Adjusting babe’s routine when the clocks fall back!
In a previous life before becoming a parent, the clocks rolling back an hour was a welcome event. An extra hour to recoup from a night out, binge-watch your current Netflix obsession or get ourselves set up for the week.
Now fall back means that our babes regular wakeup time will be one.hour.earlier 😱
Sounds scary right? But it doesn’t have to be!
I have two approaches that you can take to daylight savings depending on how keen you are, and how well your babe tolerates changes to their routine.
Option 1: Do Nothing & Make Changes the Day of Daylight Savings!
This works best for newborns [under 5 months] and babes on a 1 & 2 nap schedule.
If you have a babe under 5 months old, you really don’t need to fret too much about adjusting their schedule. Working with awake times means that our babe’s schedules are quite fluid and by the end of the week, your newborn along with you, will naturally shift onto your new routine.
If your babe is over 5 months and has a pretty consistent wakeup time - go to bed as you would on Saturday night, leave all of the clocks that need to be manually reset and worry about that on Sunday.
On Sunday morning, get your babe up at their usual time, even if that may be...5 or 6 am on the clock. Have your morning coffee, get situated for the day, and THEN change the clocks to reflect their new time.
Shifting Naptimes
When it comes to naps, shift them by half an hour. So, if your babe usually naps at 9:30, shift that to 9:00 on the new clock schedule so it will feel like 10:00 am to your babe. It’s a little push, but nothing that our 1 & 2 nap a dayers can’t handle! Do the same for their afternoon nap.
Example:
Nap 1 before: 9:30 am
Nap 1 after: 9:00 am [feels like 10 am to your babe]
Shifting Bedtime
If your babe goes to sleep at 7 pm on a regular night, for the first three nights (Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday) do a 6:30 bedtime. To your little one, this will feel like 7:30 pm.
On Wednesday night, do the final 30-minute shift and your babe will be back to their usual sleep routine!
Example:
Bedtime before: 7:00 pm
Bedtime after: 6:30 pm [ feels like 7:30 pm to your babe]
Option 2: Shift in 15-minute increments
This works best for babes taking more than 2 naps per day, or those sensitive to changes in their routine.
For babes over 5 months and on a 3 nap schedule, or if your babe is more sensitive to changes in their schedule this more gradual approach may be more suitable.
This takes 4 days to shift babe’s schedule [or more days, depending on how well your babe is doing!], so you can time it how you like. You have the option to start a day or two before the clocks fall back or start on the day that we actually fall back.
When recommending this strategy to my parents, I encourage them to start on Thursday before the clocks will fall back, this means that by the time Sunday night rolls around, babe will be going to bed at the same time as before the clocks rolled back!
NIGHT 1 - On Thursday night, shift babe’s bedtime 15-minutes later.
The following morning shift babe’s wakeup time and nap time by 15 minutes. Do this for all of their naps.
NIGHT 2 - On Friday night, shift babe’s bedtime an additional 15-minutes later.
NIGHT 3&4 - This continues for a total of 4 nights until babe’s schedule has been shifted by the full hour.
EXTENDED PLAN - Alternatively, if you would like to take things slower, shift everything on nights 1 & 2 but pause when you reach night 3 and give babe one additional night to adjust. On night 4 shift an additional 15 minutes and on night 5 babe will be on their new schedule!
More Tips & Tricks
Get outside! Fresh air and sunshine are so good for our babes and can help immensely with getting our babies an extra 10 or 15 minutes of time awake when they are starting to get sleepy at their usual sleep time!
Shift meals times as well, we are working to shift not only sleep timers but our entire schedule! This includes all meal times!
Extra bath time! An extra-long bath can be an easy way to help stretch that bedtime routine out for just a little bit longer.
Ready to make those changes?!
Screenshot the graphics below for the 30-minute routine shift approach!
Sweet dreams sweet parents!
