Parenting Consistently

As I sit here listening to Gabby cry and patiently waiting for her to go to bed I am thinking of how hard it is to actually be consistent when parenting. I think that Mike and I are pretty good, but there are times when I totally realize I am going back on what I said or giving into her just because it's easier.

We have had an easy baby when it comes to going to bed....usually we go through our routine: Brush teeth, change diaper, change into PJ's, milk, read stories and go to bed. The past few weeks she has thrown (because of me of course) into our routine rocking. It's not after reading stories she says goodnight to her sister and then  we rock. We rock and rock and rock and while we rock we sing. We sing ants go marching, twinkle little star and ABC's. Sometimes it's all three, sometimes just ants. Normally this isn't a problem, we do that (which I don't mind, it's not like she falls asleep while we do it) but lately it's that she (I think) is using it to stretch out her bedtime at night. Tonight it took us 40 minutes to get down.

Mike and I usually, when we are both home, switch off of going into her room and getting her down. Most people might not say that's consistent, but that's whats worked for us. She usually realizes that when Mike goes in there she can't get away with stuff. Tonight (at least so far) it was me.

After 4 trips of going in there every 10 minutes and having her want to be rocked, with us telling her no, and some of us (okay both of us the first two times) rocking her when we said we weren't going to (hence the title of this post), we think we have her down. The last time I went in there and was met with the typical "all done". She wanted out of the crib. I thought she might be hot, so I took off her shirt. This is how it went:

Gabby: "rock, rock, rock"
Mama: "No Gabby, we already rocked tonight, we can rock more tomorrow okay?" as I am setting her back in her crib
Gabby: crying "want out, want out".
Mama: "Gabby use your words and tell mama why you want out of your crib"
Gabby: Thinking.....thinking.....thinking..... (it was actually super cute, because you could tell she was thinking and trying to figure out what to say to get out of the crib)
Mama: "Gabby you don't have to sleep but I want you to sit down in your crib and have quiet time"
Gabby: "Shirt on" - I put her shirt on
Mama: "Gabby are you ready to go to bed and lay down?"
Gabby: "Bed" - She laid down, grabbed her chicken, asked me to fix her blanket and so far it's been 10 minutes and I haven't heard a peep out of her.

I am sure it was a fluke, but it really shows how you need to be consistent and stick to your guns. Even though these kids are only 2 years old (or sometimes younger) they sure know how to manipulate us and they are darn good at it.  I know this isn't our last struggle but at least it's one that we won - at least for these 12 minutes, we will see how long she stays down ;)