Sleeping - siblings to share a room?

[jamjarparmar]

Hiya - I am planning ahead, and considering getting my two DDS to share a room. When this happens, the eldest will be 3.5 and the youngest 5 months.. do you think this would work or is it a recipe for disaster? any tips?

[princessbride]

recipe for disaster especially if 3.5 already has an established sleep pattern, a 5 month old is going to disrupt his pattern...not sure if its fair on 3.55

[jamjarparmar]

hmm maybe I should wait a fair bit more then until the youngest is older.

[rarrie]

I have a 7 month old and a 3.7 year old. They will share a room and my eldest DD can't wait to share a room, but I'm not letting them share until the youngest can go in the bottom bunk (at about a year, when she can walk, with a trundle bed underneath her, pulled out in case she falls out!) Also, at the mo, now she can crawl putting her to bed takes forever, because she just crawls everywhere. Personally, I'm waiting because a) lack of bedroom space for a bed and a cot in there, and b) she would wake up my eldest.
HTH

[jamjarparmar]

Thanks Rarrie - bunkbeds are a nice idea, I certainly loved them when I was a kid.

[greenday]

I've got a 3 yr old DD and my 2nd is due next month. At this moment, we live in a 2-bedroom flat so I have no choice but for them to share a room.
But I feel strongly that sharing a room will hopefully foster closeness between the 2 siblings and encourage sharing and caring for each other.

[mumofhelen]

Could the 5 months old share a room with you? This is what we're currently doing. 31 months old dd sleeps in her room whilst 5 months old sleeps in our room. I'm planning to move ds to dd room to share when he is 1 year old.

[scattyspice]

Mine shared from about 12mnths and 3. Although at that point both still got up and down half a dozen times a night.

I don't think sharing a room affected their sleep though.

[Toothyboy]

Mine shared from similar ages, jamjarparmar. Ds2 didn't disturb ds1 at all - it was more often the other way round; if ds2 went to bed significantly earlier than ds1 then invariabley ds1 would make too much noise going to bed and wake up ds2! Now they are 4.3 and 17 months, they go to bed at the same time, mess about for a bit then both go to sleep.

If yours are both reasonably good sleepers they should be fine.

[carocaro]

ds1 is 5 and ds2 is 5 months and they have just gone in together and so far so good, ds1 does not wake when ds2 cries at night, approx. once or at the most twice, he loves it, he wanted to share the mo he was born! We have 2 bedrooms till we build more next year. We also wanted our room back, give it a go!

[notnowbernard]

DD2 11m moved in with DD1 3.8 about 2 months ago. I was really worried that dd2 would disturb dd1 with her night waking... was amazed at how deeply dd1 must sleep! It has not been a problem at all. And I have my bedroom back, hooray!

[jamjarparmar]

brilliant - I feel confident enough to give it a go, but probably not until DD2 is probably around 9 months. it will mean we ahve office space goodie..

[lilQuidditchKel]

good luck jamjar -- we'll be giving it a go soon too. Little DD will be 3mo and older DS will be 17mo. Crickey.