Bedtime routine for my 1st grader
As Jackson has grown, his bedtime routine has grown with him. But when I look back at the tweaks I’ve made with his routine, I realize there aren’t big differences. The order of all the tasks have remained the same because I’m a HUGE believer in consistency. It’s what keeps everybody on track and I know that kids thrive on it. But when I had Isabella, his routine got more rocky and stressful while I worried constantly about the baby being woken up before I got through with Jackson’s bedtime. Now that Isabella has her own routine, and sleeps through the night, I can focus on Jackson just like I used to.
In another blog post, I’ll share Isabella’s routine, and how she goes to bed at 7:00pm now that she has dropped her second nap. So then I have another hour and a half before Jackson gets ready for bed. Because of their 5.5 year age gap, their bedtime needs are so different and are very spread out which I’m thankful for. Knowing Isabella is fast asleep in her crib is comforting and gives me back my one-on-one time with Jackson. My relationship with him is just as important as it’s always been, and I never want him to feel like our time together has been taken from us all together. Our tasks leading to bedtime in certain order keep his mind on track and never a fight to get to bed.
Baby J’s bedtime routine, or lack-there-of
When Jackson was born, I didn’t even have a routine. Not at all. In fact, I didn’t think it mattered! He was a baby, so I figured that as long as we all go to bed, he knows it’s bedtime. But I was WRONG!!! He would get to bed whenever we went to bed, and as adults, our bedtimes are way too late for a baby. Like 10:00! And guess what? It was very hard to get him to fall asleep.
A baby’s bedtime depends on their age and range of “wake windows”, which I knew nothing about back then. I didn’t realize that babies DO NEED A ROUTINE because it actually trains their brain to wind down for sleep. It helps them fall asleep faster and stay asleep longer. So when Isabella was born, I had already done a lot of research on baby sleep and I started her bedtime routine right away. Like that second night of her life. I took a baby sleep course and everything! When I sleep trained her at 6 months old, we took her existing routine and switched it to start in her own room, and introduced book reading before bed. This continues to work perfectly for her. Consistency is key!
With Jackson, I created his routine as he got older, especially when we moved to our current home so that we could create a “brand new normal” routine. He was almost 2 years old by then but he grasped the flow.
If you feel like your children have a rocky bedtime and have a hard time following routine, I have tips! Also, it’s never too late to start a routine. As long as you repeat the same tasks on a nightly basis, you are doing it right. Whether you do one big routine with all kids together, or separately for each one, do what works best for you, and you will get in the rhythm quickly.
Jackson’s bedtime routine
8:00pm – Pyjamas on. Then he can play or watch a show for 30 minutes.
8:30pm – teeth brushed, face and hands washed.
8:45pm – cuddles in my bed for some stories, I usually limit these to 3 per night. It’s just always been 3 stories, even when he was 2 years old.
9:00pm – in his bed, say “goodnight, love you” and maybe have some talks about the day, more “goodnights”, some questions asked, more “goodnights”.
Some nights we start 15 minutes earlier if I feel he needs an earlier bedtime, and weekends can sometimes be a bit later too. Jackson is 6.5 years old, so he can handle a later bedtime but only by about an hour. This only started happening within the last couple of years. As a kindergartener, he still needed that extra sleep since he was just starting to skip naps.
Side note:
- This is where his bedtime routine ends, and he goes to sleep, but some nights he comes into our room around midnight to sleep on the floor beside the bed. I keep my big blanket there just in case he does this, because if he feels like he needs to be close to me, and he’s going back to sleep, I’ll allow it. If it becomes a habit after a few nights, we have to get tough with him and convince him to stay in his room all night so that he sleeps better, and so do we. I wake up every time I hear him walk into our bedroom at night and it disturbs my sleep.
- Tristan leaves for work at 4am so if Jackson climbs into my bed after that, I allow that too. He always goes right back to sleep and for some reason I can still sleep again for the next 2 hours. Even older children wake in the night! Some day, it will stop.
When I sleep trained Jackson
Jackson was sleep trained at 15 months, because I just wasn’t comfortable with it until then. Some could consider that “late in the game”, but he was still waking every 2 hours at night and I had just started a new job by then. I needed to get my sleep. I wanted to excel in my career and it wasn’t going to work on very little sleep. I dreaded the nights for this. I was a slave to a waking toddler, and I needed to claim my nights back! I would go into his room a few times just to reassure him that he didn’t need me, do the typical “wait 10 minutes” thing, and after 2 LOOONG weeks, he finally started sleeping through the night. It was glorious!
Sleep training Jackson. Again!
When we moved to a new house before he turned 2 years old, I had to re train him to sleep on his own. It made sense. New house, new room, of course it was going to make him insecure and scared to sleep alone. It was so frustrating this time though, because he put up quite a fight at that age. When he finally started sleeping through the night again, he was still in a crib so stayed there all night, and we all had our nights back. When we switched him to his “big boy bed” he did so well, and just loved sleeping there. But after a couple of years, he started getting scared again and running to our room. It’s typical for kids to do this at all ages. Even at 6.5 years old, Jackson will often need the comfort of being close to us. So a few nights a week, we do have to tell him to stay in his bed. Every kid is different though, and these habits don’t last forever. I’ve made my peace with it. Jackson is a sensitive kid, and he will always need the comfort on some level.
In conclusion…
These kinds of mornings are getting to be less and less and I know one day he will stop needing to be close to me in the night. Especially now having Isabella, I see how time just races by. Our babies are only babies for a few short years. Then it’s over and they are grown. Being Jackson’s mommy, and carrying out the same bedtime routine has felt like a blur when I look back, but there are little moments I’ll never let myself forget. Our bedtime stories in his room used to be in my lap, then he would play on the rug beside his bed as I read, and now they are in my bed, where it’s brighter than the glow of his night light, where we can be more cozy and comfortable. I know that some day we will stop doing our bedtime stories and that will probably make me sad.
Jackson pretty much navigates how his routine changes as he grows, and although that’s just a tiny fragment of change he will make in his life, those are the memories I will tuck away in my heart forever.