Scheduling
Scheduling is everything.
I have been very successful with my little one in the sleep department. I contribute this 100% to creating and maintaining schedule. I do my very best to maintain consistency day to day with scheduling. Regardless of what is going on at 8:30 she is ready for bed and by 9PM she is sleeping. If we are out, on vacation, out of town visiting family and friends, I still maintain her schedule. At 8:00 PM it’s time to start preparing for bed. Please this routine has taken months of practice but persistency pays off.
Since about 3 months she has been going to bed at the same time. At 3 months old she would not fall asleep immediately, but I was patient. At 8:30 she was in bedtime mode, she is bathed, the lights were off (excluding her night lights), her lullabies were playing and she is given her night time bottle. At the time she was still in my bedroom so I would watch TV on mute or work on my laptop while she became restless and would fall asleep. At this stage, she would not fall asleep until about 10PM.
When I moved her into her nursery, we still would begin our night time routine at the same time. I would sit in the glider and rock her to sleep at this time she would fall asleep by 9:15 -9:30.
Since about 7 months or so the process is like clockwork. The lights dimmed, night light glowing and her lullabies playing softly, night time bottle, she is bathed, clothed and fed a bottle and she is fast asleep by 8:45.
I have a huge portion of my night back to spend with husband and work.
In addition to sleeping our entire day is consistent from day to day.
Sample Daily Schedule
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Sleeping the Nite Away
I started off with my daughter sleeping next to me in a playard/basinet…who can stand to be away from their newborn right? I also was waking up so much through the night to put her pacifier back in her mouth I ended up moving her in the bed with me; of course this is in addition to her every three hour feedings. My fear of crushing her in the bed lead me to buying a co-sleeper that fit in the bed between my husband and I. My daughter stayed in the co-sleeper until she was about four months, when she was too long to fit comfortably. My one mistake is that I was still waking her up to feed, every four- five hours, as if she was still only a few days old. It was right at about four months when she started sleeping through night (6 – 7 hours) without cereal in her bottle. At four months I started adding cereal to her night bottle and honestly it did not seem to increase in the length of time she slept.
At four months I moved her back into the playard/basinet. She continued to sleep 6-7 hours, but for the duration of the night she wakes up every hour and a half wanting her pacifier. Once she turned six months, we moved our daughter to her room, in her crib (can you hear my heart shattering). Where her sleep pattern is the same, her bedtime routine starts at about 8PM with a bath, then I lotion her skin, she has a bottle in the dark, while listening to her lullaby CD in the glider. She is asleep by 9PM, but is awake again by 4AM and the remainder of her night/morning is restless until 7AM.
Johnson & Johnson’s bedtime bath and body lotion has always made a difference in the length of time she sleeps.
