How to bribe ... I mean, incentivize, your sleeper(s)

I will cut right to the chase here.  I have had personally very little success bribing my children to stay in bed later, stay in their rooms, rest quietly during nap time.  Professionally, I have seen very few families have solid success with incentive programs.  I have heard of promised toys, promised treats, even promised vacations - trip to Disney World if you stay in your room until 7.  I also have seen (and engaged in myself admittedly) empty threats, promised cancellations for play dates, loss of tv, loss of iPad, and so on.

That said, they could work.  I can say so with confidence because it's working for me right now in my house!  Granted my son is older and his incentives are about doing homework, piano practice, and being nice to his sister.

Here's my advice: 

make your incentive small and immediate - if you stay in your room until 6am (for example) you can have a treat at breakfast, a special surprise ... pancakes with Hershey kisses?  A new creature from a creature tube?  A temporary tattoo?
do not threaten to take away anything in the heat of the moment because you probably will not be able to stick to it in the morning.
make sure that your prize isn't too hard to earn or too conceptual - sometimes a trip to the toy store doesn't make as much sense to your child as you think it might.  
put some prizes in some sort of see through container that can visually motivate your child.  Tell them they can pick a prize if they successfully complete their sleep challenge.

Finally - make your sleep challenge or goal realistic for your sleeper.  If he wakes up every day at 5:30, make his goal to stay in his room until 5:45, then move it to 6 and so on.  Or if you want to teach a rest time, start with 10 minutes a day and then go from there.

One last little nugget of advice.  Make sure that the comforts of you and/or the entertainment that you offer in the early morning isn't too much of an incentive for your sleeper to wake early.  If playing games, watching tv, or having yummy snacks is your go to plan to survive until a respectable hour, then you might want to make the early morning less fun.

spring cleaning - it's not just for your closet

Once again we are approaching a good season for change.  Spring is coming, our clocks are springing forward, and sweet mother nature is teasing us East Coasters with one warm day and snow the next.  We spring clean our closets, our homes, and why not, our lives, our partners, our children, our sleepers.

This crib sheet is dedicated to those of you who are trying desprately to change something ... to spring forward and tackle a sleep challenge that has been beating you up all winter.

If you are trying to change early rising ... embrace this new time change, but remember move your naps and your meals too, shift the whole day.  Use the daylight to adjust your child's clock - get him out in the fresh air and sunshine (hopefully) to set these new patterns.

If you are trying to change naps ... think carefully about where you want your baby/toddler to nap and teach them how to nap there, figure out the best awake interval, and tackle one nap a day offering a back up or emergency nap for the non training naps.  That said, if you rock - hold to sleep and want to teach crib napping then avoid rocking and holding for naps that are not going well.  You also should not rescue your napper just because his nap in the crib was too short.  By this I mean don't run in when he wakes, pick him up and rock him back to sleep.

If you have a baby or toddler in your bed, and you are ready to move them to their own bed or crib, then consider the following:

• Are you really ready, 100% ready, so that you can respond calmly with conviction that you support this chage.
• Will your toddler understand this switch?  If so, go for it!  He will still protest, but at least he undersands what you are doing and why (you can tell him).
• Is your sleeper too young to understand stay in your bed all night (under 2/2.5 years usually), then come up with a good way to keep her safe and secure in her room or keep her in the crib until she gets it.

If you are trying to change your bedtime routine, make it calmer, more efficient, then think about what you dread the most.  Bathtime?  Move it to an earlier time, even before dinner.  Endless books?  Earlier in the day, before dinner ideally, choose the 3 books you plan to read at bedtime, but them in a special place and only read those books, no  matter what.

Finally whatever change you are working on, tell a friend, tell your partner, get some moral support and maybe some good advice.  Create accountability for this project.

Just think once you are finished cleaning up sleep in your house, you will have so much more energy to devote to other spring cleaning projects (taxes, files, drawers, garages, baby clothes....).

Good luck!

giving the gift of sleep

Like many of you, my holiday season isn't feeling too festive yet.  I am working, parenting, working and parenting, and I am not really sure how I am going to get my holiday game on.  So to kick off the holiday spirit, I am going to offer a few little sleep nuggets to help you and your family this holiday season.  

1. If you want your son or daughter to sleep through the night, then you need to help them learn at bedtime ... not at 1 in the morning (for the first time).  No one likes that kind of surprise, especially a baby or a toddler.

2. You don't need to cry it out, but you do need to be consistent and confident.  Whatever approach you try, do it consistently for at least 3 nights - and start at bedtime!

3.  Naps and nighttime are apples and oranges - work on bedtime first and hold your baby and get cozy for naps.  Let them sleep during the day so they will be ready and feeling less frazzled at bedtime.  You also will feel better if you didn't listen to a crying baby all day.

4. Don't let your mother, sister, brother-in-law, babysitter (or your best friend) tell you what to do about sleep - do what feels right for you and your sleeper.

