Daylight Savings Time Sleep Tips to Help Children Adjust to the Change

Daylight Savings Time is quickly approaching and for many moms that equals anxiety about getting little ones adjusted quickly to the sleep change. I am talking about my Daylight Savings Time Sleep Tips for children today, in hopes that it helps us all transition to the time change without losing any rest.

Daylight Savings Time Sleep Tips for Kids

I was lucky, that all three of my children slept great as babies. Going home from the hospital they would sleep for 4-5 hours, wake up and eat, then head back to sleep for another 4-5 hours. This meant mommy always got a good 8 hours with only one wake up.

Unfortunately, I’m paying for that luck now, my boys are horrible sleepers. Anthony at 9 and Aidan at 5, take forever to fall asleep and once they are asleep if anything wakes them up, our entire house is up for the rest of the night. Due to their lack of sleep now, I have tried everything to help them sleep and take the daylight savings switch seriously. Here are a few tips I suggest to help the time change transition go smoothly.

Daylight Savings Time Sleep Tips

Turn all screens off 2 hours before bedtime

TVs, phones, tablets, etc all prevent the body from releasing the right amount of melatonin, making sleep harder.

Dim the main lights in your home, and turn off all unnecessary lights an hour before bed

An hour before my children’s bedtime, my house is 90% dark with the exception of a dim light in the kitchen and family room. This also helps melatonin production.

Stick to your bedtime routine

For us its bath time, snack, stories, and prayers, then in bed. Our bedtime routine starts at 7:00 p.m. every night and the kids are in their beds by 8:00. It’s so important to stick to a routine once you figure out a routine that will work for your family.

Wake the kiddos up at the same time every day

Just as important as a nighttime routine, a good morning schedule is important to keep the kid’s sleep on schedule. For us, the kids have to be up every morning because school, Saturday morning activities, and church on Sunday, all require us to leave the house by 9:00 a.m. However, if we miss a day and sleep in this can easily screw up everyone’s sleep schedule.

If your babies are still in diapers, use a good one

There’s nothing worse than waking up in the middle of the night to a soggy baby, because of diaper leaks. Plus a dry diaper helps babies stay asleep longer. I used Pampers when my children were babies because the triple absorbent layers kept them dry for the entire night.

Let them run off as much energy as possible on Saturday

With daylight saving coming Saturday night, try to have a fun afternoon planned for Saturday. I’m trying to think of a great place to take the kids this weekend to run off all their energy in hopes that they will be so tired out by bedtime that we won’t have any problems squeezing in that extra hour of sleep this weekend.