sleeping separately

Ever since we brought Jonah and Micah home from the hospital, they've slept in the same bed together.

They shared one crib as babies...

(This is the first day they came home from the hospital, when they were 2 months old)

 (They were 9 months old in this photo)

After they kept escaping from their crib, they shared one toddler bed--which was actually the crib mattress on the floor in the crib surrounded by boards and walls so they couldn't get out...

(These photos were taken during naptime when they were almost 2 years old)

After they kept escaping from their toddler bed set-up, we moved them to a twin bed that was the bottom bunk and Ammon slept on the top bunk...

(This photo was when the twins still slept on the floor in the crib, and Ammon slept on the bottom bunk in another room, but they liked to climb to the top bunk to play)

(This photo was in 2008 when all 4 boys shared one bedroom: Kanyon in the toddler bed, Ammon in the top bunk, and the twins in the bottom bunk. It was a tight fit in their room at that time!)

When they got too big to sleep on the same twin bed together, we got a new bunk bed that had a double mattress on the bottom and a twin on the top, and they continued to sleep together on the bottom and Ammon slept on the top...

(This photo was taken in 2009 when they were 5 1/2 and they shared a room with just Ammon)

When we moved into our new home, and changed sleeping arrangements again, they slept together in just a double bed in their room alone. We put the older twin-size bunk beds in Kanyon's room and he slept in the bottom bunk, and Ammon got a new bunk bed in his room and he sleeps on the bottom bunk, too...

(Some of the boys' cousins and friends were playing in Jonah and Micah's room the day I took this photo)

But this past spring, Kanyon began having problems sleeping in his bed. He was always rolling off onto the floor, and he would sleep the rest of the night on the couch. And then this summer, he wasn't even sleeping in his bed anymore, he was just sleeping on the couch. I knew we needed to change things.

Jonah and Micah are turning 8 this month, and we figured that now that we have the space, they really are old enough to be sleeping apart. So, we took the twin bunkbeds out of Kanyon's room and converted them into two side-by-side beds and put them in Jonah and Micah's room. Then we took the double bed out of the twins' room and put into Kanyon's room.

(Kanyon's room before)

 (Kanyon's room now)

Now Kanyon is sleeping MUCH better in his new double bed, and Jonah and Micah are sleeping separately for the first time since they were in the hospital! It's been a month since we made the switch, and there's only been two or three nights when the twins have still ended up sleeping in the same bed together; for the most part they like their new separate beds, too!

(Jonah and Micah asleep in their new separate beds at age 7)