He earned only 2 stickers before our trip to Target but got the third one when we got home. So I guess we'll be making a trip to Walmart this afternoon or tomorrow for his prize.