Transitioning to siblings room

[Irene]

We are wondering how we can transition ds into dd's room. Neither of them go to sleep easily, and when we have tried to get them to sleep in the same room, they just feed off eachother and get more and more wound up. :shrug

any tips? Dh wants to know "what does everyone else do?" ;) we are pretty lost and without ideas here...

[MarynMunchkins]

I lie down with Colin and that keeps them both quiet and still. :giggle Or nurse Colin to sleep in the living room while Doug settles on his own in the bedroom. :)

[Irene]

this is our problem. One, ds wont nurse to sleep anymore, it seems to wind him up more. which is very frustrating, especially in the middle of the night :/ and when I lay down with him, he keeps popping back up to say goodnight or wave or kiss. DD *cant* be quiet, she tosses a lot and grunts and carries on... not a problem when shes by herself, but its way too distracting for him :/ then he pops up and she laughs and then they carry on :rolleyes

and I hate making bedtime into a war and being like "lay down and be quiet" every 2 seconds and I get so mad and well, as I have said before, Im so done by evening :blush I have pretty much used all my patience by this point :blush

Oh, Dh says that maybe lay down ds first then dd after hes asleep... that may work :think

[Gretchen]

At those ages, I'd try to put them to bed at separate times. That still works best for us, and our kids aren't even in the same room!

If you do want to put them down together, do you think you could read them to sleep (doesn't work for my kids, but seems to for others), or sing or something that gives the "time for bed" message and also distracts them (hopefully) about getting worked up over other stuff. When we've vacationed and the kids share a bed, I lay down between them and that works okay, but we didn't start that until they were a little older.

:hug2 :heart

Gretchen

[Irene]

yeah we might do that... course, now Im nervous about naps, cuz I cant really do it by myself, but then again, dd seems to be dropping her naps anyway. the other thing is nightime wake ups... going to the other room just sounds like such a pitb :/ we're still kicking it around...

no, they dont read to sleep :shrug Dh is actually putting ds to bed these days and its so wonderful :heart

thanks for the tips :tu :hug

[Dana Joy]

dd now 8, and ds now 6 have slept together since they were 2 and 4. i was a single mama in a little condo- so separate bedtimes really did not work. i laid with them and sang sothing songs, prayed and cuddled till they slept. now about 1.5 years ago we moved and gave them their own rooms- they hated it at night and would always ask to sleep together, so with this last move we gave in and they are again sharing a room with a bunk bed, but no one sleeps on top.

[snlmama]

Hmmm. My kids have their own rooms and insist on sleeping together, so at our house what works is to tell them they can only "have a sleepover" if they lay down and go to sleep. :shrug Not sure that' work if they have to sleep in the same room and not doing so is not a choice. :/
At your ds' age we read several books for bedtime stories and my youngest was usually asleep by the time I was done so I'd put him down and lay down w/ my oldest. Then they'd sneak into each others rooms later in the night. :giggle

We do still lay down w/ them to go to sleep and some nights we have to repeatedly remind them to lay back down and end up separating them and other nights they just lay down and go right to sleep. Wish I had a foolproof solution.

[Irene]

hmmm well I wonder if we should get a toddler bed or a twin bed and keep the crib in our room in case he needs to sleep with us? Oh I dont know!