Bedtimes

Before we had children, I vowed that I would not be a parent who kept her kids out at all hours and complained later that I couldn't get them to sleep consistently. Therefore, we established a good sleep routine with N early on. Now don't get me wrong, not every night works this well, and it took a loooooooooong time to get him on this routine, including many many nights of holding him, rocking him, and listening to him scream every time we laid him down for the night.

We take a bath most every night, since I find it helps in the wind-down procedure. After dinner we play for awhile and then by 6:45 or so, we hit the tub. He's generally rubbing his eyes by this point, since most days he's taking only one nap, so by 6:30 it's cranky city. We stay in the tub for awhile, playing and generally having a good time.

After bath it's PJ time! I just found these new footie pajamas (my favorite) and I bought them thinking, "their 18 months, he'll grow into them". I barely got them zipped up! I can't believe he's already wearing 18 month clothes! We play for 5-10 minutes in PJ's, then it's clean-up time. I make N "help" me pick up all his toys...I figure it's good practice for later when he'll help clean up all by himself. Then we read a book (or point at the pictures, mostly) and brush our teeth. We've been brushing teeth since he broke the second one on the bottom. Now we have seven total...gotta protect them while we can!

The downside...the kid is used to being in bed by 7:30. Which means, staying out late is a rare occasion for mom and dad. If we need to go somewhere, it's usually just one of us or we hire a sitter. But here's a bonus...no, absolutely no fussing at night. N goes right to sleep or entertains himself quietly until he poops out. Even when we're away from home the "routine" generally works very well and we have few arguments at night. I find that it's a welcome sacrifice that we're stuck at home so early to have a kiddo who's ready and willing for bed every night. Consistency is the key!