Bedtime for kiddos

Until this summer, my little people have been on a very tight sleep schedule.  As babies and toddlers, they almost always went to bed between 7 and 7:30.  Joseph has kept his 7:30 bedtime and Annalina went to bed around 8 or8:30.   For the most part they would wake up well rested and I wonder if that is part of the reason why they have been such pleasant happy children.  I had a neighbor a few houses back who used to tell me how lucky I was to have kids who got along so well with each other and the other neighborhood kids.  Maybe, just maybe it was not luck at all.  A lack of sleep can have profound affects on children.


Now that we are in Idaho, we tend to do things that keep us out later.  There are always things going on in town or in the neighborhood and we have allowed the little people to stay up later than usual.  They have handled it fairly well, BUT this past weekend we went to another drive-in movie and did not get home until almost 2am.  Joseph was up at 8am and that was just not enough sleep for him. He wasn't being naughty like he used to be when he was short on sleep, but there was something else I noticed.  He got down on himself really quickly when he was struggling with something. He had no patience with himself and would say mean things about himself.  A lowered self esteem!  Just one effect of not getting enough sleep. 

Both kids have started sleeping later than they used to. This is nice, but not something I can count on.  As the parent, it is my job to make sure my kids are healthy and getting enough sleep is just as important as making sure they are eating healthy foods!  I was reminded of an article Richard sent me a few years back that talks about the importance of sleep.  This is geared towards babies and toddlers, but sleep is just as important to older kids! My kids are getting old enough I could let them stay up until they feel ready to go to sleep, but I won't. 

Kids, when you read this later in life, just know that your mother loved you enough to make go to sleep at a decent time so you could be healthy and happy!

http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/09/14/bedtime.children/index.html