It's often said the time to move a toddler out of their crib is when they start climbing out. That never happened for us. Instead we steadily approached a self-imposed deadline.
We had decided to shift our son to a new bedroom, and a new bed, with plenty of time before the next child arrives in December. The crib needed to be free and better to not have this change associated with a new sibling. So the move was made at the end of September.
The new room already had a bed, a full-size platform bed that's low to the ground. Instead of getting rid of it and buying something smaller we're just rolling with the furniture we have. It's comically big, but it works. Finding kid themed sheets (trucks, duh) in full size turned out to be unsurprisingly difficult.
This bedroom needed a little work. The platform bed has slightly sharp edges/corners so some padding was applied. The furniture in there had to be rearranged so the rocking chair from his nursery would fit. My wife bought some cool artwork, six different hand-drawn truck pictures. After getting frames I hung them up in an array, requiring precisely drilled holes. Even though the result's not absolutely perfect, I'll have to get over it. Some other stuff went up too, only needing command strips. I found a storage contraption so our son has better access to his books. We had to move his clothes to a smaller dresser, though everything he's wearing now fit fine.
The biggest issue was the door. For whatever reason, the top sometimes got stuck in the frame. This seemed to happen when the room got warm, presumably expansion making a difference. Regardless, that couldn't stay as is with a two year old about to inhabit the space, so I took it down. Discovering that the door itself was cut poorly, the top wasn't flat, I got to work sanding. The contact spot in the frame was also rough, so I sanded (and repainted) up there too. Eventually satisfied, I rehung the door and loosened the top hinge screws ever so slightly for a better fit in the frame. When I thought I was done, reattaching the strike was tricky due to some preexisting holes. Nothing is ever easy in home improvement. That said, this little job was finished in one afternoon.
Lastly, I felt compelled to go through the closets of both his nursery and the new room. Clothes going back to 9-12 months had piled up in his nursery closet and all kinds of other baby stuff (pack-and-play, travel crib, jumper, mobiles...) were haphazardly strewn between the two. That obviously had to be better organized, have you met me? All the clothes were taken out, sorted and boxed. Anything that we'd want soon for the new baby was put into the nursery closet. Clothing boxes and other stuff transferred to the basement. Some junk could be tossed. Only a few things remain in the new bedroom closet. And it feels good.
How are thing going in the new room? The actual shift was rather painless, though after a couple days he asked, only once or twice, to go back to the crib. He's continued to sleep great, something for which we're continually grateful. Somewhat shockingly, he still doesn't get out of bed unprompted, staying in there happily until we ask him to get out. In some ways this is nice, in others a little troubling. More than anything, the troubling piece is a coinciding (and likely unrelated) backslide on the potty training front. Far too many bathroom trips are fights, as it's clearly not fun for him anymore. There's been a frustrating number of clothing changes and a few accidents in his new bed too. The way we handle this is an immediate rush after hearing him wake up, to make sure he gets quickly directed to the bathroom. Besides that, though, he appears to like his updated situation rather well. I still need to get another lamp he can turn on/off himself, but that's a problem for another day.
That's all for now, I hear the kid stirring upstairs (takes off running).
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