5. Travel with reminders of home for your sleeper - bring the white noise, the sheet (if you can), the lovey, and so on.  Offer naps on the go and offer your sleeper a little more support if she needs it.  This isn't a regression; this is a vacation (HA!*)

6. If you have a very strong feed to sleep association that you need to change, then use your partner or a beloved family member or babysitter, and let them teach your baby a new way to go to sleep.  It will take about 3 nights, and you will be amazed by your sleeper's new skills.

7. Finally, give yourself a break, accept and love the 'mess'.  My uncle Dini calls it, 'x-mess'.  The New Year is right around the corner, and who doesn't love a good resolution?

*travel with children is a trip, not a vacation, to clarify

One step (hour) forward, two steps back (ugh)

I have been stressing about the fall time change for the past 8 years.  When my son was newly sleep trained at 8 months, I broadcasted loudly to my friends and colleagues just how lucky I was to finally have such a good sleeper.  The more seasoned (no pun intended) parents smiled and me and inquired how I would handle the time change coming our way in just a few days.  My smile faded and stress sunk in.  My newly minted 6am sleeper (trust me this was a big improvement) might now get up at 5?

I have learned both personally and professionally that there are a few ways to handle this extra fun sleep challenge.  Who doesn't love a good ol' sleep challenge to test your wits and patience.  

1. Be proactive -

If your sleeper is under 3, shift bedtime and naps ahead in small increments - 15 minutes usually works - over the course of 3 to 5 days.  You can spread it out over a week if you want.  You might spend a few days with a 1:15 nap before you shift to a 1:30 nap, but your goal is to get to the full hour before Sunday at 2am.

If your sleeper is 3 and up, you can shift the day forward in a bigger increment over the course of just a few days, maybe 20 minutes one day, 30  minutes the next and then boom the full hour in time for the change.

2. Thought I would be proactive this year, but never got around to it (usually my case)

• Do what you were going to do above but do it over the course of 3 days after the time change, small shifts to the new time, bigger shifts for your older child. 
• Embrace the chaos, move right to the new time, the days and wake ups will be bumpy but you will get there after 3 days or so.  Follow the suggestions below about moving eating schedules and light and sunshine to ease the transition.

The key to working ahead of the game is to shift meals too.  The easiest way to shift a sleep schedule is to shift an eating schedule at the same time.  

If your sleeper is up early keep the lights off or low until the 'morning' and then use light to cue the daytime and get outside into the sun as much as possible during awake times.

More wisdom from the prairie

I think my husband Graham put it exactly right.  After finishing up a chapter featuring clear directions on how to slaughter and clean a hog and then cross a river, "If I ever plan a wagon ride across the country with our family, I am going to bring Laura Ingalls Wilder's set of books: Little House on the Prairie, and that's all we'll need."

He's right.  These books of course make me think about the great family sleep you get on such a journey on the Prairie from the long, slow, rocking of the wagon luring Baby Carrie to sleep to the warm fire and sounds of Pa's fiddle sending the big girls off into sweet dreams, night after night.  Besides if you are a toddler transitioning to a big girl bed then why would you ever leave your nice heavy blankets and cozy spot next to your sister, especially if the fire is out, there is frost on the floor, and there are wolves howling outside?  

My youngest sleeper is 3 now, and I have been spending a lot of time thinking about discipline as she hits and kicks whenever I dare take her to the bathroom, she hits and kicks whenever she is the car for too long, and just generally hits and kicks when life doesn't go her way.  She has great language skills and loves to share her thoughts, except when she's angry.  In my hope to help her - her siblings, and selfishly, me - I have once again returned to the Ingalls family and their guide for Prairie travel as well as parenting.  

Here are my two fundamental questions to Ma an Pa Ingalls and in italics how they might respond*:

- Why do your daughters listen to you? 

They listen to us because we keep them safe.  Our rules aren't just about being polite and being respectful; they are about staying healthy and alive.  Feeling safe in a family is really important to a child - whether it's literally keeping the wolves out - or being kind and thoughtful to a sibling.

- Why are your daughters such good sleepers?

They are physically exhausted.  Your kids would be too if they had tasks that kept their bodies moving all day too.  They also have great wind down routines to cue the end of the day.  We give them heavy blankets that trigger a calming effect - the same idea of swaddling a baby.  Finally we don't make getting out of bed alluring.  Outside the warm, safe, bed, it is cold, dark and most importantly boring.

- Pa, how do you find time to play the fiddle after such a long day?

I think it is important to show my children my interests and talents  I also like ending the day spending time together that is calming rather than exhilarating.  It works for all of us!

I am going to try to channel my innner Pa Ingalls and get Loewy to ease up on the hitting, hopefully your future bedtimes will be a little less fraught.

*I can't help but assume the voices of Ma and Pa.  I have been reading these books for 2 years, and they are very much a part of my parenting fabric for now.  It's either them or Percy Jackson (Alistair's favorite) or Toot and Puddle (Loewy's favorite).