My son is two-and a half, and I wonder when to change his room. All he does now is sleep in it, and his clothes are stored there. He gets changed in our bed, and he plays in the living room.
At what age can I change his room for him? When will he start to enjoy playing in his own room? I’m thinking about installing a high bed like this one. I tested a similar one out with him and he loves to climb. But I;m not sure if it is all just too soon.
My son is two and we keep his toys in his room. He can play there and does from time to time, but prefers play downstairs where we are. It doesn’t seem to detract from his sleep time or sleep habits. When it is bed time, he climbs in bed and stays there.
Now. This weekend, make the transition.
Yes, now now now. If you let it go much longer, you’re likely to have a kid who takes over your house and doesn’t feel ownership of his own room, which means he’ll trash his room (or you’ll spend a lot of time cleaning it) and then just go play in the living room or he’ll only play in common areas, and as his bedtime gets later, you and your SO will have no time to yourselves.
Children who have a place that’s all their own, in my experience, are easier to discipline. “Your screaming hurts my ears, please go scream in your room instead of here,” for example. (I don’t send my kids to their room as punishment, exactly, but your room is where you can behave as you like without annoying other people.)
Having things in his room and playing in there gives him the opportunity to practice cleaning up after himself in a manageable space.
Having his own room to retreat to voluntarily when he’s feeling overwhelmed from the stress of the world teaches him a good coping skill. Instead of acting out and escalating a situation, he can excuse himself until he’s feeling ready to tackle the problem constructively. (My daughter will put herself in “Time Out” while she thinks about how to talk to me more effectively/appropriately. Her room is her favorite place to do that, because she can read a book or play with her teaset while she thinks. Again, it’s not a punishment, it’s a safe refuge.)
Having a bedroom like you and your SO do (I assume) reinforces that he is as important and no more important than everyone else in the house. The common area is not his to take over, but his bedroom is. You’ll appreciate that when he’s a teenager, believe me!
You should make the kids room the play room as soon as you can get over worrying every minute something might happen to them if your not there.
No doubt Maastricht isn’t one of the notorious hellicopter parents, but by this rubric some people might put this off until after their child exits college…
We always kept the Kiddo’s toys in his room. Sometimes he played with them in his room, sometimes he brought them into the family room to play with them. Sometimes he just sat down in the hall and played there. Before bed, toys were put away back in his room. It was no bid deal.
There really wasn’t any “changing from baby to toddler room” with the exception of replacing his crib with a bed when he was 18 mos or so.
It is kind of like crate traning, only without the bars.
A kids room shold be their safe place. My kids we changed from a crib to a toddler bed as late as possible, but they had toys and were encouraged to spend alone time playing in their rooms as early as possible.
That isn’t to say we have zero toys elsewhere, but my kids don’t go in my bedroom without me, and know that when they need to find something it is pretty much always in their room.
We have a room that we plan to turn into a playroom/homework room eventually but right now it is an office.
In answer to the OP, I’d second or third whatever everyone else has said - do it when you’re comfortable leaving him alone.
That said… Do a lot of people “switch” their kids’ rooms from a baby’s room to a “toddler” room? Does that mostly entail a big kid bed and moving their toys in? And at what age do they start using their rooms like that? I ask because it never really occurred to me to change my son’s room other than to put in a bigger bed and a bookshelf for all his books. My son sometimes reads in his room by himself, and he knows that his room is his space. But usually he likes to play in the common areas of the house. He doesn’t need us to entertain him constantly - he just likes feeling part of the action, I guess. Also, I guess since his dad and I rarely use the bedroom for anything other than sleeping (at least that he’s aware), it doesn’t occur to him to hang out in his, either.
My sons’ room is very small, and if I want to put any toys there and still give him room to play, I would have to buy one of those half-high beds (I don’t know the English word for them) like these. Also, I had a spare bed in his room, for when one of us needed to sleep with the baby without disturbing the other parent. So that bed has to go as well. I’d also have to install space to put his toys away, a bean bag to sit on, shelves, other stuff; so yes, it would be a kind to redoing of his room. It seems like a fun project, I would just want to know when other parents did this.
My husband thinks two, nearly three years old, is too young to move to a bedlike this. I actually think it is safer; his current bed has no side and he has fallen out of it, even if the fall is just six inches.
When? As soon as he started to toddle. We replaced the baby stuff with a twin bed as well as boxes, bins, and other springy meshy receptacles to divide up and store his toys, but still make them easily accessible for him. We also put in a low bookshelf and a kid’s cd player. As a current three year old, he does not spend much time up there alone, but he does play up there a lot with one of us parents. We do allow one bin for toys in the corner of the family room. 90% of the time he is playing “alone” without our direct involvement, he is off to the side in the common areas of the house, far enough where he is by himself, but near enough where he can get our attention if he needs it.
We would probably call that a “loft bed” here, although it’s a very low loft. It’s so adorable! I think if your little guy is a decent climber and if he likes the bed (that part’s important!) then it’s probably fine to switch him. Really, it looks only about 10 inches taller than a standard twin bed, it’s not like it’s 6 feet in the air. It has nice sturdy rails that come up high enough to prevent him from rolling off, as long as you use the intended mattress height with it and don’t let him pile a million stuffed toys on there.
I’d probably call it a bunk bed–even though bunk beds normally come in pairs. (Although my reaction to seeing WhyNot label it a loft bed was “well, duh!”).
overlyverbose,
My brother and his wife have one room which was painted for use as a nursery. When baby girl #1 was two, she was moved down the hall (further away from Mom and Dad) and into a really girly bedroom. She was switched from crib to twin bed at that time, they got more serious about potty training, and this left the nursery available for little sister, who was born two months later.
Little sister’s transition to a bedroom down the hall was more gradual, and I’m not sure they ever did as much decorating for her as they did for her big sister.
The former nursery is now a guest room/playroom.
These transitions seemed reasonable if not neccessarily typical.
As far as the likelihood of falling out of loft beds–they are popular in college dormitory rooms, and I know PLENTY of college students who have fallen out of theirs. It’s not something you outgrow. The rails, I think, make it safe.
I should clarify - I don’t think such a transition is unreasonable. I guess it just never occurred to me to do that at this age. Then again, my son was moved to a double bed on the floor at 13 mos. because he moved so much he’d wake himself up bashing his head into the side of the crib. Had he been any older than two years old or so, I can see where selling a new situation with an “official” transition from baby to toddler might be a good idea, especially if a new baby is coming on the scene.
We have always kept the kids toys in their room, and some toys in a separate play room in the basement, for bigger stuff. They would bring toys into the living areas, but those normally would go back into their rooms at bedtime, which they are/were responsible for picking up.
We like to keep our living areas toy-free.
Our boys (ages 4 and 1) share a room, and they don’t have toys in there. Partly because it’s on the small side for toys, but mostly because we have a playroom that’s all theirs. I wouldn’t be opposed to a few toys being in the bedroom, but it just hasn’t happened. There are always stuffed animals and books in there, though.
As others have said, we like to keep the general living areas free of toys.
Well, I guess everybody does it differently. Our living room/familyroom/tv room, borders on our open kitchen. We have a corner for our kids’ toys and books. Actually, two corners now. And spreading. 
But I still think our kid wants to keep us in view all the time.
