Getting boisterous boys (in bunk bed) to sleep at night - need inspiration

As the title suggests, DH and I are stuggling to get our room-sharing boys (DS1 aged 5 and DS2 who is 3-and-a-half) to sleep at night. They are in a bunk bed, with DS1 up the top. It's mainly the 3yo who is the problem, but DS1 this week has started to follow suit.

They have an established bed-time routine. Dinner, shower or bath, reading and bed (albeit sometimes the shower/bath comes before dinner). And 7pm is their bed time, give or take five minutes. They have a dull night light on, but otherwise the room is dark and their door is closed and their room is relatively quiet. All conducive to going to sleep, you might think! Apparently not.

For the past couple of months, DS2 wil continuously yell for his brother to talk to him, or for DH or I to go back into the room. He'll ask for a dozen kisses and cuddles. He wants different, or more, toys in his bed (instead of a teddy, DS2 is very attached to a Thomas Tank train which goes with him most places). You name it, anything and everything he can think of to get out of bed (I need to do a wee ... but then can't as he'd only recently been to the toilet), or get us back in to the bedroom he will do or ask for. We're not daft, we don't give in to his every whim and wish. We also realise it's attention he's after (DS2 demands a LOT of attention). DS2 is going to OT fortnightly so we can get help with his "high engine speed", meaning he finds it hard to calm down and slow down at times. So we understand this means he takes a bit longer to wind down at night. But some nights he's up and down for up to two hours, and as mentioned ... the yelling for us or for his brother to talk to him is crazy. And the past few nights DS1 has found a reason to delay us leaving/call us back.

Between the older boys and DS3 (10m) who can't self settle to sleep (another story altogether), 7pm is becoming a horrible time in this house.

So for anyone who has room-sharing boisterous, attention-seeking siblings ... how on earth do you get them to settle to sleep? We're lost about "what next" as we thought with our fairly set routine would have helped.

Cheers, Andie

Have you tried stories on an ipod or similar (listening only). My two are younger 4 & 2 but are in bunks and stories on my old iphone work well, not always for DS but DD doesn't join in the shenanigans if she has stories to listen to and is normally two stories and she hands me the phone to go to sleep. We read them stories separately and then the phone stories are an extra. If we didn't give her something to focus on she would join in with whatever stunts DS is trying to pull and sometimes he will lay and listen too. (They listen to CBeebies podcasts) Someone have us a star projector thing was about 14 dollars I think just projects red then blue then green stars on ceiling and DS if can get to look and tell me the colors that seems to settle him right down - it also works as a night light as he likes some light but DD likes it dark but will tolerate the stars but not a night light.

No advice what so ever as I am in the same boat!! And our 3 1/2 year old is the problem!! Talk talk talk but our other ds is 8, hope you find the answers lol

I have kids sharing. My older boys will settle quickly when I tell them they will loose computer privileges the next day if they don't settle.
The younger kids.. My 4 & half yr old has a light & I tell him I will have to take it away if he doesn't settle down, be quiet & go to sleep.
I might sound mean but I have resorted to threats of taking things away. It works & I have never had to take away his light.

You might find some visuals will work also. Print out little picture of what is expected of them once in bed (A child sleeping in bed) and maybe a picture of it being night time & one of reading a bed time story & one of saying good night. Put them all in order & show them, it is time for sleeping now.

Give them 1 warning & if it continues then out goes the night light!

Far out Efjay, you should be an OT :) I should've thought of that as at each OT session, DS2's OT has a visual list of what he's doing during the session. Great idea. And no, not mean. We've tried that tack too but it doesn't work very well. DS2 is both a major attention seeker and a very persistant, tenacious little bugger. I love him dearly but my goodness, he's a challenging little boy.

Wysiwyg - you might have hit on something too. Maybe some classical music (which they actually like). Handel's Water Music Suite calms them down in the car almost every time I put it on!

DS is an only child (not for long), but likes the attention too...one more snuggle, a drink, toilet etc.... is it an age thing?! I read that you can give them a 'free pass' after you've settled them (done toilet, drink, cuddle etc) and they can get up/call you in once, but after that, you ignore all requests...straight back to bed with no interaction from you. Is your older boy awake through all of this? Does he ignore whats happening? I agree that calming music or stories might help...even just on a CD player, so he's got something to listen to and therefore doesn't need distracting. DS has lullabies on his monitor that play for about 15 mins.

A reward chart for staying in bed, not calling out, being quiet or whatever you need from him? Our DS gets up in the middle of the night and, after four plus months of 3-6 wake ups a night, we've had four nights in the past two weeks of getting up once or less. The first night was a fluke, but once we got one night, others have followed as he really wants the sticker (and the reward that goes with a certain number of stickers).

I was going to suggest music too. We have it on from bath time onwards to soothe their minds for sleep time. Another idea might be to separate them for going to sleep if you can. So little one first then 20 mins later older son goes to bed. He might be able to lie in your bed and rest with some books or something? We had to separate our two for a few months then gradually were able to get them to sleep together again. It was used as a special treat so if they didn't sleep well together then they would go back to separate bed times the next night. Bed times are so hard with lots of little ones - good luck!

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Far out Efjay, you should be an OT :) I should've thought of that as at each OT session, DS2's OT has a visual list of what he's doing during the session. Great idea.

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I spend a lot of time at OT appointments also lol.
I was amazed with my 4 yr old when he would come out all the time when I showed him a child sleeping in bed & said YOU MUST GO TO BED NOW. He turned around, crossed his arm & walked back to hi s bed in a huff but he stayed there! That was the start of his growing up & going to bed on his own (not with me sitting with him) and he needs a reminder I think as he often comes out again.

Oh my I could have written this post exactly myself.
My boys are 5 and 3.5 and share a room/bunks and their bedtime is 7pm give or take a few.

We do exactly the same routine! Our boys will chat to each other, dare the other to do something, say they need to wee 5 times and yell out for DH or myself and finally get to sleep by 7.45-8is.

Honestly we just get to the point where we are putting them back to bed over 5 times a night.
Ahhhh!
I look forward to trying all suggested solutions
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We were shocking as kids and would throw toys sing songs, climb out the window o_O etc. my mum used to sit in the room with us until we fell asleep, and now I stay with my kids until they are asleep. I know you have another baby so could you feed the baby in the dark room with the boys until they settle and then leave once baby goes to sleep. I would think a three year old needs lots of reassurance to go to sleep and the attention seeking at bedtime is his way of asking for this.