Getting Baby into a Bedtime Routine!

As I sit and type this, I have my tired feet up, luxurious candles burning, a truly wonderful tasting glass of rose poured, my gorgeous Husband and beautiful cats by my side and my darling five month old asleep upstairs in his crib. 

Bedtime for Ethan is now between 7-8pm and this leaves us with something that we hadn't had experienced in a rather long time, 'us time'. 

Getting Ethan into this routine, wasn't easy, but before now we hadn't owned a baby monitor, since owning the TOMY First Years TF550, things have drastically changed and we now get the time we so badly craved. 

 The TOMY Monitor is fantastic, the base unit that stays in the bedroom has a useful nightlight which we can control the brightness of, we can also talk to Ethan, turn the nightlight on and play lullabies from downstairs or in any other room! It has a temperature indicator, vibrate mode a clock and a rechargeable battery, we absolutely love it! I don't know quite what else we would have needed in a monitor apart from perhaps a video, but to be honest, I know that I would just constantly check it and therefore wouldn't be able to 'switch off' as well as I can with the monitor that we do have!Here's how I got my baby into a routine:

• Chose a bedtime that was reasonable for him and for us and then have a period of wind down an hour before that. 
• Keep lights low.
• Lower the TV volume and voices.
• Wind down play time.
• Give last milk just before 'bedtime', which he falls asleep with.
• Make sure nappy has been changed and bedtime grow/pyjamas are on before last milk.
• Let him sleep for around 10 minutes on us after he has finished milk.
• After this period, take him upstairs and put him into grow bag and give goodnight kisses. 
• Put our baby monitor and night light on.
• Get cats out of bedroom and shut the door, so he doesn't get disturbed. 
• If he wakes, soothe back to sleep with potentially more milk (if needed), kisses, cuddles, rocking. 
• Then feet up and enjoy the evening!

Thank you to Tomy for such a fantastic baby monitor! It has worked wonders for us! 
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