6 weeks old - bedtime routine?

[maldivemoment]

Hi all

Just after some general advice. Our 6 week old baby is finding nightime difficult, with regards to settling down for the night and I think it may be because he is over tired. I know every baby is different but generally how much sleep should a 6 week old be getting during the day? Also, is it too early to get him into a routine in the evenings i.e bathtime, dim lights, etc? He is still waking every 2/3 hours during the night for a feed (breastfeeding) - I'm assuming this is normal?
Finally, when would you settle him down for the night, after his 7/8 o'clock feed or wait until the next one to put him into his moses basket?

As always, all advice appreciated! Many thanks

We have a sort of routine, not always done at same time. But basically naked time and kick about, bath, feed and bed. My 10week old wakes every 3 hours, this is normal their stomachs are tiny.

A very helpful MNetter said no more than an hour awake before sleep at this age.

I think we introduced a routine with dd at about six weeks. We did one boob, bath, other boob, bed and kept her room fairly dim for the feeds. Pretty standard I think. Then dh did a dreamfeed with a bottle of expressed breast milk about 10 or 10.30, and I expected to be woken at least once more, but often twice. So sounds pretty similar I think.

It took a while for her to get used to it as a cue for sleep, and we were still in and out in the evenings quite a lot, but I think it was useful for her in the end and we still use the same sort of routine now (she's 15 months).

It was definitely useful for us as we knew what our strategy was, we didn't have to judge it every night or have that thing of dreading what was going to happen. Come 6.30 or 7 we just got on with the routine, and then anything after that we knew we were keeping the room dark and the aim was to keep her in bed. Those timings were just what fitted with when she tended to feed and get tired, so wouldn't be right for all babies.

We were also swaddling her at night (and did that until about 12 weeks I think) because she would get furious when over tired and it was the only thing that seemed to calm her. We found that really helpful, although disconcerting to be straightjacketing our baby into a little baby-lozenge! We got swaddle blankets from mothercare because she fought out of a normal blanket wrapped round.

Hiyah,
yeh seems normal to me, i have a 5 and half month old and i remeber this well wakening every 2-3 hours, trust me it does get better, its only been the past 2 months really that ds has been sleeping tru but still he wakes once or twice not for feeds but for his dummy. xxx