Moving a doodle from a crate at night to a "bed"

[Jess and Pippin]

Hi Everyone.  Our 6 month old doodle has been doing really well in his crate at night.  No accidents and generally sleeps through the night.  The past couple of weeks, he has been whining at night and generally not wanting to be in his crate.  He is a "busy" sleeper, and loves to move around.  A lot!! We tried settling him in the kitchen (gated and puppy proofed), but he didn't like being separated from us and wants to be in our room.  So, a sleepless night.  Out of desperation, we set up the ex pen in our room with his favorite bed in it and he had a great night!  (I'm certain that desperation is the reason for many a good invention!)  I'm wondering when and how to transition him from the ex pen, to just sleeping on his favorite bed.  That ex pen takes up a lot of space in our room  :)

[Lisa, Daisy & Dexter]

I like your idea best, like Camilla said "you know your dog best"

Daisy slept in her crate until about 1 month ago - she is 20 months...the door was open after 8 months and she was free to roam but she never did. Now the crate is in the office and she has a bed in the living room and the bedroom, she goes to all three some nights and only to one others - her choice. Daisy is a sleeper, when it gets dark and the lights are out she's sleeping, even as a 9 week old puppy she slept through the nite.

Frankly she was trust worthy at 6 months but I wasn't ready...kind of like a crib and a baby - LOL

 

[Sherri, Sophie, Winston, & Kitty]

Since SophieBear was 4.5 months I've let her sleep in my room. I keep the door closed and thoroughly puppy proofed the room. She does great. She gets restless sometimes and paces or plays with her toys so I have to be sure to give her quiet toys lol, i.e. not squeky or hard toys that bang on the floor. The only problem I had was one night when she managed to sneak in an empty paper towel roll without me noticing. I woke up in the morning and the bed was covered in bits of chewed up roll. It was annoying, but harmless. She has been really great with the potty thing, fully trained from three months on so I havent' had any issues. She bounces around a lot and sometimes wakes me up at night, but I like having her in my bed and when she wakes me up with kisses it's really cute. Good Luck!

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

We had the same problem with our Vern. I think he was just too hot in his crate. We didn't do anything other than open the door one night and close our bedroom door. He has never had an accident in our room ever, but we do have another dog and that helped too. Eventually, as he got older, he moved around too much in our bedroom and we have now opened the door and let them sleep anywhere they want and it was an easy transition for us. We found that our Vern is a bit of a night owl and likes to get up and chew a bone or something and some mornings we come out to find half his toy box emptied, but he has not been destructive to anything else and does not disturb us, so it worked for us. Good luck!!

PS We did have to put all socks out of reach :) Oh, and now we find Vern sleeping in his crate out in the foyer.

[Bonnie and Kona]

Oh Vern, of course, now you sleep in your crate! You are too cute!

[Heather & Brinkley]

We let Brinkley sleep in our room and our bed from week two.  He hated the crate and he learned really fast to come lick me to wake me up when he needed to go out.  He slept on our bed all night b/c he couldn't get down on his own for awhile.  Then when he could get down, we put a bell on our door and he would ring it. We lost one pottery barn rug in the time but other than that we did pretty well.

[Jess and Pippin]

HI Heather!  Pip did well in his crate until he got too long for it.  He loves to move around at night.  He still doesn't have a clear "signal" when he wants to go out.  Sometimes he paces, sometimes he charges the door, sometimes he just looks at it and then there are still the odd times when he just squats!  He's getting better every day though.  I'm beginning to think I'll just leave him in the ex pen until he outgrows that too!

[Coco Chanel and Cheryl]

Coco started sleeping out of her crate at 10 months. She actually ended up out of the crate at night by accident. I fell asleep on the sofa and she slept out of the crate after that! She actually does not like being in my bed and sleeps on the floor, mostly! She moved a lot in the crate so I am sure she wanders at night, but she is quiet!