Liam's Lovey

We are desperately auditioning a "lovey" for Liam. A lovey, apparently, is some soft thing that a baby takes to and it will help him or her fall to sleep. We're keenly interested in Liam sleeping better and all the baby sleep books I've read (and there have been many over the past year) say some version of "a lovey will help any child sleep better." Sounds great. So far, Liam hasn't quite taken to the whole concept. To the extent he's interested at all he has, of course, rejected the super-safe knitted lovey-fuzzy-bunny thing in favor of "soft doggie" the flip-floppy stuffed animal with the dangerous choking hazard plastic nose and eyes. I've seen Liam chew on them more than once.

We've got to figure something out. Liam's bedtime routine leaves a lot to be desired. Tonight's fun went like this: 6:15 pick Liam up from my parents' house and bring him home; 6:30 - 7:15 Liam plays with Will, this involves Will trying to get Liam to be interested in being still and looking at books and Liam running around; 7:15 begin the move towards bedtime, bring Liam upstairs, brush teeth, and quietly change him into his PJs; 7:30 rock in rocking chair, Liam drinks final baby bottle of the day. All is going pretty good up to this point. Liam is really tired. He napped well, so should sleep well.

He finishes bottle, snuggles for about 2 minutes, and then it starts. Liam wants to get down and play on the floor. When he isn't allowed to he cries. Liam wants to hid soft doggie under the pillows on the bed and find him again. When he isn't allowed to he goes nuts. Liam does not want to be in his crib. He also does not want to be held. So, we go into the crib with patting and comforting and trying to get him to lie down. When he gets too worked up, we go into the rocking chair again. More crying. More to the crib. Now it's about 8:30 and Liam is so tired that half the time when he tries to sit up in his crib he falls over. Still no sleep. Liam throws everything out of his crib on to the floor. Then wants it all back. I sit in the rocking chair next to the crib and wait for him to calm down. More crying. Finally at about 9:15 Liam is tired enough that he allows himself to be rocked to sleep. I go downstairs to start the work I didn't get to at the office today. Some version of this happens basically every night. We hope and pray that he adopts a lovey soon and that it works.