Tuesday 12 April 2011

From cot to a big bed

I have three major tasks to tackle with my 2-year old in the upcoming months.  One I've mentioned already, is him starting nursery in September. At some point in the summer we'll get to potty training. The third one, which seems the easiest of the three,  is moving him from his cot to a big bed and this is the one we'll be doing first and quite imminently. I've decided on the long  Easter weekend to make the move when my husband will be at home for a few extra days to help out.

We rent our flat so it comes furnished and there's certainly no space for a toddler bed in my son's room. There's a double bed in there so we have no choice but to move him into that. It really will be a 'big bed'!  As I am yet to make the transition with my son, I have no words of advice to offer as yet but I thought would share my plan of action, thoughts and fears in the hope that some of you who have already gone through this stage can share some advice in the comments!

So my plan of action has been as follows....firstly talking about it with my son to introduce the idea and hopefully get him comfortable with it.. I've explained that now he's not a baby any more, he gets to move into a big bed soon and be just like mummy and daddy. He'll have lots more space and it'll be great! He seems to be pretty open to the idea but of course it may be a different matter when he actually makes the move.

A few weeks ago I searched for a book about a child moving from their cot to a big bed. I thought it would be helpful to have a story to read and enjoy as preparation too.  To be honest I struggled to find a good book on the subject.  I ended up getting Sophie's Big Bed. It's ok and the short simple story is reassuring to children I think but it wasn't  quite what I was looking for.

Something else I have done recently is to swap his gro-bag with a duvet for sleeping in his cot at night, as he'll have a duvet for most of the year on his big bed. He's done fine sleeping under it. The only slight difficulty has been that he often pushes it off when he gets warm but then wakes up cold around 6am and hasn't yet grasped the reaching and pulling it over himself yet.  I have been going into his room to  put it back over him and then he sleeps for another hour or so.

I've been thinking about bed guards and coincidentally read on northernmum last week about a kind of bed guard that sounds simple and  effective that we might try out. Bed guards because of course I worry  about my son falling out of his bed at the beginning. My other fears (maybe that's too strong a word) are him not staying in bed at bedtime because it will be easier for him to get out by himself, getting up too early in the morning and feeling uneasy with all the extra space around him when he does go to sleep. I also wonder if his afternoon nap will become more of a struggle. I'm not ready for him to give that up just yet!

Now over to those of you who have made the move with your child already....what were the most challenging aspects of moving your child into a big bed? Are there any concerns I should have that I've missed? Do you have any helpful tips for making the transition smoothly? Do let me know in the comments!

---

Photo credit

---

No comments:

Post a Comment

Thank you for reading. I'd love to have your comments and thoughts!