# Toddler sleep during the summer



## healthy momma (May 28, 2009)

Ok. Although I searched I may have missed threads on this so feel free to point them out to me if you know where they are. If not, is anyone else having issues with their toddler going to sleep as the days get longer? My almost two year old is going to sleep progressively later and later and it definitely seemed to correspond to the lengthening of the days. He went to sleep like clockwork between 8:00 and 8:15 just a month ago. Now I'm lucky to have him asleep by 9:30 - 9:45. Is it the longer days? The age? Any suggestions (keep in mind he goes to sleep with me lying with him and I practice attachment style parenting)? I could use at least a little down time at night before I need to shut my own eyes.


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## caiesmommy (Feb 26, 2007)

Well my ds is 3.5 and since its been brighter he goes to bed later and wakes up earlier..A LOT earlier...Im going to black out his window


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## healthy momma (May 28, 2009)

Good to know I'm not the only one. Unfortunately, I have already tried the blackout curtains and they haven't worked in my case.


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## blizzard_babe (Feb 14, 2007)

Sun stays up until midnight around here at this point, and we're just having to relax and go with it. Blackout curtains only help so much. Bedtime is just later, but we do end up having to force the issue because he'd happily stay up all night if we let him...


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## LCBMAX (Jun 18, 2008)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *blizzard_babe* 
Sun stays up until midnight around here at this point

yowza that would be hard...

yeah, definitely noticing a slip toward a later schedule, and though I never thought I'd miss a 5:30 wake up, I must say it's a lot easier to get out of the house by 8 when you get up so early. And of course, the later the wake-up, the later the nap, the later the bedtime -- where will it end?

I'm considering going with the flow throughout the week, and then once a week do a napless day to try to reset the bedtime clock. I just really. can't. handle. the late bedtime.

BTW, we use blackout curtains and white noise all year long.


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## healthy momma (May 28, 2009)

I'd love to hear how your napless day and attempted reset goes if you are so inclined to post. I'm too chicken to try it myself or at least not before I hear how it goes for someone else!







But after a 10:30 bedtime tonight I'm feeling desperate.


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## LCBMAX (Jun 18, 2008)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *healthy momma* 
I'd love to hear how your napless day and attempted reset goes if you are so inclined to post.

Well, we did it last week, partly because of the time thing and partly because there were so many fun things going on for Saturday. It really really helped to be out of the house til 5:30. My 27 month old son was manic, but cheerful til it came to getting in the car to go home. He ate, or rather inhaled, a piece of chicken and was out cold by 7:15. Ahhhhhhh. Don't think I could have handled it well alone, or at home, so that'll be part of the plan for next time - how to stay out and BUSY til the last moment.

Ok, so that was exactly a week ago, and today the am wake up was 5:15, nap was 1 - 3, and he took a long chewy time nursing til he kind of fell off the cliff into sleep at 8:30.

No idea if this is at all an example of what anyone else, nevermind us, could expect from this experiment, since we just nightweaned 6 weeks ago, and are only on week 3 of me sleeping alone and daddy doing all the night time care (progressively less each week.)

But there you are.


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## blizzard_babe (Feb 14, 2007)

DS usually ends up napless-resetting himself once a week or so, lately. He'll just refuse and refuse and refuse to nap, and by the time he shows signs of tiredness, it's time for DH to be packing him up to come pick me up from work, so naps just don't happen (or it's a ten minute nap in the car). He goes to bed early and then is kind of back on schedule for a little while.


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## Emmery'sMom (May 31, 2009)

Just this week my DD started fighting sleep at bedtime- tossing and turning for an hour while we nurse and lay in bed. Sometimes I fall asleep before she does! She doesn't go to bed until it's dark anyway, but something has her messed up- I thought it might coincide with starting night weaning, but I nurse her to sleep so IDK....


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## sweetcheeks (May 21, 2005)

DS2 is just about 2 (only 4 more days!) and we've been noticing more difficulty getting him down to bed now that it's light out until past 9pm. He'd usually be in bed, out cold by 7:30 and now he's not asleep until 8:30 or later. And his wake up time is 6am, 6:30 if I'm lucky. We just go with it. The big kids will be out of school at the end of June and then bed time schedules go out the window anyway as we're usually out doing stuff until 9-9:30pm. Right now, DS2 still has a big nap in the afternoon -- usually 2-3 hours depending on if DD is at preschool and we have to go pick her up.


