This Sunday 27^th of March, the clocks will go forward one hour. There are a few things you can to ensure a smooth transition and to help your little one gets back into routine.

Make it a gradual change.

Over the course of 6 days, put your little one down 10 minutes earlier each evening. So, if you normally put them to bed at 7pm, try putting them to bed at 6.50pm, then 6.40pm, then 6.30pm etc. so they are eventually go to bed an hour earlier.

You need to remember to adjust their entire day. So their wake up time in the morning, nap times and meal times all need to be broughing our internal body clocks. Ensure that your little one gets plenty of natural sunlight during the day. Make sure to open the blinds so the room gets lots of natural light in the morning when you want then to get upt back by 10 minutes each day. If you alter their whole routine gradually, after a week, they should be fully adjusted to the new time.

Keep to your baby’s same napping frequency but not necessarily the same times. For example, if your baby usually wakes up at 6am and naps at 9am, then you should still put them down again 3 hours after having woken up in the morning.

Use blackout blinds to shut out light in the evening/morning to create a darker sleep environment. Light plays an important part in controll

Keep your usual bedtime routine exactly the same, i.e. dinner, milk, bath, story, bed.

Make sure your baby gets lots of exercise during the day so they will be tired enough to fall asleep when you are putting them to bed that bit earlier.

For those of you who have extremely early risers, you might not want to change anything! If your little one currently goes to bed at 6.30pm and wakes at 5.30am the new time will change this to a 7.30pm bedtime and a more sociable 6.30am wake up! Happy days!

As with any behaviour change, always remember to be consistent with your approach.

If you require support with your baby’s sleep, you can contact me on 0861000549 or send me an email sinead@betterbabysleep.ie