Transition

We have made the big move. Evalyn is now sleeping in a big girl bed! And I've got to say, easiest transition I have ever done. I was a little nervous to do it, not knowing what would come of it. I have friends that struggled with this for months, and I was already preparing myself to lose sleep over her coming into my room several times a night. Luckily, she's never gotten out of her bed. It's been 3 nights now. I wanted to write this down to help me remember in the future of what I believe made this easier.

1. Halo Sleepsack. This thing is so great. I totally have friends that have joked about this with me, but honestly, it was the best thing to train her to go to sleep. I know alot of toddlers start fighting naps once they hit 18 months or 2 years, and I can honestly say I haven't had that problem. For a while her naps were only an hour and 20 minutes or so, but after a few weeks they got longer. One thing though is that whenever I put her in her sleepsack and put her in her crib or bed, I never hear a peep out of her. She either goes right to sleep or plays silently for a few minutes til she falls asleep. I credit the sleepsack with teaching her when shes wearing that it means shut your eyes. :)

2. We introduced "time out" punishment before introducing her to a big bed. My theory was that if she understands when I tell her to not get out of her timeout chair, she will understand me when I say do not get out of your bed. We have been doing "timeout" for about 2.5 weeks now, and it's worked wonders on this girl.

3. I let her choose where she wanted to sleep. Everytime she has asked for her bed. Now that thats been consistent for 4 days, I'll have Daniel take down the crib tonight. I wanted her to be comfortable and want to sleep in her new bed instead of taking down the crib right away and giving her no options.

Ev has never had that one "thing" she had to sleep with, which is why the sleepsack I think has worked so well for her. Another bonus of it--a child can not climb out of their crib with one on. It would be suuuuper hard if not impossible. I didn't transition her because she would climb out, I just did it cause I thought she was ready. Shes been tall enough to climb out of her crib since she was 15 months old, but shes never done it except if she was playing around in there during the day, because shes always been wearing her sleepsack. Anyway, these are my pointers for my future self or for whoever else may be reading.

Note--the first night in her big bed ev slept from 7:30p-7:20a, rolled off, and I put her back in bed and she slept til 9AM. Unheard of for this girl. and so AWESOME for me!