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## Peony (Nov 27, 2003)

We drop the nap when the bedtimes start getting that late, which has always been around 2-2.5y so far. Huge fan of black out curtains as well but they don't help when the child is still too wide awake to calm down to go to sleep. 3y DD2 is still asleep by 7:30pm most nights, she will say "but is isn't dark out yet!", we go into the room, shut the blinds, read books, etc... and then by that time she has forgotten that it is still light out.







1 year old DS is getting difficult to put down at that same bedtime but he is teething so when that happens all bets are off about sleep.


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## healthy momma (May 28, 2009)

Hmm. Have other people experienced a drop of naptime around 2 to 2.5 years? If so, has that helped with an earlier bedtime? My little guy sure seems to need his naptime and *very rarely* fights it. I'd love to just go with the flow more with bedtime but I really, really need that time in the evening for me. Also, how much sleep are your little ones getting total? With my DS change in schedule he went from getting 13 hours total of sleep in a 24 hour period to only 11 and it was not a gradual change. And with that decrease there seems to be an increase in constant low level frustration for him throughout the day. I just want us both to stay healthy and happy!


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## blizzard_babe (Feb 14, 2007)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *healthy momma* 
Hmm. Have other people experienced a drop of naptime around 2 to 2.5 years? If so, has that helped with an earlier bedtime? My little guy sure seems to need his naptime and *very rarely* fights it. I'd love to just go with the flow more with bedtime but I really, really need that time in the evening for me. Also, how much sleep are your little ones getting total? With my DS change in schedule he went from getting 13 hours total of sleep in a 24 hour period to only 11 and it was not a gradual change. And with that decrease there seems to be an increase in constant low level frustration for him throughout the day. I just want us both to stay healthy and happy!

I'm not sure. I feel like we're in a little bit of no-man's-land right now when it comes to naps (DS turned 2 last week). His naptime is slipping later and later into the afternoon (to the point where, like I mentioned, it would overlap the time when he and DH need to be out the door to come get me from work), but he's still a little grouchy if he doesn't get it, most days.

I think this summer, while we're in the Lower 48 and (a) really busy during the days and (b) in a place where the daylight is a little more... SANE, we might experiment with no naps.


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## ~cassie (Aug 31, 2009)

Mine stay up later but I'm ok with it. I don't usually enforce a strict bedtime when there is no school(2 more weeks!) but what we do right now is we go outside before dinner, come inside around 4pm, cook, and then we head back out around 545-6pm and we play hard til 745-8, come inside, bathe, read, and bed by 9. We spend tons of time outside during the spring/summer-usually 2-3 hours in the morning, 1-2 when the baby is napping, and then another 1-2 after dinner and it wears them out enough to go to sleep.

ETA-about the naps-I find 2 hours outside in the morning playing really wears them down enough for a nap. If we are stuck inside just playing, naps for my nearly 3 yr old are difficult.


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## elleystar (Oct 24, 2007)

Yes, mine just turned 2 and for the last month or so we've had the exact same problem. I already had blackout curtains on one window, and a double layer of dark curtains on the other. That wasn't enough-light still comes in around the edges, especially at the top of the window. One day out of frustration I put a fleece blanket up over each window as well. I made sure that the blanket folded over the top of the curtain rod to block that light, and used a couple of clothespins to keep it in place. The blankets only hang about halfway down the window but they block the light where it's the most important, apparently. I did that about a week ago and his sleep has been so, SO much better! No more 1-2 hour fight to get to sleep, and no more 5:30 am wakeup!


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## 4Marmalade (May 4, 2004)

My twins will be two next month. They've also been going to bed a bit later. 7:30pm instead of 6:30pm (keep in mind they get up at 5:30am so it's reasonable). They still do need to nap but I find that if I get them down for an earlier nap (starting at 11am instead of 1pm) they go to bed fairly quickly.

They also go to sleep much quicker if dh lies down with them. When I lie down with them it takes up to 30 minutes more







.


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## RunningMomTegan (Oct 20, 2009)

DS has been going to bed at 8:30PM recently, which was a change from 7:30PM before the sun was up so long. He's two next week.

I have two thoughts on it:

1. He's a more "helpful" age, so incorporating him into my evening rituals, getting ready for the next day, has worked well. At 8, we both curl up in bed and he's asleep by 8:30. DH is away for school, so this is "our" routine until we're all together again in three weeks.

2. He skipped his nap yesterday, and was OUT at 6:30 for the night. He gets up at 6:10AM, and he slept until then with no problems, light or no light. The crazy early bedtime let me know he still needs a small nap, but that we are approaching the no nap zone. I have another due in July, so I'm clinging to naps for a little while longer.

