Talk to me about bedtime routine with a toddler/preschooler and infant

[Biscuits & Gravy]

I have a 3yo and a 5 month old. Up until recently the 3yo needed hand holding in going to bed and falling asleep. He has started needing less though. Instead of sitting with him and rocking until he was asleep he finally lets me tuck him in, tell him goodnight, and leave the room. Up until now my 5mo just sort of came along for the ride. He'll nurse and doze, then when I come downstairs he'll sleep in my arms while I watch a little tv until I go up to bed. (he sleeps with me)

I feel like we're at a new place now, and I feel like I need to start giving him more of a bedtime routine. He is a good sleeper, unlike DS1, so I'd like to capitalize on that!

The challenge is that my husband is gone most nights. When he is home he handles DS1's bedtime when he can, but he often has work to do. So I need tp figure out something that works for me.

So...tell me what you do.

[Alathia]

s: hiya!

Ok, my kids are a little older than yours but not by much. And you know how much DS1 hates sleep. When DS2 was younger I also did the side car baby thing and we all snuggled in bed with DS1.

Both boys get the same bedtime routine - dinner, some running up/down the hall, bath, brush teeth, story, then tuck in. Now that DS2 is getting older, we put them down at the same time.

When it's just me, I tuck in DS1, leave him some music playing, and tell him if he's "not tired" (aka is holding out for me to lay down with him) he's perfectly capable of reading in his room or playing with his magnadoodle or dancing, as long as he's quiet. then I go and nurse DS2 and put him down to bed.

Usually by the time I'm done nursing DS2, DS1 has wore himself out and is sleeping. hope that helps you out!

[Biscuits & Gravy]

Hey! Yeah, I think our older sons would be good buddies if we got them together. They are 2 of a kind.

I don't know why this is so hard for me to wrap my brain around. I think a good chunk of it is that I think K might be ready actually go to bed instead of having me cart him around in the evening, but I'm not sure where to put him. He has a crib in a separate bedroom, but he has never slept in it. Maybe I should try the pack n play in our room. I'm not comfortable with leaving him on our bed because he is a spinner, a roller, and a scooter.


I'm sure this will all end up being much easier than I'm making it out to be in my head.

[acp]

:
So far, there have always been two of us putting them down, but there will be some times coming up when it's just me and I have NO clue what to do. I'm lucky that DD (23 months) is easy to put to bed. But she still requires some time for her routine (bath, toothbrushing, pjs, stories, etc) and she's already not too happy about the new baby and i think wants/needs that to be *her* time. Plus it often coincides with a fussier time for him - not sure how i'd give her a bath or read stories. And now that he's getting a bit older (almost two months) his bedtime is moving earlier and is starting to overlap with hers - and he's starting to take a lot longer to get down to sleep than he used to.
Needless to say, I'm not looking forward to handling bedtime alone!
Very curious what other people have done...

[limabean]

My baby goes to bed before my preschooler. DS (4yo) watches a show downstairs while I nurse the baby to sleep and put her down, then I come down and read to DS and then put him to bed.

[LeahC]

from me, too!

Luckily, Chris is home in time most nights to put Henry to bed, since he goes to bed by 8:30pm. When Chris is traveling for work or stuck at the office, then I do the bedtime routine. However, Evelyn goes to bed by 7:30, so she is already down by the time I put Henry down.

Even when we were cosleeping, I would put her down in the cosleeper, which was in our room, or in her crib in her room (when she got to that point) for the first chunk of her sleep. She would sleep for a few hours, wake to nurse and then I would bring her to bed with me for the rest of the night. That way, the crib wasn't a foreign place for her (it help to get her to take her naps in it during the daytime!).

This worked perfectly for us and we just recently have weaned off of cosleeping. *tears* Little lady was way too interested in playing in the middle of the night when she awoke and discovered mommy in bed with her! Quite adorable, but exhausting! We'll cosleep whenever she needs it, but for now all of us are sleeping through the night now

[Biscuits & Gravy]

Hi Leah!

Your reason for ending co-sleeping with E is exactly what happened with N. I was so sad. I loved snuggling with him.

I think I'm going to just start trying to put K down in either his crib or the pack n play this week and see what happens. He is my good sleeper, so I'm so hesitant to change things that are working, but at the same time it just feels like a change needs to be made. I've been talking to N about me needing to start putting K to bed when he goes to bed, so hopefully he'll be cooperative.

[karla413]

How to add newborn to cosleeping toddler?

I'm finding NO support in this society for cosleeping with my toddler in the first place- oh so frustrating and sad that people are missing out on such amazingly satisfying experience/ bonding....

I am 6 months pregnant, however, and wondering how to add the new baby to our arrangement... my 2 yo definitely relishes our bonding / go to sleep routine (as do I) to the point where Daddy is not invited (by her) to be involved... though my plan was to have them sleep togehter and mom/ newborn together in a different room.

2 yo does sleep in side car arrangement (once asleep) and baby will have cosleeper -am I crazy to think there will just be enough of me to give all my love to both???

[LindsC]

I have a 2 1/2 year old and a 7 month old and our routine is dinner, playtime, bath (every other night), into pj's, books, cuddles, bed. Once I tuck in my son, I will take the baby into our room and nurse her down. DS pretty much always sleeps through the night which is great.

[hakeber]

ds has a bit of a decadant bedtime routine.

We have a before bed snack, brush teeth, shower, and then he gets stories and songs. The stories can sometimes take ages because he likes to make them up, and so it becomes this epic tale.

For now this is fine because dd is 4 weeks old. She sleeps all the time so I just nurse her to sleep and then i get started with ds. This is sort of our special time with ds, where he gets dh's and mine undivided attention, so I assumed once dd got to an age of having a proper bedtime, we would just give big brother an hour later bedtime. Maybe i am being naive?