Over the past week or so my 18 month old DD has been seeming really uncomfortable at bedtime. She has always been quite active in her cot after we put her to bed, no matter how tired she is, and will sit or stand chattering away to herself for a half an hour or so until she finally settles down to sleep.
At the moment she isn't standing up or sitting like usual, she will lie down and then spin herself round and round, she tries to stick her legs sideways through the bars of the cot (as she's in a sleeping bag she can't stick them through properly) and she stomps and kicks at the bars. She has been crying and seems frustrated. She's banged her head a few times doing her spinning and just doesn't seem to be able to get comfortable. It's also taking an average of about an hour/hour and a half for her to go to sleep.
I wondered if maybe she is getting too "big" (although I know she technically isn't) for the cot and would benefit from the sides being taken off? My worry is then that she will be constantly in and out of it all night! DH and I hadn't even been thinking about taking the sides off the cot until she was physically big enough to climb out of it if she wanted to, so it seems a bit early to us.