Bed time

My boys go to sleep at about 9pm...that way they are still asleep when the sitter comes and I have to leave for work. Less drama in the morning! Of course when it IS time they RUN for their rooms and dive under their beds. I start counting for them to get out...it is usually mommy: "one", Bug: "two", and Bear: "free"! They come out and into bed with kisses, the lullabye CD playing, and the sound maching playing ocean waves. They lay there until they fall asleep. I have people (my friend and SIL - who also have 2 1/2 year olds) ask me "how do you get them to sleep without having to lay with them until they fall asleep? I mean, it is HARD, and I have only one...how do you manage with 2?" Um...I TELL them to go to bed...and since I am the mommy...they do!

Not all children are the same. With my DS, when he was about 2 1/2 - 3, he'd go straight to bed after his bath. Usually about 7:30 - 8pm, we'd read a story & he was OUT. With my DD, she's a whole different story. She's defiant. Won't stay in bed. Everything is always a struggle with her. There have been times where she had been up past 11 pm & trust me, it's not for lack of trying to get her to sleep. She just fights me on everything!! Not all kids are the same.

I agree with Samantha that kids need a certain amount of rest to be at their best - attention and attitude! I know myself how rotten I feel if I only get 5- 6 hours of sleep and I have experienced how ill-tempered my children can be when sleep deprived. Mine are ages 8 and 10 and they are both in elementary school - their schedule is in bed at 8:30 p.m. Sunday through Thursday when in school. During the summer, I allow them to stay up until 9 p.m. (:p mom needs her downtime and they attend a day-camp while I work) during the week. Friday and Saturdays it is normally 10 - 10:30 p.m. unless we're out or something. I'm with you Makarios on "how" you get them to do it. I just tell them and expect it to happen. Of course, I also tie in their compliance to their allowance, i.e. they get docked 25cents for every night they're not ready for bed by 8:30. I do get complaints about "it's still light outside", but those are quickly squelched when I remind them the bedtime can always be earlier if the attitudes warrant it.:evilgrin:

DD starts bath-time at 6:30, followed by bed around 7:00. That's been her schedule for quite some time. She's up in the morning between 6:30 and 7:00. She's still taking 2 naps a day because she seems to need them. The first is roughly from 9:30 - 11:00, and the afternoon is roughly from 2:00 - 3:00. She's a good sleeper, which is great by me. I'm a 10 hours-of-sleep-a-night girl, so God must have taken pitty on me.

Mine goes to bed at 8:00. Sometimes she cries about it, but usually only for 2 minutes or so. Last night we put her to bed at 7:45, because I figured she was sleepy. She generally sleeps until 7 or 7:30. and she takes a 2 hour nap in the day. I know we are lucky that she is an easy sleeper, but she would gladly stay up until all hours if I let her, haha. D.

I'm with you here. Kids need their sleep and adults need time to themselves. I am always amazed if I happen to be at a store late at night and see people out with small children. Fine if that is how they want to do it, but everybody does better when they have enough sleep. I don't have any children, but when I was a nanny, I sometimes took care of the children for overnights. The baby, and all of them when they were babies, insisted on going to sleep at 7:00 no matter the time of year. She was completely unbearable if she was not in her crib at 7 sharp! The older kids were in bed by 8-8:30. They had an interesting situation for the middle boy as he got older. He liked to stay up late and wouldn't stay in bed so they told him as long as he was in his bed, he could look at his books or draw/color until he fell asleep. He is a very strong-willed child and raised quite a fuss, so for family preservation, they worked this out. It seemed to work well for them. He is the type of kid that you can just see the creative wheels turning. I think he liked that he got to do something different than the other kids, too. ;)

H goes to bed about 9 and sleeps until about 7, so he's getting his 10 hours. While I would like a little more time to myself sometimes, we don't get home until 6, so if he went to bed much earlier, we would barely see him. Also, this way he sleeps until after we've both showered and gotten ready for work, so we get about 45 minutes of peaceful time to read together, cuddle and let him drink his milk before the nanny comes. He's a morning child, so that's my favorite time of day---a good start for both of us. He's down to one nap a day, usually lasting between 2-3 hours. I know I will have to swallow these words at some point, but I've actually been amazed at how easily the household schedule synchronized. I think as long as they are getting ENOUGH sleep, it does not really make that much difference what bedtime and wake up times are---as long as they fit your family schedule.

