Since we last talked , our transition from a crib to a bed (mattress on the floor, in our case) was going smoothly but I thought I’d let you know how it has been going since we first made the switch about a month ago…
Connor continues to be happy in his bed but did start venturing off the bed. Depending on his level of tiredness he either plays nicely for a short period of time or zonks right out to sleepyland. Though there have been numerous times when I have found him sound asleep on his floor, blankie in hand of course so I’d just scoop him right up and place him in bed. No problems.
But then someone figured out how to open doors…
I couldn’t help but giggle and feel a bit proud of his new little trick when one afternoon as I was sitting in my bed writing I heard his door open, his little feet pitter patter across the hall and stand in my bedroom doorway with a huge smile on his face. He was so proud.
Needless to say, there was no afternoon nap that day…
Since the objective of having Connor’s room set up Montessori style is to promote independence & decision making skills amongst other important traits, I didn’t want to lock him in there somehow. I decided that if he’s able to open doors I should just embrace it and work with it. I didn’t want to squash his new found independence.
Since he has been on the verge of transitioning from 2 naps to 1 a day I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to work that into a solution for our door opening dilemna. On most days, he would be ready to sleep around 9am and then again around 1pm. But with the new door opening trick, I started to not put him down for a nap until I knew he was really ready no matter if that meant taking a nap at 10, 12 or 1. This way there would be less of a chance of him getting right back up, opening the door and walking out. With this method, he would be content to lay down and sleep because he truly felt tired and I’m happy to say that this has been working out great for us! No more door opening before he’s fallen asleep!
Some days he does still take 2 naps. I just go with the flow. For the most part though, Connor is just taking one nap and then sleeping through the night from 6:30ish pm (sometimes earlier if he had one earlier mid morning nap) to 7-ish am. He is actually now sleeping later in the mornings than he ever has!
More times that not, he wakes up and starts playing rather then going straight to the door so Kyle or I end up going in before he even gets to the door. We placed a gate above the stairs for the times he does come out on his own and in the mornings he comes straight to our bedroom and I have to admit, I kind of enjoy that. 
how have your crib to bed transitions been? any other door openers out there?
pssst… have you voted on top baby blogs lately?
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Love it! Carter is too a huge door opener. But, I have started locking his door because we have no way to gate off our open landing stairs safely. He just gets up slowly and calls out for us, sometimes he’ll knock on the door and yell “MORNING!” That’s our cue
He sleeps better in his big boy bed, and never wakes up whining or crying for us anymore. He truly doesn’t feel confined, the choice is his to wake, or roll back over and fall back to sleep. His special “room toys” make staying in his room once he wakes up a treat. Luckily he is really good at playing AFTER he sleeps.
I’m so glad I researched this method. Can not wait to watch his independence grow!
I have never heard of the Montessori design. I like the idea of it but I am not sure I could sleep knowing my VERY active little boy has that kind of freedom.