I had a bedtime routine FOR ME from when DD was 5 weeks. At 7.00pm i gave her a bath, then a massage, then a lo-o-o-o-ng BF (that was when she liked a longish feed anyway) and put her down in her cot (which was next to my bed) at 8pm for "night time". After that i didn't get her up again. If she cried i would go and stroke/cuddle/sing to her and at about 11pm i'd feed her again then go to bed myself, i'd then feed again usually at about 3am (let her wake me for that one though) and we co-slept either from the 11pm or 3am feed, depending on how tired i was at 11pm (i.e. could i be bothered sitting up to put her back in the cot?).
DD has had the same bedtime routine since then (though from about 6 months she started to get a story too) and for me it has been worthwhile. When we stayed at other peoples houses, and especially when XP and i split up and i had to move out with her, the routine provided a very handy marker of "normal" for us both to hold onto to, kwim?
I know lots of people with very rythmned children who never had a routine but the bubs just fell into one, and people who like me have a very chaotic kind of child that really benefits from external routine.
I think the most important thing to remember is that the routine is the external framework, not the internal structure. Often when i put DD to bed at 8 she slept. Sometimes she didn't at all. Sometimes she fell asleep in 10 minutes, sometimes it took 2 hours. To me a routine is only worthwhile if it brings comfort to at least some part of the equation (you or bubs or hoepfully both) and doesn't cause ANYONE distress. So if you know you'll feel anxious if bubs sleeps from 8pm for 3 weeks then suddenly won't for a month then it's probably not worth doing. I am able to seperate what i WANT to happen from what DD wants to happen. I see my role as one of enabling her to do wht i want - i can't (and would want to) force her. I think of it as digging a ditch where i want the water (DD) to go - mainly i can direct her ok but sometimes she bursts her banks!
The first 6 wks for me i let baby lead.....after that time i try and introduce a routine...but ive heard the same....trying to introduce a routine before 8-12 weeks is pointless...
Good luck....i know i always felt more relaxed when we both knew what was happening next LOL....
Like others have said, a bedtime routine is a good way to start.
We started ours around 6 weeks old and he got into it fairly quickly and it really helped his night-time sleep. For us, it was bath, PJs, bottle, bed.
We did the sleep-eat-play routine during the daytime as early as we could, and we have kept that up even to this day, and we kind of let him day-time routine evolve around that framework.
dont worry about routine at this age. Mia put herself in one, about 4 months. If you try one now, he will just change it on u next week. Just enjoy him, and go with his cues.
I am reading a book called baby bliss by Jo Ryan and it said that a routine can sort of be developed at around 12-16weeks, but simply by working out what yout baby does in a day and keping a log to look for patterns. As Holly said it is like they will develop it for you.
Take the lead from your baby. I don't think you need to "introduce" a routine, rather you watch your baby and see how they react to different things and if they seem to be doing things at a regular time, and work with that. At around 2 months old we noticed that DS seemed to fall asleep around 8pm (when it got dark) regardless of what time we had started putting him to sleep. So then we created a bed time routine around that- bath, cuddle and feed starting at 6:30pm. He still does that every day but it has moved a bit earlier, as we noticed he was falling asleep earlier.
I thought I should maybe introduce a bedtime routine earlier, as lots of my friends talked about giving baby a bath before "bedtime", but before 2 months he didn't really have a "bedtime", it was more like 3-4 hour cycles around the clock.
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