I had fully intended to have the baby share a room with Audrey if it indeed ended up being a girl. Ian will be nearly eight when she's born so I never considered having him share with a baby if it were a boy because I think at that age he needs his space, not a crying infant. Now that I'm actually giving it more thought though I'm not so sure. Does anyone have experience with room sharing between a baby and older sibling? How does it work in practicality? Space isn't an issue. Audrey has a huge room with a walk-in closet that makes me jealous.
For the first several months the baby will be in a cradle in our room because let's face it, I'm too lazy to have to go all the way upstairs to fetch a baby for middle of the night feedings. In a perfect world, she'll be sleeping through the night by the time she's outgrown the cradle so waking up Audrey won't be a problem. Do I need to worry about Audrey waking her though? Throwing toys into the crib? Trying to get her out? Hmmm...
If we opt for all three having their own rooms, then that means that we have to give up the sewing/class room. A room that we just entirely remodeled less than six months ago. There really isn't anywhere else for the shelves and shelves and piles of fabric, the sewing machine or the kid's work table and bookshelves. Another down side to using that room is that when we remodeled, we tore out the closet to allow for more space, so there's no storage in there.
I'd love to hear your thoughts!!
6 comments:
Well, I feel that children should share bedrooms. Most of us will have roommates all of our life (siblings, college, spouse, etc), so why not get used to it when you are young? We gotta start learning sometime. In our culture we tend to assume that children have a "right" to their own room and that they need their own space. I think this attitude just feeds the "I am the center of the world" behavior. Sure, kiddos need their own space sometimes, but I don't think that warrants going out of our way to make sure they have their own bedroom.
We have had our babies in our room until they were somewhere between 4-6 months. Once they were too big for the bassinet, they went into their room in their crib. My girls share a room and it works just fine. They never wake each other up....they are both pretty hard sleepers. There isn't much of an issue with toys, either. The older one has learned that she has to put stuff away if she doesn't want the younger one getting into it. And as far as the older getting the younger out of her crib, we just let Teya know that she wasn't allowed to get the baby, but it was never really an issue because Isabel always woke up before Teya.
Tanya ~ I was hoping you would chime in. I agree that sharing is a good thing, I just worry about Audrey doing something to the baby. Not intentionally, but in a trying to help kind of way. It's good to know that your girls manage it just fine.
Courtney, first congratulations on your precious baby girl!!! YAH! I am praying for you my dear sister in the Lord and am so happy for your growing family...
Savannah and Alisa do share a room and it has worked wonderfully for us! Savannah was 3 and 1/2 when Alisa started sleeping in her crib in the same room with her big sister. I have only good things to say about it, but certainly every family is different... and I love how you've painted Audrey's room!
*Hugs*
I remember being nervous about the same exact thing.....worried that Teya would try to "help" and then end up hurting the baby. But it ended up not being a big deal at all. I know that we told Teya that she was the big sis and she got the privilege of sharing her room with the baby and she was allowed to help mom by alerting me when the baby was up, but nothing more. It seemed to work, that and the fact that the baby was awake before she was.....Teya was never in their bedroom while the baby was sleeping unless she was sleeping, too.
Teya shared a bedroom with Ethan until we moved here, too.
Thanks so much, girls!! You've got me convinced, we'll give it a go. If for some reason we see that it's just not going to work out we've always got the other room.
I just hope and pray that this little one is as good a sleeper as the other two were and still are. They were both sleeping through the night at one month. My sister, on the other hand, JUST finally got her little 16 month old nursling to sleep through the night. Yikes, that's a lot of lost sleep!!
Living in a two bedroom house, with 5 kids and another in Jan, I know a bit about kids sharing bedrooms! LOL We also had a niece (25yo) living with us for a while. At one point, all five kids were in one room. The are B10, B8, G4, B3, and G17mo. Yes, it gets interesting... but I think it's good for them! Now we're back to girls in one room and boys in another. I have had instances of lo's "helping" by giving baby toys, but it's a great learning experience!
(If you've done the math here, you've figured out that DH and I do NOT have a bedroom. LOL We took over 1/2 of the living room in the basement -- just hung sheers for separation.)
BTW, baby #6 is a girl -- and we're due very close! I'm about 25-1/2 weeks. :)
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