Transitioning Our Son to a Big Bed from a Crib

Our son is turning 20 months and it was time for us to start moving him from the crib to a bed. Our sign that he ready was when he started to try and climb out of his crib. He could lift his leg over the edge of the crib and with a little effort he can pull himself almost over. So for us yes it is time to move him to a bed. Originally when we bought the crib we bought the four in one transition bed. But we are now re-thinking this great buy. We tried to convert the crib to a toddler bed and when we did we realized the bed is too high off the ground and we worried that our son would get hurt.

So what did we do next? We researched associated content and other websites to find out what other parents did. Most said they went right from a crib to a big bed and skipped the toddler bed. Most indicated it being a waste of money and that they would out grow out of it too fast. Regardless we kept researching and the more we researched the more we realized that the people who bought toddler beds were selling them after only a couple of months because their children were outgrowing them.

So we came to a decision, big bed. We spent an entire Sunday evening with our son prepping his room for the big bed. There was already a big bed in his room along with his crib. We just decided to take the bed off the frame and put it directly on the floor. We made him apart of the experience. We moved the crib to the end of the room and put the bed on the floor. We dressed the bed with some cool sheets and he ran and leaped right into bed, he was sooo excited. He could get on the bed himself and he could get off the bed just as easily. This is great we thought, so we moved on and proofed the room. We secured dressers and items to the wall that we thought could be harmful. We put safety knob covers on the doors. We removed all electric items from the room and covered all of the outlets. Then we noticed that he was jumping on the bed and in a very dangerous way. We tried to get him to stop but he would not, we sat up with him until 10 pm when he is usually in bed by 7:30 pm. This was not good, so we had to put him back in the crib. Night after night we continued to transition him to bed. Eventually he started to use his big bed but it did take a little coaxing. So now on to the next item the dreaded potty training.. stay tuned.