Bed time

I'm on day 3 of trying to get Jax to fall asleep without a bottle and without being rocked. Yes! Jax is 21 months old. Yes! He was still in a bottle. Yes! I still rock him even though he's 30+ pounds. I'm trying to turn all that into past tense.
In my defense, it has been absolutely wonderful having a baby who drinks from a bottle. You have to remember, Maryam stopped taking a bottle before she was 9 months old. I admit that my reasons for keeping Jax on a bottle are selfish and that's part of the reason I'm trying to stop his bed time bottle.
Getting Jax to go to bed without being rocked is for selfish reasons. Don't get me wrong! I love cuddling with Jax. I love listening to him sing "Its a Small World After All" as he drifts off to sleep. But I do not like lugging my 30+ pound baby into his bedroom and then lowering him into his bed. He's killing my back! If he weren't such a giant it wouldn't be such a big deal. My thought is, if I can stop it now then I wont have to worry about doing it when he's 35+ pounds!
Night one was a success. I told Maryam it was time for bed and had her go lat down in her bed. Then I told Jax to go lay down in his bed. She fell asleep within minutes. It took Jax 45 minutes and some patting, singing and laying him back down, but he did it! He fell asleep without being rocked and without a bottle.
Night two was also a success. Night two was similar to night one, only it took 25 minutes to get him to go to sleep. 20 minutes less than night one! Night three, tonight, was slightly more difficult. I decided to be ambitious. I wanted both of my kids asleep before 9. Those of you who are close to my little family know that my kids are usually up late. Not too late by my standards, not late at all by Christi's standards and way too late by Sarah's standards. Its all relative. But tonight I managed to get them both asleep by 8:40 pm!  Tonight it took Jax 36 minutes to fall asleep without a bottle and without being rocked.  So, by my standards, night three is a success.