If bath time is NOT a part of your bedtime routine, can you describe what your routine looks like? And how long does your routine take?
So far I have diaper, massage, PJs, sleep sack, book(s), lights out, lullaby. But it's not long enough - only maybe 15 minutes at most.
84 votes
wonderful pomelo / 30692 posts
Bath isn't part of our routine. Both kids have eczema, so they only take baths 2-3 times a week.
Logan's routine (8 months):
Diaper change, aquaphor (or desonide) for eczema, pjs (~10 minutes)
Stories (~5 minutes)
Bed!
Xander's routine (2.5 years):
Brush teeth, diaper change, pjs, inhaler (~15 minutes because I keep having to chase him around)
Playing (5-20 minutes)
Stories (~10 minutes)
Songs (5-30 minutes because he keeps trying to drag out bedtime)
Bed!
GOLD / wonderful pea / 17697 posts
It's part of our bedtime routine.
Dinner
Bath
"Squeaky clean" with my mom (basically she pinch/tickles him a few times while making squeaky noises)
Diaper
Listen to baby sister on the doppler (sometimes)
PJs
Brush teeth
Read 2-3 books (depending on the night)
3 songs + cuddling in our bed
Tuck in (his bed)
Lights out
He just turned 3, and it probably takes 30-45 minutes, depending on how long he wants to be in the tub and how much he wants to help read.
pear / 1580 posts
@Adira: Thanks! LOL about songs taking 5-30 min. DS is almost 5 months, and I'm reading so much about how important the bedtime routine is, and so many books suggest making it SUPER long! Like 30-45 min! I don't know how to drag it on that long for a baby this little.
@lovehoneybee: "Squeaky clean"! Adorable!
pomegranate / 3895 posts
Our bedtime routine is about 5-10 minutes. What makes you think it's not long enough? When I go upstairs to change from work I usually turn on his sound machine, fan, and lamp (and turn off overhead) so that when we go up for the night, the room is ready for bed. Once it's bedtime we do teeth, diaper, pajamas (onesie + sleepsack), books (x3), songs (x4 short ones - same every night), bed.
Whenever we are with friends they always comment how lucky we are that his routine isn't some big production. We can have people over for dinner and I can literally go upstairs for a few minutes and get him down.
We bathe him probably every 3rd night (or when he's stinky 
). We tried to never have bottles associated with bed time because we didn't want to have to break that habit.
grapefruit / 4545 posts
@ineebee: It is not a part of our routine bc like @Adira: DD has eczema - so baths are 2-3 days or when needed (aka Daycare leaves her covered in paint).
Routine:
lights down - sound machine on (always been this way)
voices soft
fresh diaper
lotion rub down
Jammies on
Other treatments (medicine, saline, nose freida)
Bottle in rocking chair
Book
Light off
quick rock/hug/kiss
in bed
Total process is about 10-15 minutes depending on how much bottle she takes and if we read more than 1 book.
This has basically been our routine from day 1 - and I think it has been a HUGE help in LO going to sleep so easily!
GOLD / wonderful pea / 17697 posts
@ineebee: I don't think at that young I could have stretched it out so long. E just turned 3, and I wish I could make it shorter, lol! But he wants the routine exactly as it is (he'd read more books, sing his three songs 3x each if I'd let him...)
wonderful pomelo / 30692 posts
@ineebee: Not sure why a routine would need to be so long for a baby... maybe if you have to include lots of rocking and shushing to help them fall asleep?? With Logan, we get him in his PJs, I read 2-3 board books, then I turn off the lights, turn on his sound machine, put him in his crib and say quietly "Good night, Logan, I love you," and walk away. But he can put himself to sleep, so I don't need to drag it out at all.
grapefruit / 4663 posts
Our routine is short and I like it that way.
Diaper Change
PJ's
Milk and Books (2-3)
Brush Teeth
Turn out lights and turn on sound machine
Rock and sing songs
crib/bed
grapefruit / 4545 posts
@ineebee: I am surprised it that they are pushing a certain length of time. I agree that a routine is critical (as I said I attribute DD's great sleep to her routine) but not sure I agree that the length of time matters. I would actually think longer would be more confusing and possibly causing separation issues?
nectarine / 2173 posts
Sometimes our routine ends up taking that long if she won't go to sleep, but it's not intentional! We do diaper, jammies, feed, sing songs (same 2 every night, sometimes additional if not getting sleepy), sound machine on, fan on, mobile on.
