Im sorry for the length of this, i just want to supply some back story.
My 3 1/2 dd has never really slept through the night regularly. She doesnt nap in the day as she is at nursery from 12.30-3.30. She may nap if we are in the car after nursery, but thats maybe once a month. Our bed time routine is Approx 7pm we clean up/bath, teeth, pjs and into bed where we will have a story, 2 lullabies she sings one to me and i to her, i turn down her light to a night light level, turn on her musical toy (that has a self timer) say good night then leave, she sleeps with a stuffed panda inventively named "Panda" and a small bottle of milk. Most nights she stays and falls asleep pretty easily. The problems are in the night and keeping her asleep. She may wake up to go to the toilet, she is fully toilet trained and has never had a wet night, but she keeps waking and she doesn't say what the problem is, she may come in to our room and try to creep in to our bed. There are times where dh is out over night at work (maybe once or twice a month) and dd climbs in to his side and i don't notice until morning (very big bed lol), we try not to encourage co-sleeping. When she does wake there may be a few wimpers which will develp into loud cries or full loud cries to start off with or even nothing and she'll just appear next to our bed. We have a 6month old ds who sleeps in our room who thankfully sleeps through, but dd sometimes wakes ds so then there are two to get back to sleep. i dont think ds is to be part of the problem.
Basically dd is waking 3-6 times a night mostly without reason. Her bed time is 7.30-8 and she wake up 5.30-6.30.
How to I get her to stop waking up? Is there anything wrong with the routine? are there any incentives that might work? has anyone had the same problem? also any tricks on getting her to sleep till later? do the light clocks that change colour in the mornings help?