Their bedtime is too late!

Hello! It's been this bedtime of between 8:30 to 9pm for the last couple
of weeks and despite dropping off the dreamfeed at midnight, and having
the girls sleep through, we still not sure how to get them to go to bed earlier,
I keep reading how others go to bed at 7pm (amazing!)
I would dearly love it if they would go to bed by 8 p m! How does everyone else do it?!??!

Here's their schedule:

6:00~6:40 am wake up
7:15 am bottle followed by cereal
8:30~9am nap (1 hour or more)
11:15 am bottle
12:30~1pm nap (1 hour or more)
3:15 pm bottle followed by veggie or fruit
4:30~5pm nap (1 hour or more)
6:45 pm bath
7:15 pm bottle
8:30~9:15pm bedtime

Thanks in advance!!

 

Christine, I would start cutting back on that late nap, and eventually dropping it altogether, and you will get that early bedtime! We had completely dropped that 3rd nap by about 7.5 months.

 

My girls also take that nap between 4:30 and 5:00, but they only sleep for 15 - 20 min. They get their bottle at 6:30 of to bed at 7:00. I wish I could get them to go a bit later, we have tried, but did'nt work. I would try to wake them up after the most 1/2 hour and see if that makes a difference.

 

Your schedule is our schedule but we start bottles at 6:30 (baths at 6) and they are in their cribs by 7..sometimes it takes a few times of going in the nursery to give back a binky but that's it..they don't get up until 6-630 the next day!
Their nap about 430 or so does not seem to keep them from sleeping..by 6-15 they really start getting cranky so we started their bottles at 630..used to be 7

 

I'd kick a puppy for your schedule!!

Wesley goes to bed at about 9:30. Fights until about 11:00 until he finally goes to sleep, then wakes up an average of four times per night until he wakes for the day at about 9:00. He usually take two 45 minute naps and one 30 minute nap.

I'm just going to be thankful when he finally sleeps through the night.

 

Mine are 5 months today and this is our schedule:

5.30 - 6.30 am - wake up to feed
go back down until 7.00 am (if they wake before 6 am)
start the day at 7.00 am
small bottle at 8.00 - 8.30 am
nap 9.00 am
wake up 10.30 - 11.00 am (11.00 am at the latest)
bottle
lunch at 12.30 (solids)
back down at 1.00 / 1.15 pm (with their big sister)
wake up around 2.30 pm (3 pm at the latest)
bottle
dinner at 5 pm (solids)
bath at 5.10 / 5.15 pm
bottle at 5.30 pm
in bed by 6.00 pm
sleep until 5.30 - 6.30 am (straight)

Just move their bed time forward 20-30 minutes each couple of days. We love early bed times. Twins down at 6 pm, then I have another hour to put my oldest down before 7 pm (she went down at 6 pm from 4 months - 2 years of age).

Looking at your schedule, I think you have to shorten (and/or drop) the 3rd nap and move their bed time earlier. You can't let them take a 3rd nap at that time and expect them to go down at 6 or 7 pm. But you can, when you shorten or skip that 3rd nap. At least I have 3 kids on the same afternoon schedule, and sometimes they cat nap on the go, but usually not.

 

I agree w/ Becky. . .
I wasn't allowing mine to sleep past 4pm at that age so that I could get them down for the night around 7pm.
If our day was really off, they could sleep later and go to bed around 8 pm though - once in a while.

 

I agree with Becky as well. Mine took a 3rd nap for a few months; however, they only slept for 30 minutes. I would decrease that 3rd nap and slowly begin to put them to bed earlier. You'll so enjoy having your evenings.

 

At 5 months mine still weren't doing more than about 2hrs of awake time between naps, so mine were napping at 8:30am, 11:30am and 3pm. They woke at 7am and bed at 6pm.

 

OK so the last nap today, I'm going to make sure they sleep no more than 30 mins and see how it goes. Thanks everyone! I would not have had any idea which nap to drop!!

 

Your schedule sounds like ours... or how ours used to be until this week <_< . My midgets are starting to drop their 4:30 nap and get sleepy at 6:30. But, they wake up. Now I'm sitting here at midnight, waiting for them to quit playing SLUMBER PARTY! so I can get to bed .

 

we have our schedual down pat, if we dont stick to it our day is haywire as you can imagine.

kids are all in bed by 6pm and asleep by 6:30. yes it is very early but mummy and daddy need their sanity and this has been their bedtime since very early so they know nothing else.

 

I agree with pp see if you can make their last nap a little shorter and then push their bed time back by half an hour. What we did was to push their bedtime back by 1/2 hour every week untill it was at 7pm. So now they have their dinner @ 5 bottle @ 6.15pm bath then in bed by 7. I need my time @ night to keep my sanity lol x