ETA: we both work and bath every night is too much of a production. Plus I think it gets her too excited, all that splashing around!
pomegranate / 3355 posts
Bath is not part of our routine and our routine is less than 10 mins.
I change DD into bedtime cloths after dinner/after bath on bath nights.
Once she's ready for bed we go into her room
change diaper 1-2 mins
read 2 short books (same books every night) 5 mins
Short lullaby and into bed with mobile on and paci 1 min
wonderful olive / 19353 posts
Not really. I give him a bath after dinner because he's messy. Then I let him play and do whatever for an hour or so. When it's bedtime, I just tell him it's bedtime and we go into the bedroom. He climbs into bed, lays down and asks for milk while telling me to turn off the lights. He'll finish his milk and sit up/crawl around on the bed while talking or do whatever he does. When he's tired, he'll lay down and go to sleep.
pomegranate / 3779 posts
Bath is not part of our routine because our ped said she really only needs a bath every 2-3 days unless she gets really dirty playing. I'm surprised that anyone would be pushing a really long bedtime routine, I've always been told to have a standard order of things, but it just needs to be a few cues that bedtime is happening and then putting them to bed.
At 5 months, our routine looked like this:
Fresh diaper and lotion
Pajamas
Turn on white noise
Say good night to the giraffe
Turn off light
Sit in rocker with her and sing while she nurses
Put her in crib while I finish the songs
Say "Have a good night, I love you."
Walk out
Depending on how long she took to nurse, it was usually 20-25 minutes. Once we stopped nursing at night, we added in reading 2-3 books after PJs, but the whole routine takes maybe 20 minutes now.
clementine / 918 posts
If you want to make your routine longer, you could take a walk with your baby in the carrier. I did that with L because he was so hard to get to sleep and the walk made him tired. So I would do lotion and jammies, walk (I think it took about 10 min), turn on white noise, nurse, rock to sleep.
ETA: I"m in SoCal where this walk outside idea is fine all year round but I bet that doesn't work in all climates
honeydew / 7917 posts
We don't bathe every night because of eczema. Our routine looks like this:
Floss and brush teeth
Wash Face
Diaper change for LO2
Lotion
Pajamas
Read 3 books
Sing songs
Turn on sound machine
Sleep
This process takes about half an hour or longer with two wild kids.
wonderful kiwi / 23653 posts
I voted others b/c we don't bathe every single day. So on the days without bathe, we just wipe down face/hands/feet instead. Our routine --
Turn on lamp in her nursery (instead of the brighter regular light)
Diaper change
Wipe down while singing a lullaby
Rub on lotion (singing continues)
Change into Pjs
She used to take a vitamin D drop but not anymore
Say goodnight to stuff, say good night to and turn off light
Read bed time only book
Turn on white noise
Bottle/nurse
She us 8 mo old and without bathe it takes no more than 10 min
wonderful cherry / 21504 posts
C is 2, and we have never done bath as part of her bedtime routine. Like others, she has dry skin, plus, I'm lazy. Our routine now is:
Brush teeth
Diaper and PJs
Read 3 or so books in her room with the lights dimmed and sound machine on
Sing songs in bed with her
Turn lights all the way off and sing one more song
Say goodnight and I love you.
Unfortunately since she switched to a big girl bed, now the "routine" also included her getting up a bunch of times but that's another story. I think 20 minutes is sufficient for a bedtime routine. If we get home late sometimes we shorten it by doing fewer books or songs, or I will lengthen it with more books or songs if I sense she isn't settling down.
Then again my kid is a crap sleeper so maybe don't listen to anything I say. 
apricot / 287 posts
We only do a bath every few days and it's normally earlier in the day.
Bedtime routine is:
Nurse
Read a book
Brush teeth
Diaper/pjs/sleep sack
Say prayers
Lay in crib and a quick belly rub and 'night night'
It's a lot easier for me if I just keep it short and simple.
cantaloupe / 6131 posts
We do bath every night. My son had colic and basically bath time was the only time he would be quiet and calm as an infant and so we never dropped it. He LOVES bath time, so we always do it. It relaxes him and he's always so much happier afterwards that we think its important to his sleep. However, we don't necessarily do it RIGHT up against his bedtime - mostly like an hour before? So there's usually about 30 minutes of play time between bath and bedtime bottle.
