7 Ways to Make Your Baby to Sleep Tonight

Cole Gamble — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 17:00:00 GMT

For the first year and a half of his life, your little boy may have gone down with a bottle at a regular time every night. Oh how blessed those days were. But then one day a switch flipped in that slumbering angel and now the little man won’t sleep at all. It’s midnight and Johnny Wired is bounding through the house and yelling like he’s just realized his rushing for frat. By now, you’ve learned when baby don’t sleep, you don’t sleep. And when you don’t sleep, the earth stands still; zombies rise and walk the earth (and by zombies, we mean you). If you're going to survive you need to come up with a plan. You need to lay some strategery on that kid’s butt. Here are some tactics you can employ.

1) Wear them out during the day. Take them to the park. Run them hard.

2) Shorten or cut out the nap. Wait, you’re kid isn’t sleeping at night and you are still giving them a nap? Are you nuts?!

3) Stick to the rules. If you say “only one story and then bed,” it better only be one story. Or else you’ll spend countless hours every night bargaining.

4) Set up a consistent routine. For instance, do bath, teeth, story, bed. Do it the same way every night and they will learn to wind down with the routine.

5) Create a soothing environment. If you make your kid sleep on top of a running washing machine, now is the time to rethink that strategy.

6) Stay as close as he needs you to. Some children are happy to go to sleep after a quick goodnight kiss, while others prefer to snuggle, hold hands or go to sleep with an adult in a nearby chair. This will change as your child grows and becomes more self-confident, so don't worry ' you won't have to rock your teenager to sleep.

7) Let them know you’ll be there. Sometimes the root of the problem is nightmares or fear of the dark. Assure where you will be, install a nightlight and general remove the fear factor.

More by this author: The 26 Most Disturbing Kids Movies Ever

Baby Cages: The 5 Baby Products that Should be Illegal

5 Ways to Keep the Kids from Growing Fat this Summer

5 Ways to Not Go Broke (with Kids)

Invisible Fence for Your Child

20 Disturbing Baby Products

Man locks daughters in cage while he works

5 Ways to Recapture a Day of Rest

Rachael Brownell (Redsy) — Sun, 18 May 2008 17:36:00 GMT

Finding a day of rest in the busy hither and thither of modern family life might seem old fashioned and quaint, but many of us need it now more than ever before.

Assuming you don't have a second home in the Hamptons or an ability to go to Club Med, here are a few ideas to cultivate more rest:

1. Create a Hammock - If you don't have anywhere to put a hammock, create one. A hammock is relaxing because it is outside and you have no other tasks to accomplish other than laying there, taking deep breaths, and maybe grabbing a cat nap. Create a hammock by laying outside somewhere on a soft blanket and closing your eyes. Of course, this works much better if you don't have to dodge marauding dogs or children.

2. Unplug - Turn it all off. The television, the cell phones, the computer, the pager, the fax, the blackberry. If the idea of doing this makes you twitchy (it's a lifestyle, man!) then come up with a way to keep your mind off of all those crucial emails you might be missing (the ones about enlargement and magic happy pills especially).

3. Road Trip - A change of scenery is refreshing.. even if it's only a trip to a part of the city you've not been to before, or a visit to a town 45 minutes away. Pack up a picnic and get out of your usual routine.

4. Hello Leisure, Be My Baby - In our society, we often mistake leisure for watching television and eating potato chips. True leisure and rest are states of being that require few inputs and free time. Television and music and beeping phones are all a distraction. For the type-A's among us, leisure time (unstructured, unplugged free time) can be scary, so sometimes you might have to ease into it. Plan an hour to start and go from there.

5. Just Do It - The neat thing about cultivating a day of rest, whether it's for religious or health reasons is you begin to make it part of your family routine. My brother's family sets aside Sundays for quiet family time. The kids can play games (board, not video) and are given a day off from chores and homework. The parents don't clean or catch up on email or mow the lawn. I've been able to do something similar in my family, but usually only for a half day.

Making rest and leisure a priority sets a good example for the kiddies, which is why after posting this, I'm closing this computer, laying out on a blanket and counting the clouds.

Strollerderby : rest

7 Ways to Make Your Baby to Sleep Tonight

20 Disturbing Baby Products

Man locks daughters in cage while he works

5 Ways to Recapture a Day of Rest