Desperately need sleep help!

[bella99]

Disclaimer: we are not co-sleeprs.  My 27 months old moved into a crib in her own room when she was 6 months old.  Neither she nor us were sleeping well with her in the room with us after reaching a certain point.  Also, she has a new sister, who is 4 weeks old.

So the first week of January, we moved her to a big girl bed.  My initial plan was just to put the bed in her room with the crib and let her adjust to in being in there until she felt ready to sleep there, but she was very excited about the bed and had started climbing out of her crib at every opportunity, so she started sleeping in there right away.

Prior to this, our bedtime routine was literally 5-10 minutes.  She and I would sit in the rocking chair and talk about her day or she would ask me to sing and I would.  Then we would give hugs and kisses, and I would put her in the crib and leave.  No crying at all, although sometimes she would play or talk to herself for awhile before falling asleep.  She consistently slept 8-7:30/8.

Since starting the bed, it takes about 30-45 minutes for her to fall asleep with either my husband or I in the bed with her.  She is also occasionally waking up overnight, and one of us goes into her room and lays down with her until she falls back asleep.  The biggest problem we are having is that she is now waking up between 6 and 7, so sometimes a full two hours earlier!  We are so tired, especially with the new baby!  She is still napping ok, averaging about 1.5 hours (down from an average of 2 hours), although we have to rock her until she falls asleep which is new.  When she gets up too early, she is miserable until after her nap.  It's not a matter of her just needing less sleep, because it is so obvious that she is sleep deprived.

How can we help her to sleep longer in the mornings?  Even if it was just consistently until 7 that would be great, but she is often waking up closer to 6.

Help!

[CrunchyChristianMama]

The waking up earlier in the morning lasted for a while with my DD as well when she moved to a regular bed (we aren't co-sleepers either), but it's been much better for a few months now (she's been in the bed for 8 months now).  It did seem to get better.  We nixed the laying in bed with her to fall asleep as well because that seemed to make things worse.  She's not a child that does well without a good quantity of sleep either, so we knew it wasn't a lack of need!

[bella99]

If you didn't lie in the bed with her, how did you get her to sleep?

We tried rocking her, but that takes almost twice as long and if we don't lay down with her, she won't stay in the bed.

[CrunchyChristianMama]

She falls asleep independently.  We have a whole routine that takes about 15 minutes with reading, praying, hugs, kisses, etc., and then we leave the room and she falls asleep.