"I Did It!"

Recently, we bought Kellan a special clock that has a side display which shows a boy sleeping at night and the same boy awake during the day.  When it's nighttime, the sleeping picture is illuminated.  Once 6:30am rolls around, the display switches to the daytime picture.  We bought the clock because Kellan had been waking up multiple times in the night and very early in the morning not wanting to go back to sleep; we hoped he would recognize that if the daytime picture wasn't lit, it wasn't time to wake up yet.  We incentivized things by adding that if Kellan did sleep through the night, he'd get to pick out two special stickers in the morning.  If he woke up once during the night but went right back to sleep, he'd still get one sticker.  If he woke up and wouldn't go back to sleep (or woke up multiple times), he wouldn't get any stickers.

It has worked very well!  Who knew stickers could be such a strong motivator?  About half the time he wakes up once during the night, usually because he can't find his pacifier, but lays right back down to sleep knowing he'll still get a sticker in the morning.  The other half of the time he's slept the whole night through!  Mommy and Daddy are getting more sleep, Kellan is so proud of himself, and stickers are cheap and plentiful!  It's been wonderful.  And in the morning when we go to get him out of the crib, one of the first thing he says is "I did it!".  It's so fun to see him reaching goals and pleased with himself.  We're crossing our fingers this continues!

Here's a random picture we caught one day during Kellan's nap.  It's of the display on his video monitor.  Notice how he's sprawled in the same manner as the sock monkey behind him?  Pretty cute, huh?

There are lots of photos and stories to add, but I wanted to keep up the tradition of having at least one post each calendar month, and today's the last day of November (where did the time go?).  So, keep watch - there's more to come!