getting out of big bed and coming in to our room TOO EARLY!

[me and bean]

hi everyone

we put bean into a 'big-boy' bed two weeks ago (he's 27mo), because we need the crib for a new baby coming soon.  he loves it, and generally stays in there till i come get him out.  but 2 mornings (not in a row, just random) now he has materialised at my bedside at 5.48am!!!  this is from a usual 7-7.30am waker - bean that is.  well, mummy too... 

i want to nip this in the bud before it gets to be a habit.  and i did transition him with a few months left in my pregnancy, so if this did happen, we would have some time to work it out.  what did you do?

i don't know if this has anything to do with it, but his nap since he has been in a bed now, has lengthened from 1.5hrs to 3hrs!

would love to hear any advice.

thank you.

[lawnseed]

hi!
sorry for your early mornings 

i found with my dd at around the same age she started waking at around 530 and not going back to sleep again. at the time she was having 3 hour naps in the day - i thought i'd cut down to anhour and a half to see if that made a difference, and it did! we went back to 700 starts. i increased nap time again after that and i now wake her at 2 hours as after 1.5 she was sooooooooo sleepy, and we still have a usual 7am waking.

maybe the same for you? that 3 hours is such a blessing when pregnant though, you could just wait and see if it's a phase

hope you sort it

Lorna

[mari]

If he comes in to your room too early the best thing is to take him back to his bed and say, 'no it's still nighttime, you need to go back to sleep'

Try blackout curtains or dakening the room so that he isn't thinking that it's daytime. I would also try to encourage him to call if he needs you rather than come to you as he might go walkabout during the night and fall or something

[me and bean]

thanks.

this morning was 6.48am.  thankfully. 

am i going to confuse him by letting him stay up when he comes in at this hour.  but taking him back to bed when he comes in earlier?

[mari]

Well, if he knows that during the night, when it's dark, he must sleep and he will get taken back to bed. 
I would try to encourage him to call you from his bed rather than come to you, even when it is time to get up, but when he does wake at a reasonable time and you decide to get up you can say something like 'good morning, you had a good night and didn't come to mummy until it was time to get up, well done'  Just to help reinforce it a little.  I hope that helps.

[Samuel's mum]

Can you get one of these:
http://www.bunnyclock.com/

So when the bunny wakes up he knows it's time to come in.

(Except a son of a friend of a friend still got out of bed and announced, 'something is wrong with bunny. He's not waking up'. )

[dkitto]

So when the bunny wakes up he knows it's time to come in.

(Except a son of a friend of a friend still got out of bed and announced, 'something is wrong with bunny. He's not waking up'. )

That is so funny 

I have to say it works well for us, most mornings 

[me and bean]

thanks for your help...  will check out the bunny clock (haaaa so, funny) too.

well, it's been a month and now we are here:

i put foil on his windows so his room is completely blacked out.  his naps after a couple weeks resumed to 1.5hrs, which is fine with me. 

and his new wake-up time appears to be 6am. 

BUT, now he comes in in the middle of the night too!  anywhere from 2am-5am.  sometimes i put him back to bed just once, but sometimes he'll keep coming back up to 13x dammit!  the first time i tell him, "it's still nighttime, it's not time to get up yet, let's go back to bed and go to sleep."  if he gets out again, i tell him, "back to bed."  the third time, i say nothing (supernanny style) and escort him back to bed.

is this just a phase?  anything else i can do?  #2 is due in two months and dh is a pilot so he is away alot, am wondering how i manage these little appearances in the night while i am breastfeeding???