Bedtime battles

Wow.  So sometimes I wish I had the stamina of a 3 year old.  We've been somewhat struggling with bedtime for probably two weeks or more now.  There've been a couple nights where one or both of the girls didn't fall asleep until 11:15-11:30pm!!  We put them in their room anywhere between 8-8:30 usually.  That means they're up playing for three hours at times!

There was one night not long ago when I went to check on them and usher them back into their beds.  Livi was already fast asleep and Addi was playing all by herself with the light on.  So I put Miss Adalyn back to bed, turned the light off, told her that Livi was tired and it was time to go night-night.  Well, she didn't care.  Light was back on just a few minutes later.  At one point, it finally got really quiet so I went to cover everybody up.  Here she had left the light on, climbed back into bed and zonked out!

We just recently took all of the toys out of their room.  They have a shelf of toys that moves very easily, so we just take it out at bedtime and put it right back in in the morning.  Not only had the toys become a distraction (even though they had been in there since the girls were put into big girl beds), but the mess they created was insane!!  Every single bin would get dumped out most nights.  So now we remove them.

Things have gotten significantly better, but we're far from what it was like not that long ago when we could put them in bed, meet a few demands (usually something to drink, the desire for slippers or an extra hug) and they'd settle right in.  We still have to go in several times to get them back in bed and turn off the light, but it's not lasting for hours on end like last week.  So it's progress.  Hopefully we'll keep moving in the right direction!!