Our routine is pretty fast: (DS is 11 months).
- Bath at 630pm after we're done with dinner. When its with Daddy, its only like 10 minutes. When its with Grandma, she indulges him and lets him hang out in there for 30 minutes!
- Lotion, diaper, jammies - 2-3 minutes.
- We play and hang out together until its about 715pm.
- Bedtime bottle at 715pm (we're close to dropping this, its just for hydration really - like 2-3 ounces).
- Sleepsack, blackout curtains, white noise machine, humidifier, close door. We sing the same 2 songs at every nap and bedtime while swaying with him, say a short prayer over him, lay him down, hand him his lovey and say "Have a good night night S, mommy/daddy loves you" before we leave.
We've basically had this same routine forever.
grapefruit / 4355 posts
Bath is not part of our routine because we only give her a bath every 2 to 3 days unless she gets particularly dirty.
Our bedtime routine consists of diaper change, swaddling, bottle, bed (2.5 months old). All this is done with just the night light on and quiet voices. It really doesn't take very long. I don't see why you would need to drag it out.
papaya / 10343 posts
We do baths e/o night. Either way the routine is the same.
Bath (or not)
Change into nighttime diaper and pjs
bottle
brush teeth
play in room for about 10 min
Read 2 books (about 5 min)
Into sleep sack and turn off light and turn on white noise
Rock/sing a song
Lay down in crib
The routine takes 30 min start to finish with no bath, 40 with bath. We COULD skip the play time and not mess with sleep I believe, but our LO still struggles with reflux so we like for her to stay up a bit after her bottle. Before she was old enough to run around and play I'd just hold her and read books for 15 minutes.
GOLD / wonderful olive / 19030 posts
DD1 yes, especially in summer and playing outside but DD2 no, she has eczema so we do every other day.
starting at 8 we do bottle, diaper change, lotion, pjs, and cuddling/rocking and then to bed awake but tired.
clementine / 778 posts
LO takes baths on S, T, and F. Our routine is the same, except we start at 6:30 on bath nights.
Routine (start around 7)
Brush teeth
Lotion
PJs
Get Bear Bear (his lovey)
2 books
Potty
Lights off
Prayers , Night Nights, and sing "You Are My Sunshine"
In bed by 730 the latest
cherry / 237 posts
Baths precede the bedtime routine on days when he needs/takes a bath, but we don't do baths every day -- usually twice a week.
pear / 1580 posts
@LBee: The books I'm reading all say the routine should be 20 min, some say 30-45 min! Too long, IMO, but the rationale is that they want you to use children's pattern-seeking brains to your advantage so that they can gear up (or down) to bedtime. I really want to do exactly what you're doing! And it's great to know that it works well for you!
@Mrs D: Thanks for your input! We want to start sleep training soon so I want to establish a solid routine before that happens so that, like you, it'll really help DS to sleep well!
@Adira: Yeah, I really want it to be short and sweet with minimal shushing and rocking! I'm thinking, after reading all these responses, that I can probably keep my routine as is.
@jetsa: Nice. I like a short routine too! Thanks for your input!
@sapphire: Same with DS. Baths require so much coordination, and since I'm doing bedtime solo every night, setting it up, etc. would take so much energy every night! And if the ped says 2-3x/week is fine, I'm not doing more work than I have to!
@Alivoo01: Wow. That is the simplest, shortest bedtime! Maybe when DS is older we can do something like that. Awesome.
@mrs.shinerbock: That sounds like a very reasonable bedtime routine!
@Ms.Badger: Aw, I wish I could! I'm in the Northeast. I envy you that!
@yin: Half an hour or more with two wild kids? Sounds pretty quick to me!
@snowjewelz: I decided on a bed-time-only book, too. I think I'm gonna do two books: the first one will be a rotation of books from the library, and the second book will be constant. And 10 minutes is pretty nice! I like that I'm seeing such short routines!
@blackbird: That makes sense. I think once DS gets older, I may add a bath if he sweats, gets dirty and ends up needing it everyday.
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