While we're rounding out the month and our theme on bedrooms and sleep, here's another question for you: does your child have a sleeping companion? One special toy, animal, or a whole bunch?
We found this photo in the old album and remember exactly how it came to be. We had one little stuffed lamb that we always slept with, but inevitably, every night we'd look over and see another doll or stuffed animal looking sad and abandoned and get out of bed and get him or her. This would happen another ten or so times until we had every doll and stuffed animal in the bed with us and could barely move. We felt it was a sacrifice we had to make so that no one would be lonely.
We really enjoyed hearing your sleep walking stories; any stories about sleeping companions?
5 Online Services to Save Yourself a Trip to IKEA
Nikki’s Sweet and Cheery Print Studio
Good Food to Share 
The Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces 
Apartment Therapy Presents 
The Eight-Step Home Cure 
Sprout Side Table
5 Things Paris Taught Me About Travel
Recipe: Ham, Cheddar & Chive Egg Bakes
My daughter Lillyana (age 2.5) sleeps with a few standards and then randomly brings stuff to bed every now and then.
Here are the regulars:
Hoppy (stuffed frong)
Wally (Red Sox Green Monster)
Foofa (Yo Gabba Gabba)
Recently she has added to the list of regulars:
The letter R from her Leap Frog fridge magnet set
Two plastic chocolate chip cookies from her tea set
When she first goes to bed Hoppy and Foofa are told by Lillyana that they need to stop talking because it is "night night time". The letter R is behaving so far.
My daughter (almost one) takes her mommy to bed with her every night.
My son has a green patterned teddy bear with articulated arms and legs, called (hang on for this) "Green Bear".
My daughter never used to sleep with anything, but as she got older (around 5) she would cuddle a bunny sometimes, but she also falls asleep hugging a book, a new pair of shoes, a puzzle box, a bug jar... sometimes she also puts on a sleeping mask, but not over her eyes, rather, pushed up over her forehead... we never know what we will find when we kiss her goodnight as we go to bed...
My bebe is only 9 months so he just has one floppy frog in his crib. However when I was growing up I made sure there was a menagerie of animals around me to "protect me from the night". I have pictures of me sleeping with no less than 30 animals crowded tightly around me.
My fantasy was that they came alive at night and big glorious adventures happened all around me as I slept.
Great being a kid!
I've actually been thinking on this topic lately as my almost 3 year old daughter is running out of room in her toddler bed! From early on she has slept with two blankies, plus her actual quilt, and 2 bunnies that she got as a baby. To the collection she has added 2 pound puppies, her Bitty Baby, a little bear that used to be her baby sister's, a full-size pillow that she doesn't use, but is propped up at the top of her bed along with her little pillow that she does use. She also has a stack of books that MUST go to bed with her ever night even though she has no way to read them in the dark.
Not sure what we'll do when she adds her next thing. We're only allowed to add, not replace! I'm trying to come up with ideas of what to do when there runs out of room for her!! :)
Since she was 2, our 4 (and almost 3/4!) year old daughter has carted Monkey around with her everywhere. If you know Ella, you know Monkey. Monkey has traveled to Disneyworld, Paris and everywhere in between. He even "wrote" a wishlist to Santa and received his "tiny little monkey clothes" but is still waiting for an ipod. We think of him as a member of our family. He is so well-loved that he is getting a little worn around the edges. Since he is a small bla bla sock monkey, i ordered a body double (an exact replica) as a replacement, if necessary, about 6 months ago . Ella likes Monkey's "brother" but he is not Monkey and therefore, relegated to hang out with all her other stuffed toys.
My son, Loki, has a dog that he calls "perrito" that he takes to bed each night. Luckily he is not TOO attached to it, as we have forgotten it at daycare on more than on occasion!
My two year old daughter sleeps with 3 different sized Curious George dolls (Big Conkie, Tiny Conkie, and Itty Bitty Conkie) and a Terrible Towel (the Steelers towel).
She sometimes asks my husband to make the terrible towel talk, and the towel goes into a long history of the Steelers. At least she won't have trouble falling asleep.
My 22 month old just last month started sleeping with a naked baby doll who he calls "White". She is a bath baby we received as a gift when he got scared of the bathtub around 19 months. Not only did "White" make bathtime fun again, she goes potty when he does and loves to take naps.
my two year old daughter, paisley, sleeps with a pink blanket ["gigi"] that i had from the time i was a baby. and she rotates the toys she sleeps with every month or so. right now it's two heffalump bumble bees [from winnie the pooh]. one is purple and the other blue. and "baby kevin" [the baby bird from disney's "up."]
but she's rotated through little people animals, books, and other stuffed animals.
her favorite part of the night is when we ask her what toys she wants to go night night with her. she picks up random toys and says, "purple bumble bee go night night with me?" or "pirate book go night night with me?" "milk go night night with me?" until she has at least 2, but sometimes 3 or 4.
hhitchc- they don't come alive at night?
my 3 year old son sleeps with his curious george, bear, his brown blankie and a rotating mix of 3 other blankets.
My 2 year old daughter needs a whole menagerie of animals and friends. Some are more important than others but they all need to be there. The most important, and ones she cannot sleep away from, are lambie (pink angel dear blanket with lamb head), blankie (homemade tag blanket) and bla bla (pink cat bla bla doll). Then there are the others who are generally there but don't have to travel to avoid a bedtime meltdown: floppy dog, stuffed cat, ernie, a couple of elmo dolls, stuffed mouse, armadillo, my old monchichi. And she normally has a couple of books too that she likes to read in the morning before she gets out of bed.
