Sleep at last!!!!

We are finally getting some good sleep around here!! When we went to the doctor's last Friday, he said that Ashlyn should be sleeping through the night. As I mentioned, he gave us some tips as to how to do it. We started on Sunday night. He said the important thing was to get her out of our room and into her crib in her room. He also said that we essentially needed to train her to sleep by herself. We need to put her in her crib when she is still a little awake so she learns to self-soothe. He said to let her cry for five or ten minutes, go in and soothe her, and repeat until she fell asleep. Well, this past week has been difficult but I think we are learning more and more each night and I think I may have finally got it down! The first two nights she cried for about a hour until she finally fell asleep. She woke up around two each night. (We decided that we would start the night by putting her in her crib and if she woke up we would let her sleep with us. We are hoping each night she sleeps longer and longer in her own crib.) I think the problem was that I was trying to put her to sleep when she was not tired enough. Well, Tuesday night I made sure I did not let her nap past five o'clock. We played with her a lot before bedtime. When she started acting tired, we went upstairs and I fed her. As soon as her eyes closed I put her in her crib. She was out until 5:00 a.m.!!!! It was wonderful! That was the best sleep I have gotten in a long, long time! Last night kind of got messed up because I was gone at Bunco. Joey had to put her to sleep. I don't think she drinks as much milk when she drinks out of a bottle. She woke up around 2:00 a.m. Tonight, I repeated what I did Tuesday night. She just went right to sleep when I put her down. Now, I am just really hoping she sleeps till five or later again! I really hope she is learning how to self-soothe and sleep on her own. I would love for her to be sleeping through the night! I just hope we are well on our way!

She has been doing some new stuff this week. Ashlyn LOVES to stand on her legs. She is really good at it. She can stand amazingly well for a four month old. She will stand with me holding her arms forever with a huge smile on her face! She also loves to play in her excersaucer. I think she likes this because she can "stand" and look around at everything. I also have discovered how much she loves to be sung to. I have been singing her all the kid songs and she just smiles and laughs. She can be crying and I start singing and she stops right away and smiles. Tonight, during her bath she played with bath toys for the first time. I have put them in the bath before but she has not really been too interested. Tonight she was having a great time with them. This really is such a fun age!!!! Below are some new pictures for everyone. Enjoy!

A picture of Ashlyn on her four month "birthday"

This is when she was not happy to be in her crib!

A few minutes later

Playing with her excersaucer, her new favorite toy

Getting ready to go for a car ride