It is bedtime and you are feeling tired. Chances are, you don’t just drop everything you are doing and jump straight into bed. You probably have a shower, moisturise your face, maybe you are like me add a little face oil to rejuvenate a tired Mum face, you might read a few pages of your book, you may meditate. There is a high chance you are reading this and you have a bedtime routine.

For babies and toddlers, bedtime routines signal that it’s time to wind down and go to sleep. The best routine works with your family’s schedule and can be implemented consistently, bridging the transition from busy day to calmer night.

When is a good time to start?

Don’t pressure yourself to impose a bedtime routine as soon as you get home from the hospital with your newborn. After all, they need to recover from the effort of being born — and so do you! Plus, newborns don’t have enough of a sense of day and night to have any predictable patterns. They eventually work day and night out around 10-12 weeks old but through experience, I have found setting up a good routine early on can help with the witching hour and an overtired bubba. When your baby is around 6 to 8 weeks of age, you can try starting a bedtime routine. It should be very short at first — feed, bath, massage, into pyjamas, feed, sing them a song, swaddle or sleeping bag and into bed.

Why is a bedtime routine important?

Bedtime routines reinforce babies’ natural circadian rhythms, helping teach them the difference between day and night. Later on, a bedtime routine helps little ones to slow down and prepare mentally for bedtime. A regular bedtime ritual or routine can also help our kids to winddown and relax- they know bedtime is coming.

A consistent routine can help:

• Baby fall asleep. A calming bedtime ritual that follows a predictable pattern every night gives your baby a heads-up that it’s time to wind down and prepare for sleep, which in turn can help them to nod off independently if they know how.
• Set baby up for a lifetime of good sleep. Sleep regressions — where babies have a hard time falling or staying asleep — are normal throughout the first year and beyond. Having a bedtime routine in place offers comfort that can help your baby get through these phases.
• You to relax. A bedtime routine is a wonderful way to bond with your little one at the end of a long day, and it just might make evenings more relaxing for you, too.

Sleep is undoubtedly one of the bigger challenges of your baby’s first year. But establishing a baby sleep routine early on will help both you and your baby to sleep more soundly for years to come.

What does a good routine look like?

A routine I advise clients is:

• A feed or dinner
• A soothing bath
• Gentle infant massage. Research suggests that babies who get a massage before bedtime produce more of the hormone melatonin, which is our sleepy hormone!
• Read a book or sing a certain song
• Place them in their sleeping bag or a nice tight swaddle
• White noise on
• A sleepy phrase which might be “Night night, it’s bed time now”, “Goodnight, see you in the morning”

It is also really important to make sure your baby is not overtired getting into their cot- an overtired bub will wake soon after being put down to bed. Ensure you are following the appropriate wake windows/times for the age of your baby to avoid an overtired and cranky baby which will be hard to put to sleep.

Anytime is a good time to start placing your baby into their cot or bassinet wide awake (not drowsy) to allow them the time and space to try and self soothe off to sleep. It is never too early to try and teach this magic art!

Sleep well x