Bedtime for 3 month olds?

Just curious what bedtime you are using for your 3 month olds. When we get home after work and eat it seems as though they are very tired, but I am concerned that if they go to sleep at 7:00 then they will not want to sleep all night. However, keeping them awake until 8:00 or 8:30 seems to go to 10:30 or 11:00 instead and I am guessing they are overly tired. Also, are you still swaddling your 3 month olds or just lying them in their crib?

THANKS!

 

I think at that age we were still at a 9pm bedtime. Our naps were all over the place though, so their last nap was generally late. I would try the earlier bedtime and see if it works. I stopped swaddling around 6 weeks or so.

 

If my dd is not in bed by 7pm, she goes crazy and will stay up half the night crying. I still swaddle mine.

 

My almost 3 month old goes down at 9 PM and sleeps all night long.

 

i was trying to keep my 3 month olds up for an 8 -830 bedtime but it never seemed to work.. Now i give them baths at 7 bottle at 730 and they are asleep at like 745.. They are overtired at like 6... so my house is one loud house from 6-745!!! i try not to let them take naps after 6pm... I didnt really swaddle at all... They kicked out of their swaddle almost right away..

 

That was about the age that we started getting them down a bit earlier than the usual 9pm. It was a rough time, but once they transitioned to an earlier bedtime at least the evening was much more peaceful.

 

At about 3 months I started working towards a 7pm bedtime. I took about a month of some protesting but they finally figured it out and after that I had a lot more time to do things around the house. Good luck. Naps at that point were all over the place.

Missy

 

I'm in the process of trying to figure out the ideal bedtime. Most advice I've gotten from this forum and HSHHC is that they need earlier bedtimes...like ridiculously early. It seems to be true - if I get them down at 6:45 they sleep great for a few hours and get up at 9:30 to eat and then go right back down. If I keep them up later...it's mayhem until midnight. It's not perfect but we're getting closer to learning the "magic bedtime".

 

From about 8 weeks on, we've had bedtime between 6:00-6:30. Up until 4 months, they were still waking once a night. I said then, and still believe now that I wouldn't have traded my down time in the evening for anything - even 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep. It was so nice to have the evening to relax with DH and my oldest DD!!

We swaddled in miracle blankets until almost 5 months old. We tried w/o several times before then, but they weren't ready to "be free" quite yet.

Good Luck!
Suzi

 

Just for the past week or so, I have been putting them down between 7-7:30pm, and so far, it has really seemed to work well. Before, we would keep them up till 8:30 or 9pm, but spent much of the evening trying to calm one or both fussy babies down. It was very frustrating and tiring. It has taken only a few days for the babies to get adjusted to the earlier bedtime. I may be jinxing myself here, but for the past 4 nights, we have started the bedtime routine by 6:45 and in cribs by 7:30, and they sleep well until they wake to eat again (about 3.5-4 hours). I love being able to have some time with DH to relax in the evening, and it is nice to eat dinner without holding a baby. We still swaddle with Swaddle-me's in the crib at night, and with a regular blanket for naps.

 

Mine go to bed at 7pm - we've been doing that since about 9/10 weeks. One sleeps (generally) around 8/9 hours before he gets up to eat -- my other one goes consistantly 9/10 hours - but occasionally 11-12 hours. (So i'm *generally* up at around 3/3:30, and then again 5am ish -- then up for the day at 7am. -- though we've had some weird random, non feeding "i need a paci" wakings the last couple of days from my 8/9 hour sleeper. Honestly i FEEL like I get less sleep now -- in part because I don't get to bed until around 11pm - then up at 3/4is....then up at 5ish ..then up at 7....so but I'm *HOPING* that my one DS will start getting more consistant about sleeping the 11-12 hours - which he does about 3 time a week right now.

ETA: - we are still swaddling - though I think one DS is getting ready to transition out of it - last night after his night feeding he was struggleing against the swaddle (which neither of them EVER do) -- I popped one of his arms out - and he fell alseep instantly - so I'm going to see if this is a trend....

 

AHHHH!! First off thanks for all the replies. We went ahead and tried for an earlier bedtime last night. Around 7:00 they both just finished bottles and were obviously tired and both had their eyes closed. I thought it was the perfect chance so I put them in bed with the humidifier and soft music. Both of them were crying within 10 minutes. So at this point what do most of you do? I had went to take a shower and when I got back they were both on the couch with my DH. They were then up and really fussy until 10:00!! DS slept until 2:00 ate and then went back to sleep. However, at 3:00 he woke up crying and I let him fight it and he went back to sleep. 30 minutes later the same thing and then 30 minutes later the same thing. At 4:45 I gave him the benefit of the doubt and made him a bottle and he drank maybe 1/2 ounce - he wasnt hungry!