Bedtime help?

I've posted about this before, but I'm still having issues.

My older son is 4 this weekend and my younger is 2. They share a room and while it's possible I could put a travel cot in my room or elsewhere, I'm very reluctant to do this as it took me ages to break my younger son of co-sleeping issues.

We start our bedtime routine around 7 and I try to keep things fairly calm prior to that with mixed results. We then go upstairs for tooth brushing and a cartoon in 'Momm'ys room'. They love the time with me in my room and are generally pretty calm. We don't use baths as a part of the bedtime routine as they get absolutely crazy when they have them. I don't have time to bathe them separately, nor do I have the help to watch one while I do the other.

My older son has a language comprehension delay so books and story time are, currently, not working for him. My younger son would enjoy them, but again, I can't really separate them.

Once they go to bed, that's when the fun kicks in. Sammy (the older one) in particular just is NOT tired even though by this point it's almost 8. He plays with his toys, he runs around the room, and he both engages and bothers Jake.

I've tried whale music, white noise, and even calming videos to no avail. The Super Nanny technique doesn't work either as Sammy isn't trying to get my attention. He's not trying to get out of his room or get water or anything I can do for him. He's just playing.

There are 3 issues here... one is that he *does* keep Jake awake longer than I'd like. But Jake also still takes 3 hour naps so he does make up for it. Sammy does not nap at all and has boundless energy even on 10 hours sleep. Neither of them are early risers. 7:30 is the earliest they get up and it's often later (so that's issue two - I don't want kids up at 6am I have to admit!). But having your kids up until almost 11 on some nights is just crazy (that's issue 3). Sometimes the playing they do does get really rambunctious. If it didn't I'd be inlcined to ignore them for the most part knowing that they will go to bed when they're tired.

So I guess my overall dilemma is should I really try to do anything at all here? Last night was a bit unusual with the real lateness, more often they fall asleep around 9:30 or so. The other thing I need to think about is that Sammy is not a fast mover in the morning. So on days we do have to be somewhere by or before 9, getting him to move is like herding molasses. I have to admit (ahem), that this is somewhat genetic. I was a bit of a night owl myself as a young child. But I was also an only child who loved to read under the covers and play with my stuffed animals at night - not turn the room into a 3 ring circus.

Help!

Hmmm... well, we just have my stepson every other weekend and he is nearly 4. He is also pretty rambunctious, though will usually settle in for bed around 8 (though he is supposed to have a bed time of 7, but we don't see him much so we let him have an extra hour unless he is cranky). We just recently put a tv and dvd player in his room and started putting it on for him and then coming in an hour later to switch it off and he has been sound asleep every time. I don't know if this will help or not. But, it does sound like a difficult situation when you can't really have them sleep in separate rooms.  Hopefully a full-time parent will come on with better advice.

Now, I'm not a parent and BF's son is 10, but I think you must be describing my brother and I when we were kids.  He was 2 years older than me and the instigator and I was all about doing whatever my big brother did.

Against my mother's preference, my dad decided make going to bed a game, since we were prone to playing when we should be asleep.  For us, he would fly us around like we were airplanes, but then like all good airplanes, they have to go back to the hangar to cool down.  Bed was the hangar and he'd tuck us in real tight saying that the airplanes always have covers put over them at night to keep them shiny.

I know it's not really a calming activity, but I think tricking us into thinking we were playing along to the airplane game made us lay there long enough to pass out.  My mom says that, for the most part, it worked.

Once we got sort of over the airplane game, my parents got us these sort of kids' play tents that fit over the beds, again kind of making going to bed fun or a game.  We both loved it.  Since we're the opposite sex, we got separate rooms when I was 5 and all the rambunctiosness stopped, but up to that point I think my parents just made sure to do anything that would make us interested in staying in bed.

I don't know if it'll work, but I thought I'd throw it out there.

Just wanted to offer my sympathy (!) and say that we went through that sort of thing too. I have no advice to offer at all, because nothing helped us (except an awful lot of beer-drinking in the evenings!  ) In fact, you'll probably see a similar thread I started once about this very same thing.

But I just wanted to say that it has gotten way better for us, and I'm sure it will eventually for you, too. *hugs*

Hi. I don't have kids, but I am the youngest of three siblings and I'd like to add that one of the advantages of being the youngest is that you get to do things that other kids your age don't get to do - like staying up later so you can play with your older siblings, playing with your older siblings' games, getting to talk to older kids who are friends of your older siblings, etc.


As long as your boys aren't tired the next day, and they aren't preventing you from sleeping (or disturbing the neighbours), and they are confined to one room, I don't think there is a problem.

I know grown siblings who have gone for years without speaking to one another.

I think that in the long run being able to stay up a little later so you can enjoy a bit more quality time with your brother is worth the small bit of lost sleep.

I was fortunate that my girls had separate rooms so this may or may not help in your situation. I had a 7pm deadline and after that point I was not on-call anymore. They were required to stay in their rooms, and as long as they were quiet they could read books, listen to tapes or best of all listen to books on tape and read along while lying in bed. If they were not quiet, they had to lie in bed and do nothing other than wait to fall asleep. They tried me a few times but once they learned I meant business I never had any more trouble on the playing quietly in the room.