Jodi Warned Me About Bunkbeds, But I Must Learn For Myself

We have decided it's time to transition Sarah from the crib to a bed. Once we're done with that...we'll be done with the crib forever. `Tis bittersweet. Anyway, to that end we needed to do some bed swamping. Literally.

Kate's been sleeping on the trundle bed from under our daybed which currently resides in the office. We had thought we'd move Kate to the daybed (she does enjoy it) and Sarah could have the trundle. Only the daybed is pretty huge and doesn't fit anywhere in the girls' room with all its corners and sloping ceilings. Conundrum. So we hit IKEA. Kate & Sarah love IKEA, it's like some sort of indoor park to them. As with most stores, it gives me a twitch. Nevertheless we made the trip.

Kate & Sarah played gleefully in the kids' section for about 45 minutes while Jeremiah and I hemmed and hawed over the bed. I was leaning heavily toward a reversible bed that could be bunk beds that would actually fit in their low-ceilinged room. Kate was in love with a little white toddler number. We agreed Kate's ardor was based on the bedding. In the end, we opted for the bunk beds with the (surprise!) Princess bedding. We wrote down all the aisle and bin numbers, trekked to the self serve area and plucked up everything we needed while Kate rode on the bow of the giant, unwieldy cart like a masthead. And we were done!

HA. Of course we weren't done. First, we required 4 hours to clear the space and build the @#$%ing bed. We washed all the bedding, rudely dumped our kids off with Steve & Joy at their block party (Kate never left the moonwalk, we're told), and I was hoping Kate, at least, could sleep in her new bed that night. We did all this without a beer because we're trying to lose weight. It was horrible. When the block party was over and the kids could eat no more sugar, Jeremiah was dispatched to retrieve them while I put the finishing touches on the bed. I raced downstairs to get the mattresses and threw the first one on Kate's bunk only to find...it was way too small.

Kate slept in the office on the daybed. I'll spare you the follow-up story of returning the mattresses. Suffice it to say, the mattresses on there now are not from IKEA. And IKEA - you and I are over.

Now then. The beds are up. Kate's DELIGHTED. Sarah's not quite ready to sleep in them yet. And after a few nights of Kate roughly sleeping in the top bunk, I've overcome my heart-stopping fear that her bunk will collapse on top of tiny Sarah. I can't remember how long we had the "big girl" bed set up in tandem with the crib for Kate before Kate finally opted to leave the crib, but it seems like it took a few months. So we're ready for a slow change. Sarah loves her new bed, just not for sleeping. The real problem is she's fearless and won't stop climbing up to Kate's bunk and hanging over the edge. We'll have to somehow put a stop to that...hopefully in a less painful way than just letting her fall and break a bone.
Jodi, of course you were right way back when you said "never get bunkbeds, they're impossible to make and I'm forever finding weird hidden treasures in them". I've already injured my head making both beds and there's a chance the kids have learned some inappropriate language. Still, the beds are so cute...