We just use blinds and my kids are pretty good sleepers. I agree, getting them really tired out and sticking to a routine seems to be the best thing for sleep.

Anonymous wrote:We have blackout curtains but they let a fair amount of light in. 10m old baby sleeps great at home and on vacation but wakes every day at the crack of dawn. Idk if they’re related, but we’re so lucky on sleep in general and I don’t know if blackout shades would make a difference in the morning anyway.

Oh yeah she goes to sleep at 6:30 with no problem. I’ve tried to make bedtime later but I think we’re stuck until the nap schedule changes because she hits a wall.

We have blackout curtains but they let a fair amount of light in. 10m old baby sleeps great at home and on vacation but wakes every day at the crack of dawn. Idk if they’re related, but we’re so lucky on sleep in general and I don’t know if blackout shades would make a difference in the morning anyway.

We used blackout shades and then our kid went through a phase of being scared of the dark (actually still in it). So we wound up pulling one of the shades back and just using the sheer honeycomb shade behind it, so she has some light after we leave the room. This absolutely means so goes to sleep later in midsummer when it stays light longer. But she'll just sit in bed and look at her books or sing to herself. And this is also the time of year that she wakes up earliest because the sun comes up early.

We just accept it. You can give your kid the tools for sleep via good sleep hygiene (keeping a schedule, making the room dark, making sure the bed is comfortable, eliminating distractions, avoiding screens). But you can't make them sleep.

She goes to sleep more easily in the winter and also tends to sleep longer. Honestly, this is pretty natural and normal for humans, and even when we are extremely active and busy in the summer, she still just fights sleep in the evening. Circadian rhythms are powerful.