Bottom line? The sun appears to be exacerbating a pre-existing shift in sleep needs. Sort of an excuse to stay up later as his nap becomes less of a need.


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## buttercups.nest (Jul 2, 2009)

We had almost no windows that opened/had screens in our house. My daughters room window opened but no screen. There was also no control to how far it opened which made me really nervous. Her bedroom faced the sun ALL DAY so I put tin foil on it to block out the heat. Really worked...also found out it made the room really dark so she still napped and slept at night!


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## Maine Mama Doula (Sep 6, 2007)

I stopped putting my 33 month old down for naps and he goes to bed happily around 8pm. My 16 month old rises earlier because the light is coming through the window, but I don't have any trouble putting her down. My 4 year old, on the other hand, says, "But it's still light out!" so we're working on that.


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## MamatoPeach (Nov 15, 2008)

I am so glad to find this thread. I had no idea why my kids were suddenly not going to bed but this makes since. Its their natural body clocks taking over. I felt like i was putting kids to sleep for 3 hours tonight. My 2, almost 3 year old is starting to take naps because she is waking up earlier and going to bed later, must be the summer schedule. I guess I will just go with the flow, can't force kids to sleep.


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## healthy momma (May 28, 2009)

Just a quick update on our progress. Two days ago my ds actually slept in until 8:30 am and since we had a good start to the day I thought I'd brave a no nap day to see if I could reset his clock a bit. He fell asleep on my lap at 3:00 that afternoon and I let him sleep for a half hour before gently waking him up. That was just enough to get him through the evening and by 8:00 I was getting him ready for bed. He was exhausted. After nursing he started to fight against sleep but I pulled out the sling we haven't used in probably six months, snuggled him against me and gently danced around. He just melted and was sound asleep in two minutes. He slept great and didn't get up for good until 7:30 am. Yeah! Even better, he took a good two hour nap yesterday from 12:30 to 2:30 and then we did the exact same routine last night and he was out. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for tonight. Hopefully we've licked the 10:30 bedtime for a while. If it creeps that way again I'll definitely work in a no nap day. And as another bright mom suggested I did it on a nice day where I kept him outside and distracted with his grandparents. Oh, and he's been a lot happier and less frustrated the last two days so it's been good for both of us.


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## mckittre (Jan 15, 2009)

Maybe this is my problem too. I cannot get my 15 month old on any sort of schedule anymore. It does stay light here until 10:30-11PM, and getting more so all the time. Making the room/house dark is impossible (one room house with a skylight).
He doesn't wake with the sun (wakes up 7:45-8:30ish), but lately I just can't put him to sleep. I've had him drop off at 12AM, at 1AM... I thought his naps were too late in the afternoon on those days, but today he slept 1-3PM, and still won't sleep now (at 10:30PM). If he stays up late and doesn't nap at all then he will crash super early (like 6:30PM), but I don't think he's ready to lose naps entirely. I feel like I spend my late morning/early afternoon desperately trying to get him to nap in the hopes that the nap will be early enough, then my whole evening trying to get him to bed for the night.


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## porcelina (May 2, 2007)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *healthy momma* 
Hmm. Have other people experienced a drop of naptime around 2 to 2.5 years? If so, has that helped with an earlier bedtime? My little guy sure seems to need his naptime and *very rarely* fights it. I'd love to just go with the flow more with bedtime but I really, really need that time in the evening for me. Also, how much sleep are your little ones getting total? With my DS change in schedule he went from getting 13 hours total of sleep in a 24 hour period to only 11 and it was not a gradual change. And with that decrease there seems to be an increase in constant low level frustration for him throughout the day. I just want us both to stay healthy and happy!

This is exactly what we are experiencing! My DS is 29 months From about 13 (well, maybe a bit less) to about 11 per day, so that about 9 hrs over night is normal for him now when he used to get 11 at night. It is so strange! He is also easily frustrated, cranky, on-edge, etc. during the day, and really needs the nap (without it, he wakes even more frequently at night with very disturbed sleep).

I have just been reading Sleepless in America and am implementing some of the techniques. So far, I love the book. The first night, I got him down 45 mins earlier than usual, and each consecutive night for almost a week, we made it 15-45 mins earlier. Then, we had a night of later bedtime and (of course, you guessed it) early, er, 5am wake up, which led to a day that was totally unusual (early to bed at 7.30) followed by a day that was also unusual (nap 1-4 and then bedtime at 9.40). But, in general, I think it is helping. Granted, I think the days of a 7.30 bedtime are probably long gone, as by the end of the summer, when the darkness is back, they'll be even closer to 3 yrs old. By 3, they are only said to need 12 hours total sleep per day...

