Tips on bedtime settling?! 11 month old

[Digitallife27]

Hi,

So my 11 month old and I worked hard on sorting out day naps and bedtimes. She's nailed nap times (morning and afternoon naps - 45 - 60 minutes each time). She has her bottle then I take her up to her cot and she settles within 5-10 minutes.

Bedtime is another story. I give her a bottle starting from 5pm until 5.45pm. I do it in bits to make sure she doesn't throw up as she finished her dinner by 4.30pm at the latest.

I take her up to her cot at 6pm and she's rubbing her eyes and stuff...sometimes she's settled by 6.45pm but tonight for example it took two hours!! Two bloody hours!!

I find the nights when she settles late she wakes up in the night more often. The nights she settles before 7pm then she sleeps through the night 11-12 hours sleep.

Any suggestions on how I could tackle this? Or does it just improve? I mean her naps used to be cat naps then suddenly one day she starts sleeping for up to an hour each time!

Thanks

Good grief! 12 hours at 11 months! Mine is a good sleeper, but we'd never have got her down that early. She settles in her playpen with us in the living room and we move her through at bedtime. Could it be that although your DD is tired, she needs a bit longer to unwind after dinner? I also think we started trying to not have late afternoon naps at 12/13 months, as that stopped her settling at night.

We just did sleep training with our toddler. He’s nearly two so this might not be comparable, but what really helped us was a clear delineation between daytime and “sleepy time”. After his bath he gets in his PJs and has a story read to him in his bedroom with the lights on, curtains open. This book can vary. Once he’s had that story the lights go off, the curtains are drawn to make the room dark and we tell him it’s sleepy time (or whatever phrase you want to use, just something you can repeat every night). Then he has two very short books read to him, the same two every night. It should be too dark to see the pages really so we have a couple of picture books that we know by heart. Once he’s had these two then he has a cuddle and is popped into bed, telling him “it’s sleepy time”. After a few nights of doing this there was a massive improvement in bedtime. It used to take nearly two hours with lots of tears but now he just settles down and sings himself to sleep. If he does get out of bed we just leave him a few minutes then pop him back in quickly and quietly.

@Mybabystolemysanity I found she started sleeping through the night (hit and miss still) when we did an earlier bedtime. We did previously do bedtime for 7.30pm but if she wasn't settling then she wouldn't sleep until gone 9pm. 🤷‍♀️

I try to play with her and try and use up her energy before bed but maybe that's just making her more hyper?

It's only recently that she's been doing a long afternoon nap (1 hour). So her naps are at 9.30am and 2pm...settles by 2.30pm for that. I'll try and reduce the afternoon nap to see if that helps. Thanks

@ramblor that's a good tip for bedtime for when my little one is a bit older and can understand a bit more.

Her routine is bath at 5pm, bottle, then we have a play or I read a book to her (but we do this downstairs) then I take her up. She basically instantly cries when the sleeping bag goes on! She's so kicky that we can't use blankets. Been like that since she was newborn (haha). Naps don't involve the sleeping bag...maybe she understands the bag = bedtime!

That's seems really early after having two naps? Perhaps ready to drop to one midday nap then bed at 7. I have found if they do not settle within 15 minutes it is too early for bed.

@Dangermouse80 DD wakes up properly around 6.45am and she's usually pretty whingy by 9.30am and she does settle for that nap...so I can't imagine her lasting any longer into a late morning/afternoon nap. I guess it's a learning curve for them and transition times is difficult.

She's been on two naps a day since about 6 months as I couldn't imagine fitting in 3
Naps as suggested for that age (she used to sleep until 8.30am...it was great!!)

My 11 mo is settling better on days when he's only had one, longer nap

However he's far from sleeping through but then he never has

The tables of suggested naps are mostly made up btw, go with what works for your child

I also find my 11mo sleeps better at night if they have two good naps and then down for 7pm. This very often doesn't go to plan though and then he has a very restless night sleep and is up before 6! Sleep breeds sleep.

We're going to try a slightly later bedtime tonight and see how that goes. I guess it's a bit of trial and crying!

We're going to try no sleeping bag tonight, any suggestions of what to put baby to sleep in during a mild UK summer evening?