any tips on moving a 12 month old into their own room

[pastabest]

We never intended to have DD in our room this long but due to inertia and quite liking her being in there and her generally being very little trouble (until recently - more on this) shes got to 12 months old and shes still in our room. We planned to move her before Christmas but between some major teething, illness and jabs its not happened.

This needs to change. I go back to work this month and have always said she needs to be in her own room by then. I'm also due DC no 2 in summer and don't want DD being disturbed by a newborn at night.

I also want DD settled in her own space without it being connected with the new baby arriving.

Finally shes becoming a bit of a pain during the night (in a nice way) after spending the first 12 months of her life being very independent and un-needy she has suddenly become clingy, very affectionate and wanting lots of cuddles. This includes wanting to be in our bed as soon as she stirs during the night, where as previously she was an excellent self settler.

I'm aware we missed the boat a bit on moving her into her own room when she was relatively content with her own company and would have probably just accepted it. Now she will definitely be Not Happy, I suspect.

I'm aware its not great timing as shes going to be losing me 3 days a week very soon as it is.

DP isn't being much help as he quite likes her being in the room and she doesn't disturb him in the same way. His (only semi joking) response to DC2 coming along is just to have a cot either side of the bed.

Sigh... has any one managed this at this age with minimal drama?

A shiny new toddler bed with shiny new favourite character covers? You might be able to excite her into giving it go... (it worked for the transition to a bed for both of mine, although admittedly they were younger and used to sleeping in their room in the cot) Then a folded duvet on the floor for you to lie on (and another to go on top). You can then lie next to her to resettle in comfort before slipping back off to your bed once she's sleeping. Team with a stairgate on the bedroom door to stop 3am appearances in your bed. After that just determination from your side.

Bonus: you get the cot back in time to reuse for DC2

I moved my cosleeping 12mo last month into his room. We put a double mattress on the floor so that I could BF and lie with him when he woke up. It's gone really well with him sleeping through from night 3 - not at all what we expected.

With my DD we moved her into a single bed at 16mo so again we could lie with her. Then after a month or so it became my DH who would go in and lie with her and then she started sleeping through.

But neither of mine have ever slept in a cot! She might get on better than you're expecting but also don't expect that just because she's been moved, she'll suddenly sleep. You might be going in a fair few times. And it's for this reason that we made sure we could lie with them - so they never came back into our bed but had the comfort they needed until they were ready to sleep through.