Sadie’s New “Big Girl” Bed + the Rocky Transition Period

Sadie’s last night to sleep in her crib was the night before our movers in Kansas disassembled her crib to take to Alabama. We decided months ago that with a new house and new bedroom came a new big girl bed for Sadie since she’d be just about two years old anyway (let’s just knock out all of the transitional “suck” at the same time, ‘eh?), so I choked back a few tears as I laid her in her crib for the last time and got my mind right that she’d soon be settling into a new bed.

We stayed at my parents’ house for 10 nights after arriving to Alabama before we closed on our home, and the girls slept in a room together as they usually do when we visit. Hadley sleeps in a queen bed and Sadie is nearby in a pack-n-play. This time we asked my parents to set up a twin mattress on the floor against a wall instead of putting out the pack-n-play so that we could use that time to get Sadie adjusted to a normal bed before moving into our home.

I actually transitioned Hadley right around the same age (also during a visit to my parents’ house), and it could not have gone a single ounce smoother. We hoped it would be the same with Sadie, but homegirl could sense the freedom this twin bed now gave her and she was ready to party.

The first night was such a total disaster. We are extremely comfortable practicing tough love in the sleep department, but hearing her wail for her crib was too much for me. She was only 23 months after all, so we set the pack-n-play up after an hour of struggles and let her go right to sleep.

After a couple of days of the pack-n-play though, something flipped in her mind and she begged and begged to lay on the mattress on the floor. We let her, but every time she would get up, we would threaten her with going back to the pack-n-play. We try really dang hard to follow through with our threats (that’s the former high school teacher in me – “Do not threaten unless you are prepared to act!”), so there were several times that we plopped her back in the pack-n-play for a few minutes to show her that we were serious; LAY DOWN.

By night #6 (out of 10) at my parent’s house, she went out cold in her twin bed with only about 10 minutes of protesting. By our last night there, there was no fussing. 10 days seemed like a terribly long time (I dreaded bedtime every single night as it often took 60-90 minutes to get her to fall asleep), but by the time we moved into our home, she was good to go.

We upgraded Hadley to the queen bed that we’d previously used in a guest room (which will still be used as a guest bed since we don’t have a dedicated guest room anymore), put Hadley’s twin day bed in their play room for now, and we ordered everything we needed to convert the crib into a full bed.

Until everything arrived for her full bed, Sadie slept in the twin day bed (ended up being about a week). Somehow the mounds of toys everywhere didn’t tempt her to get up. I think the exhaustion of moving and unpacking wore everybody out that first week or so, including the kids. 😉

Setting up the crib as a full bed using the conversion kit was easy; Jamie did it in about 20 minutes. It’s hard to believe that it was a crib. I think it looks so pretty both ways!

With setting up your kid with a new bed comes a load of new things that said bed needs:

• mattress
• box spring
• waterproof mattress topper
• sheets
• bedding
• safety rails

During my search for a good mattress, my mother-in-law told me that one of her neighbors raved about the “mattress in a box” they’d ordered from Amazon. I quickly looked it up and couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw the price of the mattress compared to the 15k+ outstanding reviews. I am a HUGE “read the reviews first” kind of shopper, so I didn’t need any more convincing. How had I never heard of this mattress before?

We ordered and (the mattress is currently $30 cheaper than what we paid!), and we are beyond pleased with it so far. We would absolutely consider it again and again to put on every bed in our home. I absolutely love snuggling with Sadie because her bed is so darn comfortable!

We ordered , (during a lightning deal and whoa – we love them), and set (to match her mint and pink decor that we’ll put up soon).

We struggled the first afternoon we put her in her bed for a nap (I think the poor girl was just so, so very confused after sleeping in a zillion beds throughout the last few weeks), but now we’re down to a couple different hollers for extra snuggles and then she’s out.

Also, I cannot believe this is my third post dedicated to Sadie’s sleep. The first was about transitioning her from co-sleeping to the crib at 9ish weeks old, and the second was about working with a sleep trainer when she was 10 months old. Seems kind of ridiculous to write about a child’s sleep so much, but every parent knows that a lack of sleep will make you a crazy person. We are all desperate for good sleep (because sleep, in fact, isn’t an optional part of living)!

If you’re about to transition your kiddo from the crib to a bigger bed, good luck! If you’re in a different season of parenting where sleep is a struggle, you’re not alone! There’s so many seasons where kids struggle with sleep for one reason or another.

The sleep trainer I worked with over a year ago told me something that I have never forgotten and made so much sense to me. It was powerful. She said that as parents, it is our job to teach our kids how to sleep. It might be really stupidly hard at times, but it’s worth it to teach their brains and bodies how to get the rest that they require (and that you do too). That gave me a lot of peace and confidence in the tough love we sometimes have to show the girls when it comes to their sleep. Just thought I’d share in case that resonates with you too!

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