With the long awaited light summer evenings comes the pain faced by most parents of getting their children to bed when all they want to do is play outside.
What children don’t understand is the importance of sleep. With the average child needing around ten hours rest a night, to encourage growth, build immunity, and help the body heal and repair, how do you get your precious one off to sleep without a fight? Sussex Beds has complied some top tips to help little ones drift off and dream away.
Make a splash
A warm bath can help kick-start relaxation as it raises the body’s temperature gently helping children off to sleep. For added calmness, add a couple of drops of lavender oil to the water to help relax the body and mind.
By the book
Tablets and TV stimulate the brain so switch off electronic devices at least half an hour before bed. Instead, snuggle down with your little one for a bedtime story or two. Sharing books with children offers quality bonding time and helps children’s brains unwind. Most importantly, by investing time in books when kids are little often sparks their love of literacy which can last a lifetime.
Be a softy
A bedroom can be an adventure playground by day. One minute it’s a pirate ship, the next, a princess castle. By night the room should transform to a tranquil setting. A room with dimmed lights and soft sheets will help make the bedroom more relaxing. As a top tip experts say it is better for a room to be slightly cooler to help promote deep sleep.
The white stuff
From babies to toddlers and beyond, why not offer some warm milk before bed? Milk naturally contains an amino acid which helps produce hormones that helps aid sleep. If your child doesn’t like cold milk, why not try warming and frothing the milk to make a ‘babycino’? This trick will make a little one feel a bit more grown-up with the added calcium benefits.
Spring into bed
It is of paramount and of utmost importance that children have a mattress that offers good back and neck support. Not only does a good night’s sleep help with energy levels and thus attention span, but if the back and neck are correctly supported from a young age it can potentially reduce back problems for years to come.
“There is hope though. Most parents will have the reverse problem once their children become teenagers and they are no longer able to get them out of bed, especially in the morning!”
Huge thankyou to Sussex Beds for this lovely guide to helping your children get to sleep, I shall definitely be trying some of these as all seven children NEVER want to go to bed when it’s light and our Summer holidays bedtimes get later and later!