It’s a bunkbed life for us

We’re enganging on month number two with our children sleeping on a bunkbed together.  Things seem to be going O.K. since Caleb hasn’t fallen from the top bunk (chances are he will eventually … but he has a big head that can take the fall).  The only draw back from the bunkbed experience is that Abby keeps on coming out of bed scared or crawling into Calebs bed to bug him.   We’ve found this odd because Abby rarely left her own bed in her own room and she loves to fall asleep, so why has her behaviour changed?  Karen and I found it odd  … so we did some investigating (cue suspense music).  We’ve discovered that what may be seen may not be reality. 

One night Abby walked out of the room scared that there are “monsters” in the closet.  We don’t talk about monsters and we try not to watch any shows that have monsters in them.  But, she was convinced that there were monsters in the closet.  So I put her to bed, said “goodnight” to Caleb and quietly lied with Abby until she fell asleep.  Caleb must have forgotten that I was there because two minutes later I hear from the top bunk “ABBY, do you want me to tell you another story, this time it won’t be scary!”   AH HAH – who’s the culprit? – Caleb.  He’s been telling scary stories to Abby when they go to bed. 

That solved the “I’m scared” problem, but what about the ‘crawling into Caleb’s bed to bug him’ problem?  This one was worse because she’s do it and we’d get mad at her.  We didn’t want to punish her right before bed but it kept happening over and over.  She wouldn’t get it. “Don’t go into your brother bed, he’s trying to sleep” we’d tell her, but over and over we’d hear “she’s in my bed again” from Caleb.  It wasn’t computing with her … or so we thought. 

After about a week of this routine we decided to lie in bed with Abby again to see what was the real issue here.  ONCE AGAIN, two minutes into the bedtime routine I heard from the top bunk “ABBY, come into my bed!”.      WHAT A MISCHIEVIOUS LITTLE BOY.  The whole time Caleb was asking her to come into the top bunk and then laughing when mom and dad would come in and get mad a her.   What is a three year old to do when her brother invites her to “hang” with him in his own bed? 

There are times where you think what your child did was hillarious but it was something he/she shouldn’t do.  This was one of those occasions.  What a great way to get your sister in trouble!  What a great plan he divised.  I was proud of the kid , but still a little angry.  So I told him “Bud, I don’t want you to do this again”.  What I wanted to tell him was “that’s genius, I’m proud of you!”  but that wouldn’t help in the long run. 

I hope in the future he uses his abilities for good and not evil! 

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