To sleep and where to sleep...

Sleep.

Sleep, sleep, sleep.

I love sleep. I am fully aware that my relationship with sleep is rapidly coming to an end. The fact that I already wake up from crazy dreams, wake up to pee 5 times a night and wake up at 5am thinking about crib sheets means our days are really numbered. Oh, how I'll miss you, sleep.

Babies sleep, right?  It could happen! Especiallyyyyy...if you have the right bassinet/play yard/co-sleeper/crib/dresser drawer for them to sleep in!!! I know I know, wishful thinking. But I think about this A LOT. About more than just the crib sheets, though the ones out there are SUPER cute.

A looot of the reading I've done revolves around sleep, but more in a parenting sense. Co-bedding, co-sleeping, cry it out, sleep training...everyone has an opinion, and every baby is different. So how do you decide? I go back and forth almost every day. There are some things that I don't agree with and won't do. Some things that I feel are right and we should do. But then there's baby...and you never know what he/she will do!

I know I won't be listening to baby cry it out, but I also know that baby won't be sleeping in our bed regularly. Small condo bedrooms, double beds and sprawly sleepers who like pillows, blankets and space sort of made that decision. Even though I think I have about 3 readers at this point, I want to make it clear that I am NOT JUDGING how anyone else parents or deals with sleep. I think as long as you're doing what works for your baby and your family, go for it. My whole point is being educated. Which also means there's not necessarily a right or wrong. This seems to be going in circles... Let's move on.

In order for baby to sleep, baby has to have something to sleep IN. Yes, my Nanny put one of my uncles in a dresser drawer and he lived to tell, so you can say it really doesn't matter what they sleep in! But, there's a little thing called budget, and let me tell you, something that looks like a woven basket used by tribes in Africa suddenly costs you $300.

The cutest little modern bassinet I've ever seen is this guy:

Monte Ninna Nanna Bassinet

But heavens above, it's expensive. And baby would be able to sleep in there for what, the first 6 days? Not worth it unfortunately. If someone would like to give me this to borrow/for free, come on down! My practical side would cringe still, but my "look at my modern little nursery and my modern baby in their modern design bassinet" would jump up and down a little bit.

We're 100% getting a play yard of some sort. It's a necessity for traveling back and forth to stay with friends and family, which we do SO often now, and I plan to continue to do with baby. Plus, I like the idea of baby having a familiar sleep environment, even just while traveling, so they're not always in something unfamiliar. So, just pick a play yard and we're good to go, right? HAVE YOU ANY IDEA HOW MANY OF THESE THINGS THERE ARE OUT THERE?? At what point did someone tell Graco's pack and play to "go forth and multiply x 10,000"?! There are zillions. So. We can sift through the minute differences between the 80 Graco's and 75 Chicco's and 4587 play yards on Amazon.com.... OR.....

We go with this bad boy.

The 4moms Breeze. Watch this video immediately. WATCH IT.

You watched it, right? So you agree. No contest. This will become a huge part of my life. This is my luxury item. We can go practical and affordable on EVERYTHING else. I. Want. This. Bad. I mean, watch the video again. I usually watch it at least twice a day. In all reality, it's not too crazy expensive (see that self-justification there?). It comes with a bassinet, change basket and folds up well for travel. I've looked into reviews, and since it's fairly new there aren't too many, but every single one almost hasn't even been helpful because all it talks about is how awesome it is. I mainly wonder about the bassinet, knowing that most play yard bassinets are quite hard, and since these aren't in stores (to my knowledge, or at least not in Canada), there's no opportunity to go see one in real life. One review I found, after of course singing it's praises, said that comfort wise, it seemed to be no more or less comfortable than other play yards the reviewer had used, and though it is a bit heavier, it's so worth it in the long run for the convenience. I can't wait!!!

Why are these posts always SO LONG!

Ok, so cribs. Everyone needs a crib. Eventually. There's no way that a full sized crib would fit in our room, and we want baby to start in our room for at least the first few weeks. The crib is the one major thing that can wait on our list. We've looked at a few, but it will probably come down to price. I also think we'll probably want a convertible crib that is able to become a toddler bed/daybed, because what's the point of not being able to use it down the road! Crib mattresses are a whole other story... I'd really like to make sure we get a good quality mattress, but not go crazy. Naturepedic seems to be really highly rated, and comparable prices to other similar ones. Then I get the fun part of finding crib sheets :)

So, the dilemma is still where baby goes right away. One option is to borrow or buy a used bassinet that would just be used for the first few weeks. This is fairly limiting, and I know we both don't really like the thought of buying something that we'll have to get rid of in such a short time.

I may be able to borrow an Arm's Reach co-sleeper from a friend, which could be a good solution. I had thought about this from the beginning since we want baby close, but not in our bed. This can be attached right to the side of the bed, but can also be used as a play yard/bassinet on it's own if we wanted to keep it in our room but just move it away from the bed.

 We're still doing a lot of research on co-sleeping and whether it's the best solution for us or not, but I still think we'll have baby in our room to start before going to their own room in a crib.





The last option may be the best of both worlds, but is also a bit of a temporary thing and might not be the best investment for longevity. A mini crib. So, one brand in particular looks great, has really good reviews, but is pricey. I've looked up others on Amazon, but the reviews have been super sketchy, everything from faulty parts to being difficult to put together to emitting a weird paint smell. No thanks. Sometimes it's better to go with quality! If we could find one of these used, that would be incredible. The problem is that this particular one may only last a year. We'll be in our condo for at least 2 more years so ideally, we'd have one crib get us through the condo years and if we got something new for a house, no problem. But needing 2 cribs in 2 years may not be the most economical solution. The best part about this is that we could essentially use it as a co-sleeper in our room, since it's small and could fit by our bed/in our bedroom, unlike a full sized crib. Once baby goes to their room, we can just wheel the crib in, no problem. The other nice thing is that in this scenario, we could potentially keep our futon in baby's room for guests (where it is now) and if we have people stay over, just wheel baby's crib into our room for the night while we have guests. This is probably the most appealing part of this, as we like having people come to stay, but it's much nicer to be able to offer them their own room, especially once there's a baby! I'm hoping we can find a "mini crib" that's small enough to have all these advantages, but big enough to last 2 years.

Bloom Alma Mini Crib

What to do, what to do....

So there's our options. Plus thousands more than just these that I think I've narrowed down. I think I need to start getting the word out about this blog so I can get some comments and feedback on these long winded posts...if anyone sticks around long enough/has strong enough eyesight to read through it all! Now I feel like taking a nap.