How do people turn sleeping bag with them and stay on pad?

That’s exactly why I have given up on hooded bags.   Not only that, when I roll over to my side in a regular bag trying to keep the hood in its proper place on my head, the down that is on my back has been compressed and my back is frozen for a while until the down regains its loft. I suggest a quilt and a down hoody or balaclava.  Maybe others have better ideas, but I have given up and sleep much better this way.

What Arthur said.
Cheers

I switched to quilts in part because of the hood on my sleeping bags.  If I rolled to my side within the sleeping bag I’d often find my mouth and nose buried in the hood and I’d feel like I was suffocating.  If I tried to roll with the sleeping bag (keeping the hood in place) I was sleeping on the zipper and it annoyed me (especially if I was using a Z-Rest instead of an inflatable.  It made for a restless night.

Not just the feeling of suffocation, the added moisture in the bag from my breath is not a good thing whatsoever, especially in cold weather.

Quilts are far more adaptable.

bivysack to keep the pad in place

It sounds like few people have managed to roll the bag with them and stayed on the pad.

I don’t breathe into the hood because WM Ultralite hoods don’t amount to much.

I sleep quite cold, so quilts don’t sound promising to me.

I slide myself opposite direction I want to roll till Im half hanging off pad then roll and do a bit of squirming takes a bit of practice but you either figure it out , suffer or switch to a quilt

Mark—That sounds like the best/only way to do it. I guess it seemed like an iffy and too difficult maneuver to me when I started backpacking. For yucks, I’ll give it a try next outing.

I haven’t suffered much, but I am thinking my next bag won’t need a hood since I haven’t used the one I’ve got.

Then you practice at not getting twisted up in the bag and the tail feather shake to try to get down relofted as quick as possible. Use the zipper as reference that the bag is straight and your not all twisted. After writing this it makes me realize I need to try a quilt again. I tried one years ago a old golite I was not that impressed at the time but now with the wider widths and the pad straps it might be worth trying again but if I surrender to that the hammock people will start in on me. Not sure if they are real people or voices in my head. NOOOO NOOOO LEAVE ME ALONE I WANT TO SLEEP ON THE GROUND GET OUT OF MY HEAD

And if you sleep really cold start using the hood. I have found the more I sleep outside the more comfortable I get at it

Mark—Good point about the hood for warmth. I’ve just been wearing a Carhatt knit hat at night.

I’ll offer a minority opinion here; I still love my sleeping bag. I get very cold when sleeping, so a quilt has never appealed to me. Attaching straps, adding a warmer mat, adding more headgear, yada yada – to make up for not having something really warm all around me, just doesn’t appeal. Maybe some day I’ll try a quilt, but for now, I love my bag. I use the hood almost always. I flip and flop like a rotisserie chicken, and it works because the bag is snug enough to stay fitted to my body and go with me. My face stays clear of the hood, and it all just works.

My previous sleeping bag, an REI Subkilo, didn’t work a well. The drawstring for the hood was at the top of the hood, so it would hang in my face every time I turned over. It also had a big weird neck piece that was not comfortable. I purchased a Feathered Friends Egret a few years ago and will never cheat on it. Never.

I slide myself opposite direction I want to roll till Im half hanging off pad then roll and do a bit of squirming…

I do it similar to how @mtmnmark does, but with a bit of nuance.  When I roll to the zipper side, I don’t want the zipper directly under me, so I don’t spin the bag quite as far as I spin my body.  I’m a bit paranoid that someday I’m gonna punch through the air mat with the zipper handle.  I rarely zip much higher than about my armpit, and never zip the hood.

I guess I’m the odd one- I’ve never found it difficult to just roll with the entire bag staying in the same place in relationship to my body. As to not rolling off my mat, it’s been a natural thing for me for years to shift my body as I roll, because even at home I’m crammed in a pretty small space on the edge of the bed due to pets sleeping in between my husband and I. It’s just something I’m used to. All that said, I wear a balaclava at night because the bag hood doesn’t cut it for keeping me warm.

My winter sleeping bag is zipperless and hooded. I have never had a problem taking the bag with me when I roll from side to side, the bag is an extreme tulip shape and is a good fit.

Doug, since you’re an MYOGer, couldn’t you just sew the clips that either E E or Katabatic use to your sleeping bag, and then buy the straps they use to secure the bag to your pad? Seems like it should work.

Doug—I’m not sure if you meant that idea as a way to open up my sleeping bag and use it as a quilt, or as a way to keep my bag from rotating, or something else. (Plus, modding a WM bag seems sacrilegious!)

I’m a tidy sleeper, so I don’t have a problem turning inside the bag without it turning. But then I get no use out of the hood.

As for quilts, I’m such a cold sleeper (6 ft, 150 lb, 61 yo, 97.8F temp with oral thermometer) I just can’t imagine them working for me in the Sierra. Maybe if I lived in Alabama.

So, as an MYOGer, I’m pondering ways to improve sleeping bags.

To save weight: half zipper, no down on the middle bottom (like many quilts).

To have variable girth: nylon gusset on the bottom…with snaps (?) to tighten it up on extra cold nights.

My WM Ultralite bugs me in how damn restricting it is. If I could “let it out” most nights to a somewhat wider width and snug it up on the colder ones, it’d be a really nice feature.

“I’m not sure if you meant that idea as a way to open up my sleeping bag and use it as a quilt, or as a way to keep my bag from rotating, or something else.”

I meant it as a way to keep your sleeping bag from moving off your pad, so that when you tossed and turned you wouldn’t fall off the pad, which was the issue you first wondered about.

“(Plus, modding a WM bag seems sacrilegious!)”

Well, there is that… :-)

How Do People Turn Sleeping Bag With Them and Stay on Pad?

Extra wide pad, in my case, a 25-inch-wide LW Tensor Insulated.

And I mostly use a WM sleeping bag like a quilt, until it gets too cold. Hood hasn’t been an issue.

— Rex