Settling at night

Riley has always been hard to drop off to sleep, she will normally sing or chat or shout until she's ready. thankfully the other two just sleep through her noise.

But some stuff that has worked with all the shouting out for me to go in and fix this or get that etc,

We do bath before dinner now, as i found a bath winds her up a bit more. according to my new bible (Raising your spirited child) being hot before bed isn't goood for a spirited child, and it definetly makes a difference.

Then at bed time she's allowed to read or chat quietly if she wants - but if she wants to chat then I give them a time limit and after then its quiet time. But she can read as long as she wants. I've found there's no point in telling her no, because it just winds her up more and this way she will quietly fall asleep. She has a torch and balances it on her shoulder, Lockie has a torch and a headtorch.

I also go in and check on her (them) first after 5 minutes then after 10 and every 10 after if needed. Normally when I go and check on them they have some random stuff they HAVE to tell me. but I find its easier this way rather than her calling out for me every minute or so. And then we have a rule if she calls out for me then I don't check on her.

Sometimes she can be awake when I go to bed, but I've got to the point now that as long as she's lying in bed and quiet I don't mind. I do do a bit of reverse psychology on her and say that she doesn't have to go to sleep, and can lie there with her eyes open if she wants.... she normally lasts 10 minutes max

Books and a list of bedtime things eg.
1. Bath
2. 1 book
3. A cuddle
4. Go to sleep.
Try not to add more than 4 then praise when she stays in bed with sticker chart. Reward 2 minutes special time ( something they enjoy) so will add up by the end of a week to a good amount of time. With my nanny experience I found this worked. Reward charts might need to be used for a few months. Leave a space when she doesn't do it on the chart so when it comes to reward and she counts it up when it's not very long she can see it was her choice to lose time.

I did the reading to herself idea tonight which went well. I d also given her something to think about (designing her owl a tree house) which she wanted to tell me all about when I went to check lights out, so I let her briefly.

@gilbertandmartha
Amanda I need to get that book our two bigger girls are too alike so if you find it useful, its worth a read

I did the reading to herself idea tonight which went well. I d also given her something to think about (designing her owl a tree house) which she wanted to tell me all about when I went to check lights out, so I let her briefly.

@gilbertandmartha
Amanda I need to get that book our two bigger girls are too alike so if you find it useful, its worth a read

It is seriously the only parenting book I recommend to people. Its just got lots of simple ways to help kids ease through the day, which in turn makes our lives easier.

Its like with RIley, and Lockie to a certain extent. there's just no point in saying lights out its bedtime go to sleep, if they don't want to sleep they won't and unless they have something do to they will create all kinds of problems and wind themselves up even more. I'll even let Riley do stickers in bed. Our only rules are lights out, and no noisy toys.

I did the reading to herself idea tonight which went well. I d also given her something to think about (designing her owl a tree house) which she wanted to tell me all about when I went to check lights out, so I let her briefly.

@gilbertandmartha
Amanda I need to get that book our two bigger girls are too alike so if you find it useful, its worth a read

It is seriously the only parenting book I recommend to people. Its just got lots of simple ways to help kids ease through the day, which in turn makes our lives easier.

Its like with RIley, and Lockie to a certain extent. there's just no point in saying lights out its bedtime go to sleep, if they don't want to sleep they won't and unless they have something do to they will create all kinds of problems and wind themselves up even more. I'll even let Riley do stickers in bed. Our only rules are lights out, and no noisy toys.

In the basket

My eldest boy is my problem settler at bed time. I prefer to bath/shower him in the morning as a night bath just windes him up even more. Even though he is ten in as couple of weeks time and a very proficient reader we still read to him. For some reason if I manage to get him to lie quietly too listen he seems to calm down a bit. A drop of lavender oil on bad nights helps too. He always has a pad of paper and a pencil next to his bed so he can write it all down or draw or whatever. It has been a long journey with him and we still have the odd bad night but at least it is extremely rare to have him swinging from the lights these days