Does toddler bedtime entail whining, getting out of bed and not falling asleep? If so, don’t miss this list of helpful tools for nighttime toddler issues.
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It happened again.
Our toddler took forever to go to sleep. She whined, she was hungry, she came out of her room to go potty. “I’m not tired,” she moped.
Meanwhile, I pulled my hair out after pausing the Mandalorian for the 73rd time. “Why do we even TRY to watch shows?”
The next morning of course, they’re a grouch because they didn’t get enough sleep, to which I think, “well if you’d just GO TO BED you wouldn’t have that problem.”
But I don’t say it outloud, to her anyway. Maybe just to Hubby.
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Table of Contents
Let’s face it, toddlers have sleep issues.
If it’s not difficulty falling asleep, it’s getting up in the middle of the night, or her rising so early in the morning I feel like I didn’t sleep at all.
Now with our third daughter into toddlerhood, we’ve developed a system for our toddler bedtime routine and found some amazing products that help make it routine so much easier.
Though we do have an off day here and there, the nights of struggle happen much less often.
However, said daughter number three is close to moving from crib to toddler bed, so we’ll have to freshen up on all our tricks again soon.
Below you’ll find my favorite tools that have helped our toddlers get the best night sleep possible. Some of these have become treasured parts of our routine.
Here you'll find my favorite tools that have helped our toddlers get the best night sleep possible. Some of these have become treasured parts of our routine! #toddlersleep Share on XI’d love to hear which ones you use, or what you do differently!
Plus, you can get my free tips on helping toddlers to be more polite, called “8 Keys To Teaching Kids To Say Please And Thank You,” which you can find here:
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19 Indispensable Toddler Bedtime Products For An Easier Night
Toddler Bedtime Necessities
1- Favorite Blanket: Our middle daughter’s obsession with Moana peaked around the time she needed a blanket for her bed, so we got this one. Prior to that we mostly used sleep sacks and she had a hand-me-down tiny Minion blanket.
Older sis has a fuzzy fleece Frozen blanket so we got the Moana lover a character blanket too, which she loves snuggling up into at night.
(The blanket we got is a bit large for a toddler and the edges fell apart, so I would recommend a smaller one like this instead)
2- Lovey or Favorite Stuffed Animal: our oldest was obsessed with her Bunnies By The Bay Bye Bye Bunny (that’s a lot of B’s). The other two have a bear and a sheep, and aren’t very attached to them.
Our oldest’s bunny love may be due to our strategy to give it to her around age 1 when we moved from Washington state to Virginia.
We used it to ensure she had something familiar to sleep with throughout the transition.
3- Cozy Pajamas– Have you reached the point when your toddler can unzip their footie pajamas and ends up half naked in the morning? Or worse, has taken off their diaper and you’re stuck with the clean up?
They’ve probably graduated to pajama sets, which are less enticing and easier for diaper changes.
4- Lotion– Our littles have dealt with eczema, though it appears to be getting a bit better with age. Our pediatrician recently recommended this Aveeno Baby Eczema Therapy Nighttime Balm, and we are liking the results at toddler bedtime!
5- Mattress Pad– This will save you a headache during night potty training, and your mattress isn’t ruined by a nighttime accident.
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6- Character Themed Sheets– Who’s your little one’s favorite character? Odds are, Amazon has a sheet set with that character on it.
We have these Moana sheets for our twin-size trundle bed.
7- Pool Noodle– You can help prevent your toddler from falling out of bed by sticking a pool noodle up under the sheet at the edge of the bed.
The Dollar store is the cheapest I’ve seen them, or you might even have some laying around from last summer.
8- Pillow– Our kids each graduated from plain mattress to pillow when they were around age one and had a cold.
I chose ones that were fairly flat and soft, since their heads were still little and they didn’t need much lift. The pillows helped them sleep, and we’ve never looked back.
9- Door Monkey– Sometimes toddlers (like ours) sneak out of their rooms at night and come looking for Mommy.
We’ve used two strategies to prevent this:
- Turning the door handle around so the lock is on the outside, and
- The Door Monkey, which is a plastic tool to keep the door closed almost all the way. The Door Monkey leaves the door open a crack, and it’s still easy to open for older kids and adults. So handy when the kids just won’t stay in their rooms!
RELATED: WE’RE TRYING QUIET TIME AGAIN AFTER QUITTING…
Toddler Bathroom & Bath Time Tips
We don’t do baths every night, but it seems like when we do bath night, the kids fall alseep more quickly and easily. It relaxes them and gets them in the bed-time mentality.
Hmm, maybe we should do baths every night after all…
10- Non- Character Toothbrushes– Though I do love character-themed sheets and blankets, we learned the hard way not to do Princess or Tinkerbell toothbrushes. When someone gets sick and we have to toss a toothbrush, it’s much less crushing to throw out a purple one than to through out Tink herself.
Sometimes the dentist foils us with more princess ones, but we try to avoid them.
11- Bath Toys– you can get cute Nemo squirty toys, or you can use plastic cups you got from burger king. Kids can make their own fun in the tub with the simplest of items.
12- Toddler-sized Bath Towel– If you want to see the most adorable unicodrn bath towel of all time, check this one out.
And it’s not only cute, it’s SO soft. Our youngest outgrew her baby-sized hooded towel long before we got around to getting her a new one. When we finally did I was super pleased with our choice. The other sisters wish they had this one too!
If you’re looking for a way to help your toddler be more polite, don’t miss my free download “8 Keys To Teaching Kids To Say Please And Thank You.” You can get it here:
Books
Like many families, we do story time before bed. A fun story helps kids relax, enter the world of creativity, and hopefully forget the worries of the day. Here are some of our favorites:
- 13- Anything by Sandra Boynton such as Blue Hat, Green Hat.
- 14- Karen Katz lift the flap books
- 15- My Heart Is Like A Zoo by Michael Hall
- 16- Goodnight Gorilla by Peggy Rathmann
Accessories
17- White Noise Machine– In our last house, the older girls’ room was right off the living room. We had never used a white noise machine before, but we needed one desperately.
Once we got one, the kids slept much more soundly. It really drowned out the noises from the rest of the house, so I’m a huge fan of them now.
We try to take one on trips, or use a phone app. An app isn’t practical at home so we have a plug-in one for their rooms. They’re great for naptime too!
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18- Night Light– Our kids fall asleep more easily if they have a bit of light in the room. We’ve used ones from Walmart, special character ones, and the diffuser acts as a night light as well.
19- Diffuser and Essential Oils– I love essential oils so we have diffusers for the kids. I usually use Lavender because it is so relaxing. I don’t put it in every night, but they use it for a night light even if there’s no oil inside. My kids love the changing color setting.
Putting Sleep-Deprivation To Bed
Eventually we’ll recover from the sleep-deprivation of raising kids (so I’m told) but in the mean time, we try our best to make toddler bedtime fun, relaxing and easy!
Which of these items do you use? What did I miss that you can’t live without?
