5 Tips To Get Your Tots To Sleep This Summer

Ah the joy of summer. There's nothing like the warm weather (when it's not tipping it down), eating ice lollies in the garden and running around playing in the paddling pool. It's all fun and games. Until...you have to try and get your small children to go to bed at their normal bedtime. WHICH CAN BE A NIGHTMARE! It's fine in the winter months when it is dark outside but as soon as that little ray of sunshine glows through their bedroom window? You are screwed. So here are a few ways I get my two to sleep whilst the sun still shines.

Stick To A Routine
It's tempting when the weather is a bit brighter to keep your children up later. But I find that that leads to irritability (me and them) and a further struggle to get them to bed when you want to. We stick to the same routine day in, day out. And even try to on holiday. It's the old bath, book and bed one. I am very lucky that my husband does this solo and regardless of what time of the year it is? He always starts it about 6:15pm.

The Beauty Of Blackouts
We have blackout blinds throughout our house. We mainly have Ikea ones upstairs but if you have a loft conversion it may be an idea to invest in some VELUX blinds. We not only have them in the kids rooms but also in the main bedroom. So before the children go up for bath time we make sure that all the blinds are closed throughout the whole of the upstairs so it is nearly as dark as it would be during winter.

Keep Them Cool
Hot weather makes everyone grumpy and stroppy. So we like to keep our windows open when we are in the house. As obviously you can't leave windows open at night, we also have a fan which we put on in their rooms to keep it cool before they get into bed. It's turned off when we go to sleep but by then the house has cooled down.

Change Those Sheets
As soon as it is vaguely hot we like to get rid of duvets and bring in some thinner blankets. After a few summers of my girl waking up sweaty and angry half way through the night we found that a thinner summer blanket did the job in keeping her cooler and in turn helping her to sleep better.

New Pyjamas
Kids winter pyjamas are the warmest thing ever. Especially fleecy onesies so I like to pop to Primark or Sainsburys and pick up a few shorts and t-shirt sets of pyjamas. Relatively cheap these are ideal for your children to wear during those balmy nights. Sometimes we replace the t-shirt with a vest and again these are dead cheap from Primark.

So there you go, a few ways to help your children sleep easier when the weather gets warm. Now all you have to work on is trying to get your sweaty, snoring other half to do the same!