Little ones sharing the same room

[lovelylisa]

For you mamas who are having another child, what are your sleeping arrangements going to be for the newest addition?

I have a cosleeper that I will be using for sometime after the baby's birth, (DS started sleeping through the night at 8 months, so we moved him to a crib) but I still plan on setting up a nursery in his room, for naps and etc. He will be 2.5 when his brother or sister will be born. We have a 2 bedroom apartment so the only real choice will be to divide up his room somehow for the crib, new baby clothes, etc.

How are you mamas handling this in your house? Any concerns about doing it this way? How are you decorating?

[SuburbanHippie]

Right now we're living in a 3 bedroom house.  The boys share a bedroom and the girls share a bedroom.  We close on our new house at the end of the month so we're planning on letting the oldest boy have his own room.  Then YDS (will be 4) and the baby will share a room once the baby is done co-sleeping with us.

My kids love sharing bedrooms btw, but the age gap between my boys is 8 years so I think ODS will be excited about having his own "tween" room.

[atpeace]

Not in your club, but still wanted to barge in 

We're planning on having DD and DS share a room once I'm done night-nursing (in a few years!).  DD is already talking excitedly about bunk beds.  I don't think it's a big deal to have kids share rooms.  I shared with my brother until we were teenagers, and while it was annoying in the last few years, I didn't think anything of it when we were younger.  I figure, smaller house = less room = less consumption = less crap accumulating and less cleaning!  And as for decorating, the only decorating we do is sticking DD's artwork on the walls...nothing else matches anyway since their toys and clothes are all different colours, so trying to coordinate anything in this house is impossible!  

But maybe I'm just a lazy mama, tee hee! 

[noahs.mom06]

My two older kids share a room now, and have since DD was about a year old, DS was 3 1/2. At the time, he was still in his toddler bed, and she was in her crib. We had both of those beds in their room, and one of their dressers in the closet and the other out in their room. Somewhere shortly after DS turned 4 we bought him a loft bed that DD's crib could fit under, and now that DD is in a toddler bed it is under the loft, coming out at a 90 degree angle, with one of their dressers also under the loft and the other at the foot of DD's bed. They still have a lot of room for toys and whatnot, so if we are still living here when this new baby stops cosleeping, we could easily have room for a crib in there. We're hoping to be in a 3 bedroom place by then though...

[matty02]

I don't know what to do. I have a three bedroom and DS and D step-S share a room (they are only 2 years apart). This works great because DSS doesn't sleep well on his own. The problem will be that DD will have to share a room with the new baby once the baby gets too old to sleep in my room. There will be an 8 year age gap and if this baby is a boy I don't know what I will do! 

[atpeace]

I'm curious to know why it seems to be more of an issue when the kids are opposite sex?  Just wondering...

Is it the decor?  

Shouldn't the issue be whether the kids get along or not, regardless of their sex...

[matty02]

If my children were young and close together in age I wouldn't be as worried about different sexes sharing a room. Since my DD is already 8 I am more worried because before I know it she will be 12 or so and wanting her privacy. I worry about her sharing with a toddler. It will have to be what it is but I still feel bad for her and if it was a girl at least it would be a little more comfortable for her. 

I will say that my two boys go in the closet to change. I never taught them to be shy changing in front of each other but they want the privacy. Other than that they like sharing a room. 

My half brother and sister shared a room when they were little. They were only 2 years apart and liked sharing a room until they got a bit older. For a year my DS and DD had to share a room when DS was 7 and DD was 3. They liked it. 

[FoxintheSnow]

We're trying to figure this out now. We have a 4 bedroom, but it might as well be a 3 bedroom since dh uses the fourth as a home office. What complicates things even more is our house has a split floor plan. 2 bedrooms (ds's room and home office) are upstairs and the master and dd's room are downstairs. DD's is big enough to share if we got her a twin bed. Right now she has a queen bed. It was our old master bed before we got a king, then it was our guest bed now it's her bed. I'd hate to get rid of it because it is such a nice mattress. It is sooo comfortable. The other issue is, dd is a light sleeper. I'm afraid a baby crying will wake her up. We'll probably start out cosleeping, but I don't want to do that into toddlerhood.

[tea_time]

We're thinking this over as well.  DD will be almost 4 when this baby arrives.  We'll either put them together and keep the playroom or turn the playroom into a bedroom so they each have their own.  I'd love to be able to keep the playroom the way it is, but I'm afraid that sleeping will be disrupted if they're together.  DD is a great sleeper and I'd hate for that to change!  

If this baby is a boy I think I'd be more likely to have separate rooms b/c DD's room is very girly right now (lots of pink even though the walls are a light blue).

[Inkedstar]

Oy vey, wish I had this all planned out. Apparently I'm not alone though.

 Our home is three bedrooms with 1 bedroom being used as a play-room. Right now we have ODD in her own room on the top level of her loft bed. YDD is in bed with DH & I, which is already a bit crowded since our bed is only queen sized. DH is really hoping that YDD will be moved into ODD's room (floor level bed) by the time the new LO arrives.   I'm not so confident that will be happening since YDD just weaned and has co-slept since she was born.

