Kay. . . not funny now!

How do I get my little guys to sleep in later than 5:00 a.m.?? We are usually in bed by 8:00 a.m. That seems pretty late to me but should we go later??

 

Actually, they should bed in be earlier. What are their naps like? My boys just turned 2 and at that age they were in bed no later than 7:00pm.

The average one year old needs 14 hours of sleep a day. If they are getting the bulk of it in their naps, it may be why they are waking at 5:00.

 

I never put my kids to bed before 8 pm. They sleep till 7-7:30 am. If I were you I would try putting them to bed later and hopefully they will wake up later in am. 10 hours of sleep at night is fine with me. There are kids that need more sleep,others need less.
I would not worry much. Just see if pushing bed time later will make them wake up later.Unless you like getting up yourself that early?

 

i would try an earlier bedtime before i tried a later one. have you read Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child? he talks a lot about the principle of sleep begetting sleep. my girls go to bed at 6:30pm & sleep until 7:00am (average). Riley slept until 8:00am this morning! ardon: they take one nap a day (usually about 2 - 2.5 hours). as i understand it, at this age most toddlers need between 11 - 12 hours of sleep at night. as the PP said though, all babies are different. it may take a bit of trial & error to figure out what works best for yours.

the other thing i was going to suggest was to treat the 5:00am wake up as you would a middle of the night waking. a lot of babies are coming out of a sleep cycle around that time in the morning and could use more sleep but because the bulk of their night sleep is already behind them, the drive to go back to sleep isn't very strong. i do this with my girls. if they wake before 6:30am, i'll go in & soothe them (usually a quick cuddle or some time patting their backs) & tuck them back into bed. most times it works & we get more sleep. other times, i just keep repeating the process until it's after 6:30am & then we get up for the day. GL! early morning wake ups are no fun!

 

I agree with the PP - earlier bedtimes actually worked better to get ours to sleep later. They still wake up at 6:45, but that is what works for us because I have to get to work and get them to daycare. As far as early morning wake-up, mine did that for a while but I did like suggested and treated it like a middle of the night wake-up. They don't get out of their cribs until 6:30 period, and have now just started going back to sleep if they wake before their wake up time. I didn't actually soothe them or anything like that though, just let them learn how to put themselves back to sleep - good luck!

 

Wow, lightbulb! Treat the 5 a.m. like the middle of the night wakings. . . duh. . . what a great idea! I will absolutely do this.
5 is WAY to early for me!! I would love to sleep in if I could ;o)
I think 7:30 is about the earliest we can do it. . . here's our evening schedule:
5:00-5:20 pick up from daycare
5:20-6 prepare dinner
6-6:30 eat dinner
6:30-7:30 bath, water, brush teeth, book, bed

If they wake before 5 I treat it as an early waking and they go back to bed. . . Typically wake between 5-5:30. . . we did have a HEAVENLY period where they both were sleeping in until 6 or 6:30 *sigh*

Anyone see anywhere I can get them in bed earlier?

Naps at daycare are anywhere from 2-2.5 hours long. . .
I did read the HSHHC but it's been awhile so I may go back and re-read it. . .

 

Mine go to bed at 7:15 to 7:30 with a similar schedule. I don't think super early is imperative, just not pushing later since that seems to have the opposite effect at my house! Our schedule is:
5:30 - get home from daycare pick-up
6:15 - Dinner (we just made this a little later when I realized that mine were eating better towards the end of their dinner and I found they weren't really hungry until then).
6:45 - Bathtime (together and pretty short)
7:00ish - Book,brush teeth, etc.
In bed at 7:15 - 7:30 and usually asleep in five minutes or so.

 

We've had this problem occasionally, and one thing we've found is if you let them get up early, they start getting up earlier and earlier. So we've done a few things that help somewhat 1) earlier bedtime 2) not getting them out of the bed until after a set time in our case after 6. My son Elie cried off and on in his bed for the past week--from any time between 5-5:30 until we get him at 6-6:30.

 

Have you ever not gone in their room when they wake at 5:00? There are times when mine will wake up early and they will usually go back to sleep. I never go in their room before 7:00.

 

I do the same thing. My guys go to bed at 7:30-8pm and if I hear them fussing earlier than 7 I just wait it out. Usually they settle back down and go to sleep. Sometimes I have to wake them by 8am so I can get them breakfast before I go to work!

 

We do the same thing as PPs, we don't go in before our set wake up time, which at our house is 7:00am. Ours go to bed at 6:30pm - 6:45pm. Most of the time they have just woken up and a day or two a week they'll sleep in until 7:30.

I was always told that babies will become VERY attached to a 4:30am - 5:30am wake up time if you let them, so we've stuck to the the "set" wake up time.

 

I think a 7:30pm bedtime is fine. Just be consistent with it. I would set a time in the morning that you want them to wake up and don't go in until that time, unless you think something is wrong. It might take a few days, but they should either go back to sleep or just hang out in their cribs until it is time to wake up. I definitely wouldn't do a later bedtime. Mine never sleep any later if they go to bed later. They are just cranky the next day. I think the key is to keep their bedtime and wake up times the same every day, if you can. Same with naps. I find when I start changing nap time and bedtime, everything gets totally screwed up. Good luck!

 

this is a good point - it's a good idea to stick with any changes you make for about 5 - 7 days before evaluating whether the change is helping or not. it can definitely take time for things to settle when you make a change.

 

Great post. I was coming on here to post something similar. All of you say not to go in there. Does that still apply if they are in toddler beds and standing at the baby gate to their room hollering "no no night-night.....stuck (the baby gate is "stuck") and then start crying...then playing? So what I do now is say night-night and they go get back in bed, I cover them up and leave. Sometimes this starts as early as 4:30 and repeats every 15-20 minutes until I let them get up. I just ordered the "Tot Clock" I will give a review when I start using it.
BTW bed time is 7:30, we tried 8:00 for a week and it didn't help.