What a child will do for 2 jelly beans...

With the upcoming baby, we decided to put Aiden into a "big boy bed" last weekend. I wasn't sure I was ready to give up the confines of the crib yet, but after his last nap in his crib I knew it had to be done. Here are a few pictures and videos of how the first week went.

This is what we found when we went into Aidens room after his last nap (although there wasn't any napping actually involved) in his crib.


Aiden wanted to get in on all the action of taking his crib down and putting his new big boy bed together.

Aiden loves to help daddy, especially when it involves power tools.

Yeah my new bed!! If you can't tell, Aiden is a huge fan of the movie cars and he was very happy to get to sleep with a new cars blanket and pillow case. It was a liitle difficult for mom to to accept that for a while I will have to live with cars instead of some more classy style of bedding. Aiden was very excited to sleep in it... or so we thought...

Aiden doesn't quite know what to do with his new found freedom. He is really good about not coming out of his room but he figured out he could get out of bed and play with all his toys

This next video is what I found at 8:30 the next morning. Who knows when or how long Aiden had been up playing but he did sleep in until 10:30.

So you are probable wondering why I titled this blog what a child will do for 2 jelly beans. Well after a few days of endless conversations about staying in bed and Aiden continuing to enjoy his new freedom of being able to get out of bed and play, I realized that I needed to check on him every few minutes so he would know that I would know if he got out of bed. The first time I did this, I closed his door and opened it almost immediately, he was already up and getting toys in his closest. So I stood at his door and opened it about every thirty seconds. He finally started to understand the idea and eventually was asleep when I checked on him. That same night our genious daddy was putting Aiden to bed while I was out and told him that if he stayed in bed and didn't get out at all he would get a surprise in the morning. Shae informed me of this when I got home but didn't say what the surprise would be. So the next morning I went in and Aiden was quietly reading in his bed. He looked at me and said "I stay in bed... surprise. I get a prize." I racked my brain for an easy prize that could be given on an regular basis for a while when I remembered an episode of John and Kate plus 8 (If you are a mom and haven't seen this show it will definitely make you feel like your life isn't so crazy). They give 1-2 M&M's to their kids as a reward for using the potty successfully. We didn't have M&M's but we did have Jelly Beans!!! Voila, I told Aiden he could have 2 jelly beans for staying in his bed all night without getting out. He was so excited and overjoyed. Now he tells all his friends about it and we haven't had any problems with him getting out of bed and playing and if he does get out of bed he is so honest about it, he will tell us. What a sweet boy! So there you have it. Hopefully we continue on this path to success .We will keep you all posted!