I was considering possibly ODD & YDD sharing the floor level bed so YDD can get used to sleeping in another room with someone else. If that doesn't work, then DH will likely land in the floor level bed with YDD. I'm thinking this arrangement might work out better after the LO is born so I can sleep in a seperate room with the newborn and not wake anyone else up (changing, feeding, etc).

And if that doesn't work and we become desperate, we have part of our sectional couch (think chaise lounge) upstairs in our bedroom (where DH & I sleep). YDD may need to crash there until she is comfortable moving into another bedroom.

Potty learning and changing sleep arrangements are big changes for YDD, I'm trying not to pressure her and I know we'll deal with whatever situation we have going on when the baby arrives. Sometimes I just feel so guilty about trying to push these changes.

[Gismobabe]

We also have a 3 bedroom and soon 3 kids. My DD wants the baby in her room but she will be 7 and does not know what she is in for. The baby will be in our room for about a year and then I will move the baby to the room that seems best at the time. I am waiting to see whether the baby will be closer to my son or daughter and I figure it will somehow work out. I shared a room all my childhood years and I feel it was a big advantage for me.

The privacy issue might happen but then again my whole family is not that worried about nudity.

By the time this baby is 12 my oldest DD might have left the house already!

[samhope]

We are not decorating, although this time around I have decided to have a changing table as it might be nice to have the baby out of my son's reach and also for the storage.  I think I might also get a baby hammock. My son will be 2yr 10mo when baby is born and he just switched into his own room at 2yrs (still sleeps in bed with us from 3-6am), so I am thinking the next baby probably will too and then once baby is 2 they will sleep together.  We have a trundle bed with 2 great mattresses set up, so I think that should be enough.  Maybe I am oversimplifying things??  Figure it will all work itself out.  When my brother and I were 3 and 2 we were moved into separate rooms, but continued to chose to sleep in the same room till we were 7 and 6.  That is 5 years away for me and I have no idea what kind of a house we will be in then.  Maybe bunkbeds to give them personal space.  Not sure:)  Son's room is just decorated with lots of his art and phots of people who love him, so gender neutral.

[staryla]

Our 2.5 yr old will be sharing his room with his new sister.  My biggest concern right now is the crying baby waking up DS.  We never let DS 'cry it out' but he did start sleeping in his own room once he outgrew the bassinet.  We'd end up staying in his room until he went to sleep which sometimes took hours.  If this new baby is a worse sleeper or even about the same I don't know how this will interrupt DS's sleeping not to mention his whole bedtime routine.

Sharing a bedroom later on doesn't seem as much an issue as what to do when the little one wakes up throughout the night and has trouble going down.  DS sleeps all night long by himself and I don't want to screw that up!

How in the world do you put two young children to bed if there is only one parent home?  I need some input from you more experienced mamas!

[sunnymw]

We are renting a 2 bedroom house, but luckily the bedrooms are both HUGE. Heck, in the boys' room, we have 2 toddler beds, a huge dresser, play stands (disassembled now, the arches broke), and a train table... with room to spare!!

The boys will stay in their room, but I'll get them a new dresser so I can put the changing table in our bedroom. I'll have the crib set up for naps, but we'll probably wind up co-sleeping most of the night.

The boys still crawl into our bed around 3-5am.... I need to find a way to stop that, because there is just NO MORE ROOM in our king bed!! LOL

[noahs.mom06]

Originally Posted by staryla 

How in the world do you put two young children to bed if there is only one parent home?  I need some input from you more experienced mamas!

I have a lot of experience with this one... we finally brought DD home from all of her hospital adventures when she was 6 months old, and then DH left for basic training for the army a week later! Before the kids were sharing a room, I just put DS (the older child) to bed first. I would put DD in her crib usually while I put DS down. Having a set bedtime routine for him really helped streamline the process (putting on pj's, reading a story, prayers, then bed). DD didn't nurse, but I had a lot of medical stuff I had to do with her every night, hooking her up to IV nutrition and whatnot, so there was just no other option, DS HAD to go to bed first so that I'd be able to take care of DD. But, I'd imagine it would be the same with a "normal" baby, the baby requires more in-depth attention to put to sleep with nursing and whatnot, so it would make sense to put the older child to bed first.

Once the kids started sharing a room (after DD wasn't on IV nutrition overnight anymore, she was around a year old when we moved her into DS's room), it got even easier. She already slept through the night (she always did, from birth really, because she was constantly receiving nutrition either IV or through her feeding tube, so she wasn't hungry and really had no reason to wake up). We just incorporated DD into DS's already established bedtime routine, and put them both down at the same time. It has worked great for us, and for the most part is really pretty easy... although, like I said, DD isn't exactly "normal", so I don't know that it would be nearly as easy if the younger child was still night-nursing/night-waking and the kids were sharing a room...

[staryla]

Thanks for the input Noahs mom!  It probably won't be as big a deal as I'm worried about, but this is actually the one thing that routinely occupies my mind this pregnancy. LOL.