Anyway, the main things I'm doing are blacking out the entire upstairs part of the house (as much as humanly possible with blackout shades in every room plus draping a blanket on the one window where most light comes in) AND dimming all the lights. You can buy a dimmer that you can plug your lamp into, and keep the room dimmer. You can also read by a flashlight, and have bath with a nightlight. I start the light dimming about 1.5-2 hours before I really hope he will be asleep, so around 6.30 or so. I also pull the shades and blinds downstairs to limit the light if we are a little on the late side of getting upstairs.

Another change is to be more consistent about earlier eating time (5.30 or so), and then having a bedtime snack (part of setting the body clock). I'm also less likely to fight him about the whole sleep thing, and keep a more calm environment, because I now understand it's his body that won't wind down, not that he's intentionally avoiding sleep. And the major change to start with is enforcing a wake-up time, though he has been exceeding my target of 7.00 am almost every day (maybe I need to make it earlier for this to really work). Then, make sure they get LOTS of natural sunlight when it's time to wake up, and get them outside as early as you can. The goal of all of this is to re-set their internal clocks.

Anyway, I highly recommend the book, even if we're still trying to work it out! Good luck!


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## mermaidmama (Sep 17, 2008)

My almost 2 yr old has been going to bed later.......AND skipping naps! I feel so exhausted by the days end. I guess I should be happy that he doesn't usually wake up very early (knock on wood).


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## brandianndesigns (Jun 8, 2008)

we've been having some interesting sleep patterns here too. my almost 3yo has been going to sleep later (around 9) and up earlier (around 530 am). he is still taking a nap but it's before noon because he's up so early - which won't work once he starts school, so i've been trying to get the times moved back.

he's always in bed by 7 and only rarely is still awake at 8. he goes down for a nap at 11 and usually sleeps for a couple of hours. for a while i had his naps moved back to 1pm which worked well, but not right now.

we have a rule in our house - even if there's no nap, quiet rest time is required. he does not have to sleep, but he does have to rest. this will help tremendously in the middle of summer when he wants to be out in the pool and it's just too hot that time of day.

in the mornings if he's up before 6 i will give him a cup of milk (i figure normally he's hungry like i am first thing in the morning) and tell him it's too early to be up that he has to go back to bed. normally that will work for about 30-45 minutes if he stays awake or longer if he falls back to sleep.

we usually run errands in the mornings and then play at home in/outside in the afternoons. i like it that way because if he naps late (i don't let him sleep past 330 so it doesn't interfere with bed time) then i don't have to worry about running here or there or anything - i can just go with it. because it gets so hot here in the summers (and it's already in the 90s during the day) we play outside early mornings, run errands, lunch (1030-11ish), nap, wake up, play, dinner at 5-530 (i also have a 16 mo who needs to eat earlier), play, bath around 615, bed for the little one, then the bigger one goes to bed later.


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## CI Mama (Apr 8, 2010)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *Emmery'sMom* 
Just this week my DD started fighting sleep at bedtime- tossing and turning for an hour while we nurse and lay in bed. Sometimes I fall asleep before she does! She doesn't go to bed until it's dark anyway, but something has her messed up- I thought it might coincide with starting night weaning, but I nurse her to sleep so IDK....

This is my DD, too! (19 month old). About 3 weeks ago, our nice, peaceful "nurse to sleep" routine turned into 1-1.5 hours of nursing gymnastics in bed, with me falling asleep before her. Not good.

I couldn't take it anymore, so now she has a short nurse on the couch and either my partner or I walks her to sleep in the stroller. We've also pushed back our routine so that it's truly dark when we take her out of the house (between 8:30-9:00 at the moment). When we bring her home, she sleeps in the stroller in the living room or kitchen until I'm ready to go to bed, and then I take her with me. She usually wakes up at that point, but a quick nurse will put her back down again.

We just hope that before next winter's blizzards, the routine has shifted again.


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## MJ13 (Jun 10, 2007)

oh gosh I'm so glad I found this thread.

My 28 mos DS has always been a great sleeper (well except still waking up many time a night) In bed early 6:30ish sleeping until 6-7am and taking at least a 2 hour nap. This past week he's been staying up until 10-10:30 even 11 and taking really short naps or none at all.

We're getting lots of outside time and hard playing time and it doesn't seem to be making a difference.

glad to know I'm not alone...


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