Clock change - how on earth do you tell a baby??

[Raydan]

I've got an 8 month old DS. He's on a pretty good routine, two naps a day, bed at 7.30, up at 6 to 6.30. I'm totally clueless about how to get him to adjust to the time change though. Any tips please?

I did bedtime an hour early then made it a little later so 630 for a few nights then 645, 7 and so on over a couple of weeks.

DD is 2.5 and I'm not going to this time but have up til now both ways.

I’m no expert, but with 13 month DD I plan to push each nap back by 30 minutes or so and hope that within a day or two she’d have adjusted.

Gradually nudge his routine!

So for instance we are going to try and make DD last half an hour more before her bedtime. She usually goes to bed at 7, so once the clocks have gone back she will go to bed at “new” 6.30 (but effectively she’ll fell like she has been up an extra half hour) . Do that for a few days then try and get her to last to “new” 7pm. Have done this before and it seems to work fine!

Good luck!

Best plan is to start adjusting by 10 minutes a day 5 days before but bit late for that now!

I'd just go for adjusting times by 10 minutes a day over the next 6 days

Ah x post.

Thanks ladies, you're thinking what I'm thinking. I'm just hoping it works!

@dancemom I've been trying to adjust for two days but it's going badly. Fingers crossed anyways...

We’ve been putting DS bedtime forward 10mins a day for last week and it has not been good!! He’s now getting up an hour earlier (we have quite a strict sleep routine as he is a terrible sleeper!)
Hopefully once they change and we stick to one time he’ll get used to it!!!
Dreading the early wake up tomorrow

Oh banana that sounds awful ...why would he do that to you?!

I used to use it to my benefit so I could slightly change their bedtimes to my advantage!

I don't think you realise how terrible an idea daylight savings is until you have a baby.
Hoping that they really do scrap it soon.

I think daylight savings is a fantastic idea. What I don't like so much is the reverting to GMT which will happen tomorrow with the darker evenings. Personally I think we should stay on BST all year round.

DS didn’t notice the spring clock change when he was 8mo. So it’s not always a nightmare!

The first clock change when DS was little, we spent a fortnight leading up to it changing DS's bedtime by 5 minutes each night. We got to the day of the change and realised we'd adjusted in the wrong direction and he was now 2 hours out of sync.

Since then we just wait until it happens and then adjust afterwards if we need to, but it has never taken more than a couple of days.

In saying that, he's always been a terrible sleeper, so there's no "routine" to interrupt really.

I've already adjusted by 30 mins by systematically putting to bed after 7, will nudge naps further this week, but I think it will be mealtimes I'll have trouble with.

He woke at 6 new time / 7 old - far better than hoped! Like you @Di11y I think mealtimes will be tricky. Thanks for the tips everyone and good luck to you all too!

@BelfastSmile thanks for making me fully LOL

The babies think nothing and changed because nothing has changed apart from the numbers on the ticky box in the corner and why would they worry about that.

I don’t do things based on the time on the clock but on what the child needs/wants to do at that point, so it has never been an issue.

Set alarms to buzz you an hour before anywhere you actually need to be at a certain time, set the tv to record programmes, over the next couple of weeks and then cover all the clocks and don’t go by time any more. Sleep when you are tired, put the baby to bed when they are sleepy, eat when you are hungry, watch your programme when you want to, don’t calculate how many hours sleep people have or get.....

In two weeks it’ll all have evened out, and you might even be happier.

Do they need an exact routine... exactly the same every day?!

My baby goes to bed/ wakes up/naps/eats roughly the same time every day.

He has three hours between his two naps, three hours before night time sleep and about 12 hours in bed.

We’re not rigid. If he wakes later his nap time is later as is his bedtime, if he wakes earlier then it’s earlier!

Works for us.

Today he woke at 10 new time.. so he’s obviously worked the clocks out already. 😉

No really- he’s got four teeth and watching him on the monitor he was moving around a bit and tossing and turning. Bless him! 😍

Should say four teeth coming through at once- he’s 9 months btw

@rubyroot I had a more loose routine like yourself but then due to circumstance we needed to get him on a right schedule last month. I thought it would be a nuisance being more strict but I've surprisingly found it much better. It feels easier and more relaxing knowing what's coming next and DS has been more rested and in better humour.

• a tight schedule

Oh, I’m the other way- gone from tight schedule to loose routine. I’m hoping I’ll be able to change it to a tighter schedule should the need arise.

Oh I'm sure you will! If loose is working for you I'd stick to it. Looking back I think change with my baby has always been easier than I'd feared.