My 2 1/2 yr old's bedtime was 9:00 when I worked full-time for the same reason one of the poster's mentioned - I would never see her!! However, I have been a stay-at-home mom for the last 2 months and I'm trying to push the bedtime back to 8 or 8:30 because I'm exhausted!!

This issue always interests me. I guess you could say I've been blessed with a good sleeper as well. He is almost 2.5 yo and has slept thru the night since he was 6 mos old. He goes to bed around 10p but sleeps in until 9a and takes a 3 hr afternoon nap (from 2-5). Yes, I would like him to go to bed earlier so I could have some me time BUT I love to sleep, so getting up at 9 works for me as well. I wonder if there is any relation between being a CIO kid and being a good sleeper? From friends and some message boards, it does seem that CIO-ers do seem to sleep very well. Does anyone know of a study of this? Anyway, back to the point. It HAS been proven that more sleep=better kid, as in concentration, etc. I mean, really, how much did THAT study cost? Who wouldn't know that more sleep=better mood? LOL

What's CIO?

Last night, I had to have the foster care licensing worker come by to recertify my house because I moved to a house from an apartment. My kids were running around (acting naughty), so I told them, ok..go to your room and wait there until I get you ready for bed. (it was almost 7:30pm) She told me I was sending my kids to bed too early! Then she had the nerve to ask me, did I feed them? Excuse me, what kind of mother do you think I am that I would send my kids to bed without eating? She made me feel like a horrible person....The very first thing we do is eat when we get home. I guess she thought I was sending them to bed because they were getting on my nerves or I didn't want to be bothered with them. My boys do not do very well, when their schedule is thrown off. They get very grumpy and/or anxious!! They absolutely NEED structure. AND besides that we get up between 5:30- 6:30 am during the weekday and the majority of the time, I HAVE TO WAKE THEM UP in the morning because they are still sleeping! When my niece age 7 and my nephew age 5 come over, I let them stay up til 9pm because they don't require as much sleep as my young kids. I often go to bed before my niece and nephew. Last night, I went to bed and 8:30pm. I'm a single mom to three kids under 3, I need some "me time" to myself at night to stay sane - (lol) and I often do things after they go to bed around the house that I can't get done while they are woke. Many times things don't even get done around the house because I focus all my time on them until they go to bed and then sometimes I fall alseep right after they do. I would LOVE to spend more time with them, as a matter of fact I am looking into quitting my job and opening up a daycare, just so I can be with them all day, but right now there are not enough hours in the day. ((((sigh))) I guess I really am being unreasonable, if you ask the lw. (sheesh) Anyway thanks for letting me vent! I feel better now-lol!

CIO=cry it out

It really depends sometimes on the baby, but yeah and the routine that they gotten used to. But, yeah, exhausting them with physical activities in the morning would make them stick to an earlier bed time. Baby Toy Town.com is a great resource of baby cribs and furnitures. Try and check out the latest crib designs featured by the Stanley Young America collection: [url=http://www.babytoytown.com/cat-146.html]Baby Toy Town - Crib Bedding & Nursery Furniture - Cat-146[/url] Their cribs and furnitures only offers the best in design and functionality.

My kids all go to bed 'early' for several reasons. My 2, 3, 6, and 9 year olds all go to bed between 7 and 8 p.m. on weeknights. We may deviate SLIGHTLY on the weekends (say, 8:30 for the older kids, 7:30 for the younger ones) but we try to remain consistent all seven days of the week. My 14 year old goes to bed between 9 and 10 p.m., usually, but really ought to go to bed sooner. She does sleep until 8 a.m., so I think overall she's getting enough, but....My Dh works an odd shift, so we've also scheduled bed times to work so that he can tuck them in. I need time to get those things done that I can't do with them helping me ( :D ) and they need a predictable schedule. Seriously, I'm big on routines and maintaining them. We've adopted drug addicted or exposed children and this helps them greatly. However, ALL children, even those who are infinitely normal do better with routines and predictable events during their day and week.So, hooray for you, putting your toddlers to bed at the time that works for you and your family and maintaining it. :D

Nicholas takes a 3 hour nap everyday and goes to bed at 8/8:30... all kids sleep differently.That said, his wake up time has moved up recently... even if we put him to bed later (and so we're not doing that because that just creates a crankier situation!). I'm not sure what the switch in wake-up time is about but it's not my favorite. :)