Sleep Routines

Are you having issues with getting your child to sleep?  Don't think you are alone!  Many, many parents have these same issues and problems.  Most can find a routine to work for their child(ren) but some times it can take many days or weeks for your child(ren) to learn what he or she should be doing.  Here are some tips that I thought I would pass along that I received from an e-mail through one of the health care programs in our area.  I hope maybe some of these tips can help you if you are having trouble getting your little ones clam and ready for bed.

 

 Bedtime routines are not limited to after dinner, preparing your child for bedtime starts when they first wake up.

Wake up Routine: If you want your children to have an early bedtime around 7pm, then they need to be up before 8am. If they sleep in, their nap will be later and therefore bedtime will be later. Try to wake them up at the same time each morning.

Physical Activity: Children who are physically active fall asleep easier. Therefore it’s important that your child is physically active throughout the day.

Naps: For most children, if they miss their nap there is a danger that they will be over tired and find it hard to settle at night. If they sleep too long or too late in the afternoon, after 3pm, they will not feel sleepy at bedtime.

Bedtime Routine: Incorporate a routine after dinner leading up to bedtime. This will signal to your children that bedtime is approaching and that when the routines are completed; it’s expected for them to go to sleep. If you keep the same routines at the same times, your children will know what will happen next and when it’s time to sleep. A routine provides your children with stability. A common bedtime routine might be a bath, snack, story, brush teeth and a bedtime snuggle.

Remember as you get closer to bedtime, keep activities quiet and calm. Minimize after-dinner television because this may stimulate a child.

When getting your children ready for bed, dim the lights, dress them in cozy sleepers and blankets and try snuggling. This encourages relaxation and will create drowsiness. Always try to create an environment that will induce sleep. Soft music may also help.

If your child does not want to go to bed: Try waiting in your child’s room until they fall asleep. As you keep a consistent day and bedtime routine, you will find the wait time for them to fall asleep will shorten. Don’t make eye contact while you are in the room, and be as boring as possible. Wait until your child is calm, and then move away. If he gets upset come back and reassure him by touching him but not by making eye contact. As he becomes more settled move further and further away.

Night time restlessness: Settle your child back to sleep if they wake during the night by comforting them. Touch them but don’t speak or make eye contact. Just comfort them until they go back to sleep or are settled enough for you too leave.

The luck of an Irish

Well we had our little party for the big green day and what a blast we had doing all sorts of fun little things through out the day.

We made our own Happy St. Patrick's Day pictures on green paper, with stickers and drawings.

Shamrock Hats

What you need:

• green paper
• scissors
• stickers
• stapler
• pipe cleaners

How to make these fancy hats:

• Cut 2 shamrocks for each child out of green paper
• Cut a strips of green paper long enough to wrap around your child's head (you might have to tape two pieces together to make it big enough)
• Let the children decorate the head band strips
• Once decorated, wrap the paper around the child's head to make sure its the right size and then staple together.
• Staple a pipe cleaner to the back of each shamrock
• Staple the other end of the pipe cleaner the the head band paper
• Once finished you might want to place a piece of tape over the staples so that they don't get caught in the children's hair, or make sure when you staple that the loops of the staple are to the outside of the head.

Each child received a green beaded neck lace today also to wear with their new hats.

While I was making lunch I found some St. Patrick's Day shows on YouTube for the children to watch (as I don't have any of my own!)

 








For lunch we had some fun also......
I cut their sandwiches in to shamrock shapes
We had cucumbers (cause they are green!)
Our juice was the "pot of gold" as is was a citrus punch
Dessert was vanilla pudding that I died green with food coloring (the kids thought this was just amazing!)









During Lunch time we listened to some Irish and St. Patrick's Day music. 








 

Our afternoon snack they children got to have fun decorating sugar cookies with green icing and shamrock sprinkles.




While the children had their nap/quiet time, I painted small clay pots so they were black.  Once dried I placed gold chocolate coins in them.  And they can take their pot of gold home for a treat for later (we all know, I have given the kids enough sugar with the cookies and icing, there is no way they get chocolate here too.  Mom and Dad can deal with that sugar high!)

Check out additional pictures at Ducky's Photos

Leading up to St. Patrick's Day

We Start off our St Patrick's Day crafts at the end of last week.  I was short on kids so I didn't want to move into the next farm animal yet so.... what better to do then more fun crafts!

Here are some of the crafts that lead us up to the big Irish Day.


We colored numerous St. Patty Day pictures:

Page can be found at Parenting Leehansen.com

Page can be found at Craft Elf

Page can be found at dulemba.blogspot.com
 



Tie-died Coffee Filter Shamrocks

This craft came from Kaboose website, I just changed a few things to make it easier for the younger ones.

