Bedtime Routine
Hannah’s always been super into routines. It seems that now Connor has picked up on this and has become a big fan. Ever since we moved to Utah hannah and Connor have been sharing a room. I used to do two different bedtime routines and Connor’s was much shorter. All I had to do was sing him 1-2 songs and most of the time he didn’t even like me to do that. Eventually he became a pretty big fan of “Itsy Bitsy Spider” and would ONLY want me to sing that song to him. Once we got to Utah his new favorite song was and still is “Popcorn Popping” and that used to be the only thing I had to do. Hannah went through long phase where I had to make up these ghost stories, but they had to include at least three of these people.
1. Ghost
2. Vampire
3. Blanket Monster
4. Tickle Monster
I could usually switch out the ghost or the vampire but the story pretty much always had to end the same way. Hannah would establish rules of what I was supposed to say and do. This routine continued even since moving to Utah.
Anyways, a couple weeks ago we bought Connor a pretty thick coloring book of Cars, trucks, planes, trains, and several other machines. Connor does’t really care about actually coloring the book. Instead he sleeps with it. So every night I lift him into his bed and he immediately grabs the big coloring book and says, “READ IT!.” The first time he did it I tried to convince him that there were no words to actually read. I eventually figured out that what he wanted me to do was flip through every page so he could tell me what machine was on each page. I figure we are trying to get him to talk more and learn more words, so this is actually a great activity for him. There are four other books that he sleeps with. Potty (a potty training book), Lucas the Lion, Shake It Up Baby, and Little Blue Truck Leads the Way. It started off by him making me read those three books. Actually this all started by me letting Hannah pick out one book each night for me to read to both of them. During the school year I would try to get Hannah to read to both Connor and I so she could practice. It was part of her home work every week. Most of the time after I would read a book Connor would want me to give him the book so he could continue to flip through the book even after I left. So eventually he started gathering a collection of books in his crib. After awhile it was no longer Hannah picking books out to read, instead it was Connor demanding one of the books in his bed get read. After while he began finding favorite books. He also began liking books a lot more. So then we started buying him his own books. All the books I named are books we’ve since bought specifically for Connor or Jack.
After I flip through the coloring book he keeps the book nd continues to flip through it but hands me a new book (one of the four) to read until I work my way through all four books. After that he wants me to sing “Popcorn Popping” then I usually ask Hannah what song she would like me to sing to her. Sometimes Hannah will also pick out a book for me to read to her. So sometimes I end up reading about five books in one bed time routine. Sometimes I also end up singing 3-4 different songs to both Connor and Hannah.
I am wondering what the bedtime routine will be as Jack gets older and more interested. Soon we will most likely need to move JAck and Connor into the same room, because Jack already gets super jealous if Connor and Hannah are doing anything that he’s not.
