Time to spring forward! How to adjust babe’s routine.
Is it just me or does it seems like we just adjusted for fallback! How are we here already?!
If you’ve been working through early mornings, then this timing may be perfect for you. Otherwise, this time shift is in my opinion, quite a bit easier on our little ones and means that the longer, sunnier days are coming our way! Yesssssss!
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.
As a third option, you can make absolutely no adjustments and enjoy a later start time and later bedtime.
Many families find this nice during the summer months as it allows you to get out in the evening without rushing home for bedtime! My one pointer should you go this route - BLACKOUT THEIR ROOM! With a later wakeup time and the sun staying up longer in the evening, make sure your babe’s room is niiiiice and blacked out.
Option 1: Do Nothing & Begin 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. Continuing to honor 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.
For 3-4 days, work with an earlier wake-up time in the morning, along with shifting naptimes and bedtimes earlier as well!
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 slightly earlier than usual, so if they usually wake at 7 am, get them up at 7:30 am [which will feel like 6:30 am!]. Have your morning coffee, get situated for the day, and THEN change the clocks to reflect their new time.
Shifting Naptimes
We are then going to shift naps earlier by 30 minutes. So, if your babe usually naps at 9:30, shift that to 10:00 on the new clock schedule so it will feel like 9:00 am to your babe, BUT we were up 30-minutes earlier to compensate for this.
Example:
Nap 1 before: 9:30 am
Nap 1 after: 10:00 am [feels like 9 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 7:30 bedtime. To your little one, this will feel like 6:30 pm, but falls in line with their earlier morning, and shifted naptimes.
On Wednesday night, do the final 30-minute shift and your babe will be back to their usual sleep routine!
Example [Sunday,Monday & Tuesday]:
Bedtime before: 7:00 pm
Bedtime after: 7:30 pm [feels like 6:30 pm to your babe]
Option 2: Shift in 20-minute increments
This works best for babe’s taking more than 2 naps per day, or those sensitive to changes in their routine.
For babes over 5 months and on a 2+ nap schedule, or if your babe is more sensitive to changes to their schedule this more gradual approach may be more suitable.
This takes 3 days to shift babe’s schedule, so you can time it how you like. You have the option to start a day or two before the clocks spring forward or start on Sunday when the clocks change.
When recommending this strategy to my parents, I encourage them to start on the Friday morning before the clocks spring forward, this means that by the time Sunday morning rolls around, babe will be waking up at the same time as before the clocks rolled forward!
Starting on Friday morning, wake babe 20 minutes earlier than usual.
For naps and bedtime, move everything 20-minutes earlier to keep in line with waking babe 20-minutes earlier than usual!
This continues for a total of 3 days until babe’s schedule has been shifted by the full hour.
Alternatively, if you would like to take things slower, shift everything on mornings 1 & 2 but pause when you reach morning 3 and give babe one additional day to adjust. On morning 4 shift an additional 20 minutes and on morning 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 making sure our babes are nice and tired and will go down more easily for their earlier naptimes and bedtime.
Shift meals times as well, we are working to shift not only sleep times but our entire routine! This includes all meal times!
Extra bath time! An extra-long bath can be an easy way to get out those final evening ants in our babes pants.
Ready to make those changes?!
Screenshot the graphics below for the strategy that you have chosen for your little babe!
Sweet dreams sweet parents!
