Bedtime routine feat Mum & me products

One of two resounding pieces of advice that a lot of my friends with kids have recommended is starting a vague bedtime routine ASAP so little O gets used to knowing when and where she should be going to sleep through the night.  Here is the routine we currently use and for the last two nights she has actually been going down and getting up at the right time that we would expect her to in the long run (we'll just ignore the amount of times she wakes up during that time!).

Bath/Top and tail

We start the routine usually about 6pm by giving Ophelia a bath or a wash down.  We currently use a plastic storage box because she isn't big enough to use the baby bath we have.  She loves the box because she can kick a little bit, which is probably her favourite ever activity! We get her used to the water by first putting water on her face and head whilst clothed in the towel.  Recently i've started putting johnsons baby bath stuff in the bath for her.  I only put a tiny bit in but it makes so many bubbles it is untrue and makes her ridiculously slippery! We also have a few other baby birth stuff which I might use, The Mum & me one seems like it might be better for her in terms of a gentler smell!

Baby massage 

Work were  kind enough to gift us some Cusson's mum and me baby massage oil and sleep tight balm so we thought we'd work them into our bedtime routine.  I started by warming the oil in my hands and asking Ophelia if it was ok to give her a massage. I uncovered her legs first so she didn't cold and put one hand at the top of her leg (wrapped around it) and the other loosely around her ankle.  I then moved the top hand downwards towards ankle and then the other hand the same, continuously.  After her legs I moved onto her tummy; Ophelia suffers from real bad wind that makes her scream, the massage oil claims to help reduce this so I placed one hand on her tum at a time and gently used a downwards pattering motion.  After the massage I used the balm and massaged it into the pulse points on her wrists, all the while Ophelia appeared calm and to enjoy what I was doing.  I then gave her a cuddle to say thank you. 

Pjamas

I'm a big fan of pjamas so it's only right that i'm so strict on this for her! She doesn't actually wear pjamas yet as such but we call her sleepsuits her pjs!

After pjs I usually give her a top up feed and by then if her eyes start to go, I then put her down in her bed to let her get herself to sleep! All that is on a good day! On a bad day she can stay awake for hours afterwards so I try all the usual things, including sometimes swaddling her although this all depends because sometimes she hates the restriction of swaddling.

This routine is so far working well for us, and I'm really hoping it'll pay off dividends in the long term.