Daylight savings time begins this coming Sunday. That means some changes; like setting your clock forward by one hour and losing an hour of sleep. Daylight savings time can be tricky and confusing every time the clocks change when you think about your little one’s bedtime. How do you get them on track with their new bedtime schedule?

There is not one specific way to do this, so I have compiled a few tips and tricks that parents use when dealing with this. I spend a lot of my time researching, talking to other mothers and learning from their experiences, so everything I share here comes from other mamas and my personal experiences to help you. My goal is to encourage and empower another mama out there.

I first of all want to share two websites that you might find very useful: https://takingcarababies.com/ & https://www.babysleepscience.com// – they have great tips and might be a great resource to you.

For the springtime you need to get your little one to bed earlier. For instance, 7pm becomes 8pm after the time change, so if bedtime is 7pm, that’s the old 6pm, if that makes sense. It might be challenging to put your little one to bed a whole hour earlier once daylight savings begins. I’ve heard people have luck with doing bedtime like 10-15 minutes earlier each day. This method will help your little one gradually ease into their new bedtime.

And, in the morning encourage them to wake up earlier than they usually would. The sooner they wake up, the sooner they exhaust themselves, so the earlier they’ll go to bed. In a week’s time your little one will most likely get used to the new bedtime.

Another way is to skip naps, so your little one can get tired and go to bed earlier. That will get them acclimated to the new time eventually. If your little one takes two naps a day, limit them to one nap, or cut their naps shorter if they start being cranky. This method might take a little longer, but I’ve seen it work for parents.

If your little one is older and can read the clocks, cover them and tell them the time you want them to know. I had a mom tell me about this the other day. She told me she just covers all the clocks in the house and puts them to sleep. Her little one is also a flexible sleeper though, so that might have helped. Try it anyway, you never know.

As always I’d love to hear from you.

With love,