My first child was happy as a clam sleeping in the crib until she was 2 ½ years old. The arrival of her baby brother meant we had to move her to a normal bed. While she was in the crib, we did not have to worry about things like baby pillows and blankets. She happily slept snugly in a sleep sack and pajamas. The sleep sack prevented her from crawling out of the crib, because she couldnt swing her legs up. I dont know that she would have anyway, as she was so happy in there. When we moved her to her bed, there was no drama. After getting her used to the big bed with a few naps, we transitioned her to nighttime too. It was a full size bed in a beautiful wooden frame. She had two pillows and a big comforter. Because she was almost 3, we did not have to mess with those little baby pillows or toddler pillows.
My son was an entirely different story. He learned how to unzip his sleep sack shortly after his first birthday. He could easily swing his leg up on the crib rail. For months and months, that is as far as he would go. Until one night, when he climbed out of the crib entirely and walked to greet me at the door. We did not waste any time setting up his crib mattress on the floor.
We had a lot more challenges introducing him to a bed than we did when we did the same with his older sister. It was a rough transition, because he was so young. He wasnt even 2 years old yet. We had to remove most of the things from his room for a couple weeks, so he could not get into trouble. We also put a gate on the door, which was the best advice we received. There were many nights and nap times, when he would stubbornly sit in the middle of his wood floor and fall asleep sitting up. It took about a week to make the transition.
He was digging his new bed when people started doling out the advice. "Oh, he is not old enough to be sleeping in a big bed." "It is dangerous." "Do not use pillows and bedding." Wait. What? He can not use a pillow? How is he going to be comfortable? Can he use a tiny airline baby pillow? Being an overly cautious mom, I checked in our medical baby books and online. Indeed, it is NOT recommended that you give children under the age of 2 any pillows or heavy blankets. Most of what I read says you can introduce those things around age 2 or when the child moves to a big bed.
Since my son was not yet 2, I decided to follow the advice and start with one of those baby pillows. It was the size of an airline pillow and did not look very useful to me. It did not look like our pillows, so I think my son thought it was something else. I think the need to put a pillow and bedding on his bed was due to my own notion of what a bed is supposed to look like. We waited about a month, until my son was totally comfortable in his bed. Then we put pillows and a comfy blanket on his bed. He loved sitting up with the pillows and snuggling like he did in our bed. And he actually used the pillows for his head, so he was happy to have a normal pillow instead of that baby pillow.

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by: frankwarehouse
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