How do you put a 15 month old to bed (routine)?

[LL1991]

Hi,

Odd one but we just never seemed to graduate to a more engaging bedtime routine, story time, bottle then teeth brushing is what I think other people are probably doing at this point.

I still put mine to sleep by getting him through the bath, brush our teeth in the bath (it’s messy!) and not well as he hates me getting too involved, and then I feed him a bottle to sleep in my arms. It’s getting to the point where I feel like this is quite juvenile for him but I never really saw a point where things should change and now I’m worried he’s so aware of the routine that any change will cause issues!

So I’m wondering how others do it, are you still bottle feeding? Or did you stop that months ago and your baby is much more aware they are going to bed (rather than being tricked/lulled to sleep with milk) and they have a bottle before and then get themselves to sleep?

At what point do you change the routine? I feel like there’s so much info/advice for tiny babies but now he’s past the age of 1 I don’t know where to look for help! I’m a FTM with no help from our parents and my husband works long hours so just me doing bedtimes.

Any help appreciated as I don’t know how we go about changing. I’d love to get him into a big bed as early as possible (but I know this happens closer to 2) and feel like we need a set bedtime routine that he is part of before I can do that. I’m also worried about ‘bottle rot’ from the feeding to sleep.

Thanks in advance for any help given!

We have a few sleep associations/bed time things like bath, reading with daddy once he's in his pyjamas. Nothing really structured but we're now at the point where he'll go and turn off his light when he's ready for bed (still needs supporting to sleep obvs 😂) - he's 18 months. 15 months is still little, I think yours sounds normal and fine!!

For us it was bath, downstairs books then a bottle of warm milk infront of the tv to wind down, upstairs for teeth and into bed.

and once in bed is it just ‘ok goodnight, love you, etc’, lie them down, turn light off a leave?

My boy would scream bloody murder if I did that now! I’m just trying to work out the stepping stones from what we do now to having a 2 year old who won’t get out of bed when we take the sides off! 🤦🏼‍♀️

Thanks, he’s just growing so much and becoming so aware of what we do and such a little copy cat that I think we need to switch things up soon so he’s on board with it. I don’t know if I’ve missed something but how do people know to do this stuff! 😅

Yep- I made sure to use the same phrase every night and essentially sleep trained
once we gave up bfeeding to sleep (not cry it out), if they cried returning at timed intervals to comfort and sssh and walk out again.

story, milk, bath, bed for my 18 month old. We just put her down and say night night and she goes to sleep. But we built up to this when she was younger - hand on her then moved to stand by cot etc until she would be fine just being put down and left

I'm bf and honestly the nights where we do story then boob and baby falls asleep feeding are the dream for me! I don't do bath every night just once of twice a week unless dirty. It's the nights where I boob bubs but an hour or even two later there is still an over tired wide awake gorgeous lump of tears crawling all over me that I wish for feeding to sleep;

16 mo here, our bathroom is downstairs so while she was bf we would brush teeth downstairs, do bath then go up for moisturiser/massage, story then bf to sleep and put down
Then she started to stay awake after bf so it would be rocked to sleep then put down
Then around 13.5 months she started to refuse bf so we moved to cup of cows milk, if not bath night then it would be done downstairs followed by teeth brushing (if bath night it would be done upstairs after moisturiser then followed by teeth brushing), then story and rock to sleep then put down

I'll move to putting her down when she's ready to not be rocked to sleep

Hi OP. People will have their opinions on routine and sleep arrangements but it really is down to what works for you and baba. My DD is 2 next month and she Co sleeps with me. We have bathtime at 7 for around 30 minutes- I make it fun with cups and bubbles and let her play to get the last of that toddler energy out 🤣 I brush her teeth in the bath too because of the mess! I get her out and dressed, wind things down a bit, soft voice and lots of cuddles and kisses. She still has a bottle of milk once we get into bed (though plenty will tell you that’s wrong) then a story (same one every night since xmas 🤣) pop her sleeping bag on and I sit with her until she falls asleep. Then I potter off and do my thing til im ready to climb in next to her! Works for us, I’m a lone single parent and Co sleeping is the only way we both get a semi decent nights sleep, and truth be told I love the cuddles 🥰 your lo is still a baby, unless you really need to I wouldn’t worry about rushing him into a big bed x

Hmm, maybe my first change is bottle while awake and then rock to sleep instead 🤔

The dream… to just be able to walk out 👏🏻

We do bath, pyjamas, milk, teeth brushing, books and then DD falls asleep on my chest and I transfer her to her cot. We still haven’t managed going to sleep independently at 23 months.

At 12 months we switched to tooth brushing after bottle and a few months ago we switched from bottle to sippy cup and stopped warming her milk.

Honestly don’t change one habit for
another you’re going to need to then tackle- go straight to
the new normal.

Think my first (I'll try to bother you less as time goes on as that's theory I don't the little one will will one connsent fuss

I actually think your routine sounds sweet and lovely. No need to rush growing up, IMO!