toddlers sharing a room how did you teach them to not mess about at bed time?

[lighteningmcmama]

Hi

4yo ds and 2yo dd share a room and they play up so much, and they feed off each other. They actually look at each other after I've said good night in a 'we can mess about now' kind of way. It's driving me potty as I'm 26w pregnant. Please tell me what you do or how you taught your kids to sleep nicely.

Roughly what we do now is-dinner, bath most nights, stories, lights out and a prayer, then they used to sleep well. Stories start at 8pm. Neither nap in the day.

[Ihateparties]

Fwiw we do have a stair gate and it doesn't really help.

I just took dd1 up as dd2 had been quiet for about twenty minutes, when I opened the door she had taken all of the drawers out, put some of the clothes back into the spaces, the rest strewn around, the curtains were open and she was was sitting quietly in a teeny tiny drawer.

[Ihateparties]

I wouldn't mind but the monitor was on and turned right up! We don't have a video one.. Too late now I think, most people think we're odd still having one at all.

[lighteningmcmama]

Oh no, ihateparties that is my worst nightmare the kids messing up the folded clothes, you have my utmost sympathy!!!

Tonight ds fell asleep in the car on way back from.ILs so dd should settle down soon too. She napped in the car on the way there so didn't sleep coming back, hence today's late bedtime...

[lighteningmcmama]

Softlysoftly I suppose I should laugh too, better than crying!! Which I have been reduced to on two v bad nights :(

[Ihateparties]

I can live with the clothes, I have to draw the line at taking the furniture apart

[lighteningmcmama]

Yes dismantling furniture does go beyond most definitions of acceptable levels of messing about!!

[fizzly]

I sit outside shouting 'zip it' at regular intervals, until they finally give it a rest.

[scouseontheinside]

What about a reward chart mcmama? the 4yo should be able to grasp that.

How did the podcast work out?

[lighteningmcmama]

Sunday night ds fell.asleep in the car and Monday night he had a sleepover with cousins so he could see the tour de France:) so they were fine then, and amazingly last night when they were back together in same room they slept ok. I didn't do the podcast yet because I still can't get my head round how to do it without it being screen time-we don't have a simple cd player! Anyway dh thinks he may have a solution so I'm hopping we can try it tonight

Things that made a difference I think were getting them into bed at 7.30, and the reward box.

Last night though it was v upsetting because they were back to their usual tricks. Frustrating ly after about 15 minutes of lying down nicely, ds started playing up. He was talking and singing really loudly, in a v loud voice that was clearly being done to flout the rules (whispering and talking to yourself while gong to sleep is fine, but this was different).

He had 7 ping pong balls in his reward box (we couldn't find any marbles lol). Slowly slowly each one made it's way back into the box and the reward box is now empty :(

If I can get the gadgetry sorted tonight I'll try separating them

[lighteningmcmama]

Ok that doesn't read clearly...Because I wrote half if it last night Wednesday and then I got distracted.

The night which went well was Tuesday, the night which was a disaster was Wednesday.

Hope some of you are still with me and I'm not talking complete nonsense...

[lighteningmcmama]

i don't know if anyone is still following this but thought i would update and hopefully tap into your expertise

we tried the podcast and i was so hopeful, it sounded like it would create such a peaceful night time routine. on the first night ds came down after 20 minutes saying 'hed had enough of the story now' . next night he lasted 5 minutes before the same.

anyway last night bedtime got really delayed because i wanted to instal a bed guard on dd's bed to help keep her in bed (there are still gaps either side but at the moment i'm playing being a human bed guard just to keep things a little calmer, and at 28w pregnant that's getting a bit tricky!). it didn't fit after all that but that's another story they got so tired and took less than 20 minutes to conk out with no messing about.

which left me wondering whether pulling bedtime earlier is not the solution, maybe they just aren't tired, and a later bedtime (8.30) is ok. tonight we tried that and it worked again in that we had no messing about, although they took about 40 minutes to sleep.

do some kids just need less sleep? i tried googling that question, and the majority response was 'no'. but maybe i just have odd kids i'll keep this up for a few more days and see how it goes anyway.

oh, i also bought a gro clock, but that's to stop the getting into my very squashed bed during the night. ds did seem fascinated with it as he was lying in bed though. so of course it could be that and not the later bedtime, i'll have to just see how the next few days go.

don't know if anyone is out there, but its therapeutic getting it all down, and thank you all for your help so far!!

[Gardenhelp]

I'm listening

Keep at it, you'll look back at this time in amusement one day :)

[mousmous]

yes, I think some dc need less sleep than others.
I would try later bedtime for a while.
I have found though that when they start school I had to bring bedtime forward half an hour, school is much harder on their system than preschool/nursery.

[lighteningmcmama]

Gardenhelp thank you! I'm sure you're right, I know from their cousins this is nothing compared to teenage issues

Miaow I have to lie down with them every night...it wasn't a problem in early pregnancy, I needed the extra sleep anyway! But now it's a pain. But despite various attempts at various times, I've never been able to move past the inside of the bedroom door...

Good news is a later bedtime has really helped. All week we have had much better bedtimes. Only 1 night was there a little bit of messing about which was quickly sorted out, and otherwise it's been much much better. A long way off from just kissing them good night and leaving the room, but hey given where we were things are looking much better!

[lighteningmcmama]

I'm sure you're right mousmous. Ds starts school in September so I'm thinking this is a temporary solution. The main thing I've realised though is not to go by the clock as such, but to see when they're actually tired. Which for now at least seems to be 8.30. Thank you