Playing in the middle of the night (no crying just playing)

My girls for the past few months or so, a couple of times per week, wake up in the middle of the night and play. Sometimes only one wakes, sometimes both. They don't cry and are not upset, just play, babble, make noise in general. If only one is awake, she will go back to sleep in 20-30 minutes, but if both are awake, they can, like last night, stay up for a couple of hours! This is terrible for me because I can hear them from my room and I cannot go back to sleep until they do.

there doesn't seem much that I can do, I used to go in and turn their music on to help them back to sleep but as they've got older, I've stopped going in and just peep through the door to make sure they're ok.

I guess I'm not really looking for advice on what to do (although if you know of a miracle solution then please share but I'm just wondering who else has been through it and how long did it last? Please tell me that it ends!!

oh and they've been sleeping through since 12 weeks.

 

Aaron used to do this. It lasted for months! And I was pregnant with the twins so I desperately needed my sleep! He'd wake up and talk, play, bang around in the crib sometimes for a few minutes, sometimes for hours. I never went in (we had a monitor so I could hear if something changed and he needed me) and he finally stopped; or if he didn't stop at least he was quiet about it.

 

Mine do too now and then. I can hear them jumping on their beds (cribs), squealing, and laughing. I just let it go and figure they'll sleep in a bit later that morning. Guess that doesn't help much if you have to be up at a certain time though... Honestly, I think their little midnight parties as we call them are cute. Don't know how you could stop them aside from separating them and that still doesn't help if just one wakes up.

 

Turn down the baby monitor and enjoy it!

 

Oh my goodness, we don't have the baby monitor in our room, their room is next to ours! I am such a light sleeper, I couldn't wait for them to move into their room, unfortunately I can still hear them. I usually shut my door when they wake during the night but I can still hear them plus I can't sleep until I know they are!

In any case I am more worried about the fragmented sleep they are having as they are very, very tired the next day, accumulation of sleep debt I am thinking. I've been putting them super early to bed, last two days, to try and catch up. And I've turned the night light out tonight, we will see how that works - a bit nervous bout that though - I would hate for them to wake and be scared.

 

I wouldn't worry about them being scared- its pretty dark inside you and that wasn't so long ago.

 

Hahaha thank you Michelle, I never thought of it like that and of course you're right!

This morning they slept till 6am and they were asleep by 5pm-5.10pm last night so combination with no light, I think worked really well. They did wake separately last night but didn't play for long.

 

Our girls will wake usually early in the morning and play/babble for about an hour. If i hear for fifteen minutes that they aren't getting upset i usually turn down our baby monitor and go back to sleep myself. Fortunatly for us if they do start crying or screaming i can hear them with out the baby monitor plus our baby monitor has a noise light on it that indicates how loud they are getting with or with out the volume being on which is good. But it sounds like you have found a solution. I love listening to my girls play in the morning but then again i can usually get to sleep.