Quiet Time

I posted a while back about how I was going to stop allowing Ryan to nap. Bedtime was a nightmare, and so I decided that in order to make him as tired as possible at night, naps would have to go. The result? Success!! Instead of taking 2 hours to fall asleep at night, Ryan now typically falls asleep within 30 minutes of Adam or I laying down with him. It. Is. So. Nice. 

 

However, I would be lying if I said giving up his nap was easy. By late afternoon Ryan is just exhausted. And cranky. And I'm tired because I no longer get a little break in the middle of the day. So I implemented "quiet time". Basically, Ryan has to stay in his room for approximately 45-60 minutes and play quietly. The first few days were very rough, but Ryan caught on to the idea pretty quickly after a lot of discipline for coming out of his room. For about a week I thought everything was great. He was learning to play independently and I was still getting some time to myself. 

 

But then he started getting creative. And naughty. I would watch him on the video monitor and see him doing some crazy things.

Tying things to the doorknob, climbing up onto his dresser, unplugging the video monitor, unpeeling and snapping all 64 crayons in the box, taking all the clothes out of his closet, and his personal favorite, "cleaning up". For him this means picking up absolutely everything in his room and putting it on top of his bed. Oh and then there was the day he discovered the Christmas wrapping paper box beneath his bed.

Quiet time is turning into more work for me than I anticipated. I am going into his room every 5 minutes to tell him to stop doing whatever destructive/dangerous thing he is doing. Ryan's latest thing is to constantly come out of his room to use the bathroom. Except it always seems to be a false alarm. But how can I say no to his request when we're in the middle of potty training?

Uggg this is feeling like more work than it's worth. How do you make quiet time quiet? And non-destructive?