Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Go To Bed!

This is a plea for help...I have 2 little girls who both have school for another three weeks, and with the sun bright in the sky at 7:30, neither of them are feeling the need to obey my pleas that they get some shut-eye. For the past three nights Ellie has not gone to sleep until almost 10:00 and Becca hasn't done much better. Poor Rachel has been awakened more than once this week because I didn't keep my voice down after the 42nd reminder that "I'm not kidding...It's BED TIME!"
I have tried promising treats and movies if they will just go to bed on time, but to no avail. This evening sunshine does not mix well with their need to wake up early for school.
I realize that if I just wait 3 weeks I can bump their bed time to 8:30 or 9:00 without too much trouble, but I would really like them to not be over-tired from now until then (their temperaments are not very pleasant when they don't get enough sleep).
So my question/plea is...what can I do to help them settle down & stay in bed?
I have tried extra stories, special tuck-ins, and closing the blinds but so far nothing seems to help, so if you know any great tricks I would LOVE to hear them & I'm pretty sure my girls would, too because my next idea is to wake them up even earlier than I need to so they will be too exhausted to stay awake by bed time.
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3 comments:

  1. Anonymous10:35 AM, May 14, 2009

    Well, it turns out that our children must have "Brain Damage"... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ysFvUizRj8

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  2. Emily9:25 PM, May 16, 2009

    Try just getting them up at their early time and they'll work into going to be earlier!! (maybe) (I was afraid our kids were going to do that too, because they have in the past, but it's actually been okay this year - we did shift their bedtime to about a half hour later from 8 to 8:30.)

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  3. Liesl9:44 PM, May 18, 2009

    This is what works for me...Maybe it will work for you. I let my boys read quietly in bed from 8:30 (regular bed time) until 9pm (when it's dark enough to sleep). Then bedtime is firm and any arguments about bed after that result in reduced or no reading time the next night - just laying in bed in a light room.

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