A bunch of soft toys. What's really adorable is when we check on her and she's sleeping at one end of her crib, with her buddies surrounding her like an audience. She must pull them over and arrange them after we put her to bed. Her current sleeping buddies are Tinky Winky, Po, Brobee, her teddy bear Tim, and Sy the Seahorse (the Fisher Price toy with the illuminated belly that plays music.)
my 3 yr old sleeps with 2 cabbage patch kids, and "whoopsie-do" doll (which seems werid to me being that "whoopsie" is made of hard plastic from head to toe. . . AND she's kind of scary looking).
my 21 month old sleeps with a teddy he's had since he was an infant and his sister's "nuffie" (Knuffle Bunny from the Moe Willems books). Neither one is interested in my ratty hand-me-down blankie from my childhood and I'm slightly sad. . . but kind of understand - it IS pretty ratty. :)
my dd (who's 4yo) has a special orange kitty (very funky looking) that she always takes to bed. She never actually played with it. She says it's not a toy, it's for sleeping.
my older son always slept alone and didn't care about a special stuffed animal or blankie, even though we have some awesome ones. he just wasn't attached to anything like that. when he weaned at age 3, he suddenly started waking up at night and coming into my room. understandable. so now he sleeps with me.
my younger son has always slept with me, yet he must have at least one beloved stuffed puppy or kitty, a pacifier, and - recently, as of this week - a black plastic knight. weird.
Meeeeeee! :)
http://www.chinasprout.com/shop/DCR017
My mother got this doll for my daughter, Ada, for her first christmas. she is now going to be 6 & still takes that doll w/ her everywhere, even to kindergarten in her backpack! She sleeps with her every night & we all just include the doll in our daily routine, as if she were real. I guess she's part of the family! :)
The doll's hair looks like more like dreads now, haha, but Ada loves her the same.... oh! & the doll's name?
Rufus.
after Rufus Wainright.
My daughter, no. Nothing to get in her way.
My son, half the animal kingdom, see?
http://teamcraunchatter.blogspot.com/2010/01/nathaniels-cadet-blue-cave.html
My son sleeps with "Blue Bear". Robinp: When my son decided blue bear was it, I also went on ebay to locate some "twins"...and bought three more just in case. One stays at daycare for naps, the other two extras are always in his crib (since he's been 8 months old). Unfortch...those two extras just aren't getting the same nose rubs and chomps that "real" blue bear gets, so they just aren't the same. Hoping they'll do if we ever lose him. But I really hope we don't have to ever find out!
Every night, my 8 yr old sleeps with Maggie May, Kitty, Annie & Gigi. She has to have them all...piled in her arms as she drifts off. Love it.
My 5 year old sleeps with Pink Bear, Blue Bear, Horse, Baby Kitty, and Puppy almost every night. A few others come and go. And lately he's been bringing his collection of pretend wooden swords to bed with him too. I take those out of the bed after he falls asleep though.
Oh my god, I LOVE the story about the Terrible Towel!!!!
My 22 month old sleeps with her baby doll and a rotating cast of stuffed animals - usually Minnie Mouse - every night. Occasionally she will also bring Little People or, my favorite, pictures of people to bed with her.
My son named his small baby blanket "Hi" and will not go to bed without it. We don't know where the name came from but he's called it that since he could speak.
One day while running errands we left it in the car to go into Target. While shopping with him he announced -in a very gentle, subdued toddler voice :) - "Mommy, I want to go out to the car and get Hi!" Needless to say, that comment turned a few heads. I'm sure DCFS will be showing up on my doorstep any day now.
My baby sleeps with the Fisher Price light up seahorse. He's three and a half months old and he loves that thing.
I've slept with a Pound Puppy named Violet since I was three...and I'll be twenty-eight next month!
When my son was a baby, he slept schunched up like a frog on top of a large frog stuffed animal. When he was about 18 months old he discovered a stuffed puppy (aka Pup the Dog) without whom he would now be forlorn, scared, and lost. Of course, the puppy was bought for him at the now-defunct FAO Schwartz and so can never be replaced should he lose it. I'm always nervous when the puppy leaves his room for any reason.
Quick Aside: Way to rock the Hair Bear Bunch sheets! What a blast from the past--used to watch them every week on the USA cartoon express.
my son sleeps with a big floppy monkey, two small monkeys (one bought as a daycare monkey, but as soon as he turned two he became obsessed with there being 2 of everything and when he caught onto the pair of monkeys they were inseperable) a HUGE white tiger, a mismatched pair of bears (same as the monkey thing), sometimes a lion and now a tinky winky that my mother brought him after getting him hooked on (the impossible to find) teletubbies. i try to sneak a few out every once in a while since he is still in a crib (with no desire to leave it any time soon) and is quickly running out of space in there!
i love the story of the terrible towel!
My daughter does more than sleep with her "Kinket". It is hauled around the house Linus style all day long. It was my crocheted baby blanket, and my mother reports that she is far more enamored with it than I ever was! Her latest request is to bring her two month old brother, "Mardoo" into bed with her. His actual name is Nolan.