Hi Everyone, hope you all had a good weekend?

My son is six months old next week and up until two weeks ago his night time routine would be the following - bath, change into bed clothes, last bottle and then he would fall asleep in his swing - we would then move him into his cot when he was asleep (we tried to just lay him his cot awake but i couldn't stand how upset he would get) - anway all of this would start at 6pm and without fail he would be asleep by about 6.45, we would then do a dreamfeed at about 10.30 and he would sleep through until about 6am.

I realise that teething etc can change their routine however for the last two weeks we have bathed him at the same time and he has not gone to sleep until about 10pm by which time he is so over tired that he ends up screaming and screaming until we manage to rock him to sleep - I don't think this is just a phase i.e growth spurt etc as it has gone on for too long.

The other thing I should mention is that he is a good eater throughout the day and has been on solid foods for a while now (on hv advice).

I was just wondering what your night time routines/timings look like as I think I need to change ours to get him back to winding down and understanding that it is time to go to sleep - not for myself but for him as I hate him going to sleep in the state that he gets himself into.

Thank for reading my ramble.

Lisa xx

i think the big thing is probably the waiting until hes asleep, we have a bath about 6, in PJs, cuddles with mummy and daddy, bottle, story then bed by half 7

Thanks piggypops - can I ask - is your lo asleep by the time you put him down or do you do bottle, story and then put him in his cot awake? if so does he cry?

he is nearly always put down awake, we started this early on, it was a pain in the behind and took 3 weeks of going to settle him every 5 min until he got the message that cot ment sleep, it was hard and i hated him cring but its was well worth a little bit of upset, we use a dummy so after i put him down and said good night, as soon as i hit the bottom step he would start to cry, i would go back up put his dummy in or cuddle him if he was very upset and put him back down say good night and start again, now he only crys if he has wind or tooth pain

if you are finding he is falling asleep on his bottle deeply he may need an extra little cat nap in the afternoon, if LO misses his afternoon nap he will fall asleep but its not very often x

We dont bath every night as Lizzie has bad ezemca and the water dries her skin out, so our routine can change so much but there are a few things we do exactly the same every night.
Lizzie is put into night clothes either after dinner or bath (bath is after dinner every other night)
then she plays on floor with dd1 then at 7pm dd1 goes to bed, then its wind down time for lizzie too. she gernally rolls round floor but no loud musical toys or anything, then she gernally falls asleep on the floor! then at 8:15 she has her last bottle, she falls asleep towards the end of it but we will then change her nappy which wakes her. then we carry her up to her cot (she also has dummy but she doesnt have it until we reach the cot other wise she falls asleep in my arms!) then lie her down and give her dummy and i leave the room. i dont speak at all after changing her nappy and she tpouch wood never sries and falls to sleep quickly.
I started of putting her down awake for naps in her cot. it took about 25 mins first day but after that it got easier and i think i kept on resettling her at the nap as i wasnt tired myself. to resettle i lie her back down and give her dummy and leave again. if she is screaming then i will pick her up til she stops then lie her down again x

Thanks for your replys everyone - last night we tried something different on the back of all of your suggestions. I settled him down for his afternoon nap at about 3.30 hoping this would then tide him over until bed time but by 6pm he was terribly ratty so we bathed him, gave him a bottle, then red him a story(he just tried to eat the book rather than listen) and then i put him in his cot awake with his dummy and his blankie and he went off to sleep almost straight away. I think this was more fluke then anything else as he was so tired.

Do you think I should try and give him a nap a bit later in the afternoon so that he is not so overtired by 6pm?

thanks Lisa

its prob worth a try, does he have an afternoon nap at all usually? we nap about 2 hours in the morning from either 9 or 10 am then a hours in the afternoon about 2 or 3 pm after a bottle then he goes to bed about half 7/8 pm

good luck x

Jacks naps are similar - he has a big 2 hr nap in the morning - usually at about 10am and then he has a couple of short naps in the afternoon - maybe 30mins at 230 and 30mins at about 430 - yesterday he only had one 30 minute one at about 330 but silly mummy didn't put him in his cot for it so he probably woke up earlier than he needed to!!!

I think i will try and get him to have a longer sleep at about 3.30 then hopefully he will still be ok at 6.