This article is authored by Melissa Corso, Director of The Balanced Mother, a Career Money Life Certified Supplier.
Day light savings has started. I am getting lots of questions about how to prepare for it. So I thought I would put my advice into a blog article for you all!
If you have an early riser your problems might be fixed thanks to the start of Day Light Savings *yass* I would suggest you do nothing to prepare, just wait and see what your earlier riser does when we change the clocks. Put your baby to sleep at the same time as usually on Saturday night and Sunday baby will wake up hopefully at 7 or just after. The trick will be keeping them waking at this time most days.
If you have a baby who is waking after 7am then you have 2 choices, 1) prepare for it before or 2) deal with it after.
1) Should you want to prepare for it before I would suggest following these steps in the lead up to daylight savings.
- Wednesday: Start the day 15 mins earlier and bring forward all naps, meals and bedtime by 15 mins.
- Thursday: Start the day 30 mins earlier and bring forward all naps, meals and bedtime by 30 mins.
- Friday: Start the day 45 mins earlier and bring forward all naps, meals and bedtime by 45 mins.
- Saturday: Start the day 1 hour earlier and bring forward all naps, meals and bedtime by 1 hour.
- Sunday: Your baby should be waking at 7am (new time)
2) Should you want to deal with it after day light saving starts I would suggest following these steps for the days that follow. Even thought the clock will say 7pm, their body clock still thinks it is 6pm.
- Sunday: Start the day 45 mins later and push out all naps, meals and bed time by 45 mins.
- Monday: Start the day 30 mins later and push out all naps, meals and bed time by 30 mins.
- Tuesday: Start the day 15 mins later and push out all naps, meals and bed time by 15 mins.
- Wednesday: You should be transitioned to the perfect time for all wakes ups, naps, meals and bedtime.
If you still have an earlier riser a few weeks after day light savings starts here are my top tips:
- If you haven’t already create a little bed time routine that you can use to help your child recognise that the longest sleep of the day is coming – it could be as fast as reading a quick book, or it could include bath, milk, a song, a story, saying goodnight to 500 teddies and then sleep. Whatever it is, make sure it works for you and your child.
- Consider getting a sleep trainer clock, Kmart has them for $25 at the moment! The trick with these clocks is actually setting the time to just before your child usually wakes, so they experience the excitement of seeing the clock change to have the sun rise. Then slowly moving the clock forward by 10 mins each day until your child is waking at the time you want. These clocks are only suggested for children who are 2.5 years and older.
- Think about making sure there is NO light streaming into their rooms in the morning. You could invest in great block out blinds (or even try tin foil on the windows to see if it helps). This is to prevent the light at sunrise streaming in at 5:30am and waking your child up.
- Consider doing some outdoor activities after dinner (5 – 6pm) the extra light your child will get at this hour will give your child a boost in serotonin late in the day which will convert to more melatonin during the night. This will hopefully help your early riser sleep later in the morning.
If you found this helpful feel free to share with your friends and family. Also if you have any tips for helping transition children into daylight savings I’d love to hear them.
Looking forward to enjoying the warmer weather and longer days, I hope you are too.
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