Science Experiment...

Materials:
1 beautiful nursery
1 master bedroom
3 cribs
2 babies
1 monitor (video preferably)

Experiment A:
Procedure:
1. Place 2 cribs in nursery.
2. At bedtime put Baby A in one crib, and Baby B in second crib.
3. Kiss babies and say "Goodnight!"
4. Leave room and turn on monitor.

Observations: Babies fuss (not crying, or screaming, just fussing) for approximately 5 minutes while attempting to get comfortable and settled. Babies go to sleep. At 2am Baby B wakes up and wants diaper change. At 4am Baby A wakes up and wants paci insertion (despite the fact that we have never given them pacis! Don't even get me started on this one...) At 6am Baby A wants up for the day and wants to play. Baby B wakes up at 7am.

Experiment B:
Procedure:
1. Place 1 crib in master bedroom.
2. At bedtime put both babies in same crib at opposite ends.
3. Kiss babies and say "Goodnight!"
4. Leave room and turn on monitor.

Observations: Babies immediately roll/crawl/scoot over to one another and attack (hair pulling, hitting, kicking, head butting, gnawing (thank goodness they don't have teeth!), you name it) all while cooing, squeeling, and smiling for the most part. Ever repeatedly seperating them they just go back at it. After 5 minutes babies fall asleep practically on top of each other - one still clutching the other's ear, one's legs sprawled across the chest of the other one. At 7am we have to wake the babies up to get them up for the day.

Conclusions:
1. Babies are sadists, or masochists I am not sure which.
2. We need to record my husband snoring to play as "white noise" for the nursery.
3. We are in so much trouble.... They are going to be 10 and still sleeping in our room if we want to get a good nights sleep!

What's up with this? We moved them up to the nursery at around 3 1/2 months when they got too big for just one crib sleeping short ways and were sleeping through the night so well so we didn't have to keep hiking upstairs constantly. They slept fine up there for 3 weeks. Then we had the "4 mo sleep gone to crap phase" where they were up on and off wanting to be fed for about 3 weeks. Then they started sleeping through the night again for about 2 weeks. And now this... I want my good sleeping babies back!! Preferably without black eyes, and bruises... Please tell me this too shall pass... and soon!

 

Wow. Is it wrong that my first thought was, "well...a little pre bedtime fight isn't too bad if they slept all night".

That is a very interesting experiment. Do you think the closeness of each other helped or knowing they were in your room? Have you tried putting them in the same crib in their room?

 

It sounds like having them sleep in the same crib together in a separate room might work really well!

 

You need another control experiment

As Pamela suggested, both in same crib in their room would work nicely

GL figuring it all out. I can't help with STTN advice, since mine didn't STTN until 8 months old.

 

Too funny! (And cute!) I agree you need one more experiment: putting them together in one crib in their nursery. Sounds like they loooove (love being a very active verb) being together!

 

I agree- try having them sleep together in their room.

And get the pre-sleep fights on video for later!

 

So funny! Let us know what you decide.

 

They went in one crib in the nursery tonight, so we will see in the morning...

They went down with a little less voilence tonight. The only real tantrum was when Baby A pinned Baby B up against the bumper at one end of the crib and wouldn't let him roll back over. They fell asleep like a T with their heads together. Awww... :blush:

 

QUOTE(Kellytwinmom @ Aug 13 2008, 11:12 AM) [snapback]928232[/snapback]
Wow. Is it wrong that my first thought was, "well...a little pre bedtime fight isn't too bad if they slept all night".

That is a very interesting experiment. Do you think the closeness of each other helped or knowing they were in your room? Have you tried putting them in the same crib in their room?


What is sad is that's exactly what I thought, too! Does that make me a bad mom?

They really do love to be together. So much so that one learned to crawl much to my chagrin a few days before they turned 5 months old just to get to his brother. I was seriously like are you kidding me?!?! You can't crawl yet! You can't even sit up without falling over! And any chance they get they are right on top of each other - mostly attacking one another.

We put their cribs back to back and don't have bumpers on the sides that adjoin so they can see each other. Every night they fall asleep wedged up to the slats beside each other. Sometimes they even get hands through and grab onto one another.

