The art of Bribery!

When our babies are babies, we practice co-sleeping. For me, I feel like I get the most sleep if I'm not having to fully wake up, get baby, feed baby, put baby back in crib/bassinet and then try to fall back asleep, rather than just rolling over, feeding baby and going back to sleep! This works for us. I know some people will talk you to death about all of the negatives. Honestly, until I had Oliver I probably would've too but he was such a fussy baby it was literally the only way we could go. And it worked so we stuck with it. Having said that, my nearly 3 year old is still sleeping in my bed. It really doesn't make a difference most of the time because Berto works graveyard and isn't home to sleep in our bed most nights anyway! But, Isaac is getting older and I feel like I need to get him out of my bed. So we are implementing the ever popular sticker chart! Isaac will get a sticker for each night he sleeps all night in his own bed and in turn will get a scooter of his very own. I am a firm believer in situations like this you have to make the bribe worth it or the whole plan will backfire. Potty training was a breeze and I know it was probably partially because he was ready and mostly because we picked the right prize! So we begin the attempt to get him in his own bed, in his room!
Now, I realized when I came up with the right prize, that I was going to have a jealous 5 year old on my hands, and there are some things I've been wanting to work with Oliver on. Mainly, channeling his anger/frustration and using his words more effectively rather than punching his little brother. So Oliver has a chart too. He has to go through the entire day without hitting Isaac when he's mad. He has to learn to use his words to express what he is feeling. If he goes through the entire day, he gets a sticker before bed each night. Oliver will also be rewarded with a scooter!
So there you have it. The art of bribery. Ok, really I'm not bribing them. I'm richly rewarding them for working on some things that need to be worked on! Wish us luck!