Quick - tell me how to deal with this one!

[MyNameIsInigoMontoya]

DD (nearly 2) has been going absolutely ape in her cot for nearly 45 minutes now - since I switched off the landing light to try and get them both to sleep - because she wants it back on so she can "read" Mr. Men all evening in her cot. (She's keeping DS awake too...)

I have been up dozens of times, given cuddles, talked to her, offered to rub her back (which she sometimes wants to help her get to sleep - but not today as she doesn't want to sleep...) - even put the light back on briefly to calm her down, but then of course she just kicked off again as soon as I switched it back off.

Really don't want to give in and leave the light on, otherwise we will have meltdowns about it every night, or she (and DS) will just stay up reading till really late and then be monsters the next day... but how on earth else can I get her to stop screaming and finally go to sleep before I go completely insane? It is wiping out all my precious evening too so I am getting quite and ...

I should add she already had 3 stories before bed, so it's not that she hasn't had enough! Should be glad she likes reading I suppose

Buy her a wee nightlight so she can read in her cot?

hmm i would probably stand my ground but then i wouldn't allow a nearly 2 year old to be reading at 9pm. it all depends on the rest of your routines i think....

Phew - she gave in eventually. I nearly caved, had gone up again and put the landing light on but I think she had finally tired herself out. The cheeky monkey sat up and looked at me and said "medicine?", but after checking she wasn't actually poorly, she sat on my knee for a bit and calmed down (seemed to have finally forgotten about the books thank goodness...).

Then after a bit she just said "bed?", so I popped her in and then she asked for her comforter and curled up for me to rub her back; and then after a bit she said "dark?" and sent me to switch the light off so she could sleep. Pity she couldn't have done that an hour earlier!

I thought about a nightlight, that would help if she was scared of the dark but if she's just wanting to read then she would just stay up for ages unless I switched it off, so it would be the same problem really.

Hopefully she isn't going to start doing this every night... I am still a bit at wasting most of my evening going up and down the stairs! Mind you I was a total bookworm as a child so my mum probably had just the same with me

Well done you for sticking to your plan! It is probably just a phase. I too was a bookworm and would be exhausted in the morning, even when I was older. Dad would get up in the middle of the night and find me pouring over a drawing at my desk or hunched under the duvet reading. I suppose you should be happy really :)