But lately they only STTN in our room, although we haven't tried one crib upstairs, yet. Since they could see and touch each other we didn't think too much about it. We will get it a try tonight though.

 

How did it go???

I always say thank God that DD is a twin she always needed to sleep next to somebody when she was tiny, whether it be me or her brother. Thankfully her brother didn't mind too much and they slept in the same crib for a long while until they started waking each other up. Now their cribs are side by side and they peer through the bars and play with each other and grab each others face/hands/whatever they can reach.

 

QUOTE(beemer @ Aug 13 2008, 09:45 PM) [snapback]929353[/snapback]
They went in one crib in the nursery tonight, so we will see in the morning...

They went down with a little less voilence tonight. The only real tantrum was when Baby A pinned Baby B up against the bumper at one end of the crib and wouldn't let him roll back over. They fell asleep like a T with their heads together. Awww... :blush:


Baby B woke up at 4:45 am protesting Baby A's hand in his mouth pinching his cheek. Then at 6:10am Baby A woke up for the day and pestered his brother to get up by crawling on top of him and pulling his hair (unfortunately Baby B is a tummy sleeper and is way less mobile anyways so he had no recourse). Lots of screaming ensued. Poor baby... For his safety I don't think we can let them sleep together. Back to the drawing board... Maybe Baby A just needs something to cuddle with? Is it too early to give them one of the blanket things with heads - I think some people call them lovies? We let them play with them during the day, but haven't been comfortable trying it at night, yet.

 

I don't think it's too early for loveys. We started at about 6 months, I did it for naps only for a few days until I was comfortable that they wouldn't try to suffocate themselves with them and then left them in all night. At first DS could have cared less, but in the last month or two he is always laying on top of his lovey. DD likes to chew hers and then throw it out of the crib before sleeping.

 

QUOTE(beemer @ Aug 14 2008, 10:19 AM) [snapback]929847[/snapback]
(unfortunately Baby B is a tummy sleeper and is way less mobile anyways so he had no recourse).


Just curious...does Baby B usually sleep better than Baby A because they are a tummy sleeper? I'm counting down the days that my babies will roll well enough to be able to sleep this way. I'm praying we will all start sleeping better once they do.

 

I think a lovey is a great idea. We introduced them around 5 months, and the babies hold on to them when they sleep. It is so cute!

 

QUOTE(DeniseT @ Aug 14 2008, 09:34 AM) [snapback]929870[/snapback]
Just curious...does Baby B usually sleep better than Baby A because they are a tummy sleeper? I'm counting down the days that my babies will roll well enough to be able to sleep this way. I'm praying we will all start sleeping better once they do.


Baby B has been a better sleeper since day 1. Seriously, if you could have a baby sleep model - he's it. Would have STTN at 6 weeks if we let him. Baby A was still getting up so we kept waking him until 8 weeks. He is also the one you can put down wide awake and 95% of the time he will drift off in 5 minutes or less without a peep. Sleeping on his tummy didn't really change his sleep habits much. I can say that if we can get Baby A down on his tummy - he's my mover an always has been - he does sleep much better on his tummy. Naps go from 45 min to an hour on his back to easily an hour and a half to two hours.

 

QUOTE(beemer @ Aug 14 2008, 10:19 AM) [snapback]929847[/snapback]
Baby B woke up at 4:45 am protesting Baby A's hand in his mouth pinching his cheek. Then at 6:10am Baby A woke up for the day and pestered his brother to get up by crawling on top of him and pulling his hair (unfortunately Baby B is a tummy sleeper and is way less mobile anyways so he had no recourse). Lots of screaming ensued. Poor baby... For his safety I don't think we can let them sleep together. Back to the drawing board... Maybe Baby A just needs something to cuddle with? Is it too early to give them one of the blanket things with heads - I think some people call them lovies? We let them play with them during the day, but haven't been comfortable trying it at night, yet.


I started lovies with my babies at 16 weeks...so I don't think it's too early, at all (especially if they're crawling and can escape the lovey if need be!). We never had a problem (they don't roll around much in their sleep, even now at 7 months).