What you need:

• coffee filters
• green markers
• Q-tips
• Small dish of water
• scissors

How to make your tie-die Shamrocks:

1. Have the children color all over the coffee filter with the green makers. (Don't worry about designs or anything fancy, just let them scribble for once!)
2. After they have colored the filters dip your Q-tip in the water
3. Then on to the colored filters
4. Now watch the magic happen...... the water makes the coloring run and forms fancy designs of its own
5. Set filters to the side to dry
6. Once dry cut the filters into the shape of shamrocks and hang up for decorations!

Treasure Boxes

I found some cute little wooden boxes at the Dollar store and thought that they would make great little treasure chests for the children.

What you need:

• Small boxes (doesn't have to be wooden ones they could be cardboard too)
• Green paint
• Paint Brushes
• Gems (we used little jewels, that I found at the Dollar Store)
• Glue

Instead of gems/jewels you could use:

• buttons
• beads
• stickers
• little rocks

How we made our treasure chests:

1. Paint the boxes green
2. Let dry
3. Glue the little gems on to the box
4. Let dry
5. Now your little ones have their very own special box to keep whatever they like to in it

A Treasure Hunt

While the children were painting there Treasure Boxes, I headed to the living room for a bit and started hiding some St Patrick's Day goodies.  Also at the Dollar Store, I found some green coins and shinny shamrocks... I picked them up just because I knew the children would love them.  So I thought for a while on what we could do with these fun little items.  That's when I came up with the idea for the treasure hunt to go along with our sparkly boxes.  With having younger children, I decided not to hide our treasure in any place all to hard for them to find.  They were all located in plain sight for them to find, yet they still had to look for them.  Once they found them they were able to put their treasures in their own boxes to keep and take home.

Remember to check out Ducky's Photos for more amazing pictures of the children having fun.

A rainbow and snack

Our St. Patrick's Day craft started today with a snack and craft in one.

We made rainbows out of Fruit Loops and Cheerios. First I had the children sort the Fruit Loops by color and of course they were eating just as many as they were putting in the dishes!  This was great because we were able to do a number of activities and learning experiences at once. 

• Snack
• Learning colors (for those that don't know their colors yet)
• Sorting/math skills

While the children finished sorting the colored Fruit Loops, I was making the outline of the rainbow.  I wasn't able to find one that I liked from the Internet so I decided to do it myself.  I imagine if I took some more time I would have found one, but instead I just drew two clouds at the bottom of each paper and connected them with one big loop for the starting of the rainbow.



What you need:

• Heavy paper (card stock) in the colour you choose
• Glue
• Fruit Loops
• Cheerios
• Template of a rainbow

Directions:

1. Have the children place glue along the top row of the rainbow and place the red fruit loops long it
2. Continue the first step until you reach the final color (each row will get smaller and smaller)
3. Place glue inside the cloud and use the cheerios for this

Colors of the Rainbow in order:

1. Red
2. Orange
3. Yellow
4. Green
5. Blue
6. Indigo
7. Violet (Purple)

Of course we skipped the indigo cause Fruit Loops don't come in that color!!!!

Other ideas: 

Instead of fruit loops you could use

• beads
• buttons
• tissue paper
• colored pasta
• colored rice

Instead of the cheerios you could use

• cotton balls
• white tissue paper
• rice
• pasta
• white buttons
• white beads

Remember to check out Ducky's Photos for more pictures of today's craft

Lion or Lamb

So the old saying goes.....
IF MARCH COMES IN LIKE A LION IT GOES OUT LIKE A LAMB

Well I sure hope this stands true, the kids and I are tired of winter already.  We have hardly been able to go outside, between the ugly weather and all the colds we seem to be passing around.

March 1st surely came in like a lion here is Saskatchewan, with a temperature of -39 Celsius with the windchill.  So none the less we stayed inside again and did some crafts for this fun little saying.  Now lets hope it starts to change over the the lamb real soon, so we can go outside for a while during the day.

We made LAMBS and LIONS.


What you need:
cotton balls
scrap paper (pink, black, orange, brown, yellow)
Black marker
paper plates
glue
scissors
brown or black pipe cleaners
googly eyes










What you do:
LION

1. Cut the yellow, brown, and orange paper in the small strips about 2" to 3" in length
2. glue strips of colour paper around the outside edge of one of the paper plates
3. add folded pipe cleaners to the sides of the face for whiskers
4. add eyes and a black triangle to the middle for a nose
5. We then added a mouth with a black marker and a few dots for details for the whiskers

LAMB

1. glue cotton balls around the outside edge of a paper plate
2. add googly eyes and a pink triangle to the center of the plate for a nose
3. we then drew on a mouth with a black marker
4. if you have extra paper laying around you can make a bow and glue it on to the top of the lambs head too, if you would like.

A fun easy project to do with children.  And each day they can look outside and change the face of the animal to how the weather is.  So if its cold and ugly out, its a lion day and if its nice and warm its a lamb day.