Sleep Patterns a-changing

All of a sudden our little Carmella decided she wants to be a tummy sleeper.

About four days ago Carmella started flipping herself over when placed in her crib for the night. At first it scared both Ella and me--now it mainly scares me. She still startles herself when she rolls over, but now at least she doesn’t scream all of the time. The screams were mainly because she didn’t realize that she could turn her head to the side and relax. Instead she held her little arms out in front of her, supporting her body, and kept her head up until mommy or daddy came in to rescue her.

Sometimes she gets herself so worked up that there is no calming her back to a state of relaxation needed for sleep. Those are the moments I dread and love at the same time. Until she got the hang of tummy sleeping, the only way to get her to nap was to take her into my bedroom with me and let her sleep in my arms. She still gets worked up but I know that she will never learn how to sleep on her own if I cuddle with her all of the time. So getting her accustomed to a new way of sleeping is absolutely essential.

The issue now is that she not only rolls, but moves around. Too many times I leave her smack in the center of her little bed only to come back less than five minutes later to find her curled up in one of the corners. This frightens me. If anyone has any suggestions of how to keep her from corner sleeping—please do chime in. She is still too little to get herself out of a “tight spot” (little O Brother, Where Art Thou reference).