Advice for bedtime routine for DS aged 14 weeks

[jennifer86]

We have started to introduce a bedtime routine for DS aged 14 weeks over the past week. This consists of going to dark bedroom, changing nappy and into babygrow, feed (expressed breast milk), read a book, sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star softly a couple of times and rock gently, then Ewan the sheep, put into bed whilst drowsy and hope he drifts off, if he gets agitated i pick him up and settle again. Actually working well overall, but I am not sure what I should do if the routine does not go to plan -

For example, today he was falling asleep during his feed. I decided to read just a couple of pages of the book then did all the rest of it at the same time rather than as I have written.

Yesterday he initially did not seem to want any milk so I started the book but then he became agitated so I fed him and he took a reasonable amount. But I don't know where this leaves the routine?

I had initially wanted to avoid feeding to sleep but should I rejig the order so book comes before feed? Or maybe "book end" it with feeds before and after everything else?

He still wakes a couple of times (or more) overnight but we will deal with one thing at a time and thought it would be good to get a bedtime routine and positivevsleep associations in place :)

Any ideas / experience much appreciated! Thanks

Honestly, I think you are over thinking it.

At 14 weeks, just go with the flow. A loose routine at bedtime is great, but really not a big problem to be flexible depending on how tired he is, what sort of mood and so on.

My son would find a book too distracting/stimulating at that age. So i removed it from the routine. In fact he's only got into bed time stories in the last few months - age 2.5.

Personally I think maximising the drowsy powers of the feed by putting to bed straight after milk is the way to go.

At that age getting them used to settling themselves is more important than the detail of the routine that leads up to it. but I have found being absolutely consistent to be key.

Do whatever works at that age - if that means feeding to sleep, rocking to sleep, singing to sleep, whatever - do it

Thanks for the replies. Reading my post again I can see that I might be overthinking it - but at the moment I'm trying to be consistent with him so I need to get it straight in my own head what to do in those situations so that it is consistent every time! Yes, I'm trying to get him used to self settling and this seems to be one of the times when we have more success (especially compared with during the night when he WILL NOT settle without being cuddled / rocked to sleep - and often not even then). Our aim, I suppose, is really to help him develop ability to self settle or sleep associations which we can then use when he wakes during the night!