It's Bedtime Baby!!

Yep. My baby has a bedtime. I've always believed that tiny babies don't need schedules, and I still don't. By schedule I mean the baby eats at 10, 2, 6, and 10 and no where in between etc. I think those types of schedules are unnecessary. If I'm hungry, I pity the fool who tells me I can't eat because its not lunchtime yet. He eats when he wants, and plays when he wants and for the most part, during the day, he sleeps when he wants.

Bedtime is a different story. We start getting ready for bed somewhere between seven and eight, and he's usually asleep by eight thirty at the latest. First he plays in just a diaper for a bit, then he gets gas medicine, a nice warm bath, new diaper and clean sleeper, swaddled, then nursed and rocked to sleep. Sometimes the routine varies, but thats pretty much how it goes around here every night. We started this routine when he was about six weeks old.

Did I decide that he should be in bed by 8ish every night? No. Plain and simple this was not really my idea. I was fine with putting the baby to bed when we went to bed, but after about two weeks of him being so fussy and inconsolable that you couldn't stand to live with him from around 9pm until midnight when he would finally, out of exhaustion, fall asleep I had a moment of clarity. Maybe, just maybe, he was overtired which in turn was causing him not to be able to fall asleep. I wondered if I could head him off at the pass and get him to bed BEFORE he got so cranky. Lo and behold it worked. I've never looked back.

Nine times out of ten he sleeps from eight-ish until midnight, eats and then sleeps until four, eats again and then sleeps until around eight in the morning. For those of you who say that I should put him to bed later so he won't get up so early...no thanks. I am a night owl, and absolutely not a morning person. I would LOVE to sleep late in the mornings, but I would never get anything done because I guarantee you that I'm not crawling out of bed before the baby does to load the dishwasher. These things are much easier to do at night, before I sink into that warm comfy bed that I never ever ever want to crawl back out of.

So there. That is the long drawn out reason that Trevor has a bedtime (loosely) for those of you who are making fun of me for it. He's a happier baby and I'm a happier mama. :)


*Trevor is 2 months, 1 week and 3 days old*