Newborn night routine tips

[Samantha003]

Interested to hear tips and advice for developing a newborns current / future night routine.

My DS is a few weeks old. Sleeps well and feeds well in the day. I'd say our night time is going as good as any newborn. Sleeps for 2-3 hours.

He does come alive a bit more between around 8pm and 11pm. Some times just awake and alert. Some times he's a bit uncomfy (wind or reflux).

He likes to sleep on us at the moment and does cry and fuss when being put down. So we have to get him into a deep enough sleep them carefully put him to bed...

I'd like to hear how you got your newborn down earlier than 11pm and how you established night and day.

Thanks !! Xo

I'm still working on it my DS is 6 weeks now but the last 2 weeks we have introduced a bedtime routine at 8pm and it seems to be helping.
At 8pm we strip him down for a bath and DH baths him. I then take over and speak softly, get him into a new vest and baby grow, keep lights as low as possible. I then feed him, read a story (I know he can't understand but I thought this is what I'd want to do when he's older so might as well now) and he lies on me until he's sleeping but not a totally deep sleep. I then transfer him to his crib and rock him until he falls asleep.

We had a next to me but he loves movement so we switched to a rocking crib and it's really helped.

He's now going down between 9-12/1 and then again until 4/5, before starting his day at 7. I'm finding it's also getting easier to settle him after his feeds through the night too.

It's been total trial and error but it seems to work ok for us? I'm by no means an expert though so hopefully someone who knows better than I might be able to give you some full proof advice!

We didn't with either of ours. Ours just stayed up with us until they were 6 months and if they fell asleep they just went in the Moses basket or bouncy chair downstairs until we went to bed. Things change with sleep so much in the first 6 months, one week they're sleeping well and the next they're up all night getting a routine seems so much effort (and we like to follow the SIDS guidelines)

We didnt.

They do work out night and day naturally by themselves, don't worry!

We kept both of ours downstairs with us in an evening until they consistently showed signs of tiredness or were falling asleep around the same time each night, I think it was around 12 weeks.

We then did the bath, bottle, bed routine every night from about 7pm. Lights off, no TV and kept upstairs nice and quiet. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.

Totally normal for a newborn to just nap feed nap feed and go to sleep late. Mine went into a predictable pattern of 8.30 sleeps at about 2/2.5 months old that is until the 4 month sleep regression. I advise just go with the flow and let baby guide you, no rush to get them to bed early.

Thanks for your replies. I'll just carry on how we are for now and see how we progress naturally. Sounds like best option whilst he's only few weeks old

Yep it sounds like you are going about it the right way. My lo fell into his own routine about 10-12 weeks of 7-11, 11-3, 3-5. Something that helped me is feeding him as soon as he stirs, before he opens his eyes, so that he actually doesn't open his eyes during feeds and goes right back down. Also I only change a nappy if there is a poo (and sometimes not even then tbh ) because that makes one wide awake baby! Hoping that 5am wake up starts to extend soon.. zzzz

Time.
It just takes time IME.
They all settle in to their own routine in their own time.

Nothing wrong with trying to nudge him in the direction you want him to go, but in my study of 4 boys the one who slept the least as a baby still as a teenager sleeps the least. The one who was brilliant at self-settling and slept 14 hour nights, now aged 13 sleeps 14 hour nights again .

For me the idea of a 'routine' just stressed me and going with the flow and allowing my baby to train me worked much better.
Having said that I know people who did very well with a very rigid routine.
Hourse/courses.

Give him time

From early on I did the last feed in the dark in a quiet room and did all the night feeds in the dark; putting her down as soon as she was fed and asleep and not talking/interacting with her and only changing her nappy when needed.
Then at about 12 weeks I found that she was very unsettled in the evenings so decided to try an earlier bedtime and started getting her ready for bed and feed in a dark room then down to bed at 8pm. I never and still don't do much of a bathtime as part of the bedtime routine as I found it worked better for us to do it at other times.
The first week of the earlier bedtime it took about an hour to 90 minutes to get her down, second week more like 45-60 minutes and now a few weeks on she's down in 10-15 minutes.
I stressed myself about the bedtime routine when she was only a few weeks old as I felt like she should be in one but it was too early for her at the time and at 12 weeks it felt like the right time for her.
I treat any wake ups or feeds before 6am as night feeds then when she wakes up in the morning I speak to her a lot and interact a lot so she understands the difference between night and day.
I also do her daytime naps in light rooms with curtains open and noise going on but some people have different opinions about that.